Walking Away from the Fighting

After writing my last post, I felt the need to share it with one of the young conservative republicans who had posted the previous pleas that caused the piece to be written in the first place. Her husband, who I have never met, apparently chose to respond, and this was for me, due to time difference, just as I was getting ready to go teach an evening class, which meant getting my daughter ready, too. I didn’t have evergy. When I got back, I didn’t have the energy so I stopped and unfollowed the post. It’s not like I posted an essay-length commentary onm her comments section. I linked to my blog post and explained that that was my response. Others could choose to go over there and read it or not. Apparently some chose to, and while I do believe in civil discourse, there are requirements of such, including time, energy, compassion, and an adversary with an equal amount of each. I had no energy left to deal with whatever the conservative Christian republicans who generally only talk to like-minded individuals had to say on the subject. I lacked the energy and compassion. I still don’t know what was said and don’t really want to.
The next morning, I saw that my cousin, the one who posted the original “Don’t hate me for being Republican” post, had chosen to chime in. Facebook and gmail now sometime show you the first line of a longer message or comment so you can know what’s going on before you click, right? Well I saw the first line, even though I unfollowed this post, and it was something like “Are you liberal or do you just not get it?” which to me sounded a lot like “Are you exactly like me or some kind of moron?” which may not even be what she meant.
Again, if I can’t engage with compassion, I’d rather not engage. I don’t have the patience for this and raising a 3 year old. I unfollowed the cousin. I will not go back to that page, not to read their comments nor delete my own. I feel like an inadvertent troll, inciting them to whatever that crap was and walking away, but I didn’t do it for entertainment. I was trying to explain the alternative side so that maybe we could all figure stuff out together, and maybe that is what they are doing, too. I hope it is and that this is me being overly cautious with my energy expenditure. If it is, I am sorry to them and all the people I could have helped by staying in that loop and having a civil discussion of the merits of….whatever is supposed to have merit there.
But I haven’t seen a lot of rational people showing their love for this man. I’m not willing to jump in the deep end and hope the great white leaves me alone. I’d rather just stay in my distant pond, with the fishes I can swim with.
Maybe on some level I did them a favor by giving them a liberal to yell at, a voice to overpower with whatever it is they threw in my general direction. And maybe I am letting my side down by not responding, but I need to take care of myself right now, especially emotionally. I need to be able to be non-psycho with my kid, and I'm not 100% when I burn up all my patience trying to explain something that seems obvious and empathetic to me to people who have never heard of such a thing and meet my pleas for thoughtful discourse with righteous indignation.
How this sounds in my head:  Stupid Liberal! How Dare You Ask Me To Think of Minorities Like They Are People! They Are Not My Equals! Only My Church Friends Are My Equals!
(This might be unfair, but it follows the rhetoric provided.)

Anyway, an hour after I unfollowed my cousin, I skyped my grandmother (a regularly scheduled occurrence) and since she too had supported Bernie Sanders, I chose to mention the election. Big mistake. It was a passionate monologue with the following summary: It doesn’t matter who’s in the office. They were equally bad. I hated her more. Repeal Obamacare. I didn't vote anyway.
I had little to say to this, as it was time to call my father. A lot of white folks feel this way, though. That it doesn't matter because they both sucked, but that doesn't cover how much truly hateful stuff that guy said during his campaign. Do you remember any other presidential candidate ever suggesting his followers commit violence against those who do not agree? Not even Bush. Not even Nixon. Not anyone I’ve heard of or seen footage of, to my knowledge. The leaders who say things like that are people like Hitler. They say, “Let’s get violent against those who are different,” and some people love them for it and that is why this is dangerous.

What we need now is for Trump to stand up and tell ALL of his constituents to stop the violence and hatred. That would earn him some of my respect. If he tells his most violent friends to stop hurting anyone, that you cannot and should not hurt people with words or worse for something as basic as the color of their skin or their religion or sexual orientation or gender or lack of any of the above….If he could just get that violence to stop….
They might not listen. They might revolt. But he’d get a little of my respect.
I wonder if that is worth it to him.

He did do something surprising regarding transphobia and bathrooms this week, so who knows? It is unlikely that I will ever like him, but maybe he could show the world that he is a human being, not a violent, hateful object at the center of a cult of personality.

I want to see that. I really do.