I Hope I’m Wrong

Here we are. 10 days post-election. No shortage of rhetoric across the political spectrum. Human reactions ranging from gleeful celebration to gutted devastation. It’s a challenging time to be an American. Reactions from around the world have been interesting as well. Messages from friends across ponds saying all variations of “WTAF, America?”

This post won’t tackle the above sentiments in detail. It’s intended mainly as a placeholder. The “I hope I’m wrong.” placeholder. 

Readers of my blog, my socials, or my facial expressions won’t be surprised to learn that I’m on the gutted devastation end of the equation. The past week has included lots of shock and awe in various forms, and has also included a few relatively-civil tussles with those on the gleeful celebration side of things. 

One such tussle was with an old friend from child raising years whose post wove the narrative around Christianity and the victory, blah, blah. I’ll spare you the details. I’ve scrolled on past a few of these, but at this moment of weakness a little 🤢 emoji accidentally slipped out. It struck a nerve with her, she called me out, and we ended up having a relatively civil exchange via text. The gist is that she has two kids in the armed forces, and her politics are rooted in her belief that she thinks her kids will be safer in Trump’s America. I’m no military scholar, but I have a hard time seeing how this is possible. We agreed to disagree and wished each other well. 

I hope I’m wrong. 

Another such tussle was with a person with more history degrees and more experience with politics than I. They expressed certainty that “It’ll be fine. I wouldn’t worry.” They proceeded to explain why gay people shouldn’t worry, the ACA being gutted will just involve some growing pains, the US Dept of Education is so dysfunctional that we’ll be better off without it, and that “illegals” should have known the risk of deportation when they committed the crime of coming here. Oh, and if a woman has complications related to a medical issue related to abortion, it’s not the fault of the President. 

I hope I’m wrong. 

I sincerely do. And I’m trying really hard not to close myself off from dialog related to the issues. Sometimes I can be the bigger person. Sometimes I cannot. No one’s mind will be changed through disrespect, and we have now seen that some people’s minds cannot be changed through facts and experts who’ve spent their lives in careers studying and working on these issues. 

So here we have it. Place held. 

I hope I’m wrong.