I recall a lot of feelings eight years ago about the cognitive disconnect between character, morals and reflective honesty among people who voted for Trump. We had the racism, misogyny, xenophobia and such then, but now we also have the felonies, enlisted people who are "suckers and losers," being held liable for sexual assault and libel, leading an insurrection, desire to be a dictator, wanting to "suspend" the Constitution, being pals with our enemies, etc. As much as I'd love people to look me in the eye and explain how they justify it (I think you already know that they can't), there's a more fundamental problem that's even more personal.
I can be honest, as a hetero white guy who can afford things, I am not in significant cultural or economic danger. The thing that keeps me up at night is the people that I care about. Half of them are women, but they're also immigrants, people of color, non-Christians, LGBTQ, children. They're coworkers, friends, friends of my son, neighbors, people in communities that I'm a part of. They've all been victims of increasing levels of targeted hate speech that has been getting worse all year. This week it has spiked to astronomical levels, as Black people via text and on Twitter are getting "@s" telling them to report to plantations. Jews, Asians and Latinos are being threatened and told to leave the country, and I saw an actual tweet from a guy who said, "I can fuck whoever I want and get away with it."
Had the election gone the other way, the MAGA folks would exist in the next four years as they did the last four years, which is to say better off on average. Every real statistic validates this. Instead, regardless of what policy may actually occur, the people that I care about will face real danger, discrimination and quality of life issues. It's already happening.
So look me in the eye, without hate, and explain to me why you don't care if people that are important to me will be hurt. Explain to my kid why that queer friend at school shouldn't be scared.
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