Condensed, compressed and condescended

Hey #SPLC! Is it time to call out the Republican Party yet? via Facebook
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“All along, Trump seemed like a twisted caricature of every rotten reflex of the radical right. That he has prevailed, that he has won this election, is a crushing blow to the spirit; it is an event that will likely cast the country into a period of economic, political, and social uncertainty that we cannot yet imagine. That the electorate has, in its plurality, decided to live in Trump’s world of vanity, hate, arrogance, untruth, and recklessness, his disdain for democratic norms, is a fact that will lead, inevitably, to all manner of national decline and suffering.
In the coming days, commentators will attempt to normalize this event. They will try to soothe their readers and viewers with thoughts about the “innate wisdom” and “essential decency” of the American people. They will downplay the virulence of the nationalism displayed, the cruel decision to elevate a man who rides in a gold-plated airliner but who has staked his claim with the populist rhetoric of blood and soil. George Orwell, the most fearless of commentators, was right to point out that public opinion is no more innately wise than humans are innately kind. People can behave foolishly, recklessly, self-destructively in the aggregate just as they can individually. Sometimes all they require is a leader of cunning, a demagogue who reads the waves of resentment and rides them to a popular victory. “The point is that the relative freedom which we enjoy depends of public opinion,” Orwell wrote in his essay “Freedom of the Park.” “The law is no protection. Governments make laws, but whether they are carried out, and how the police behave, depends on the general temper in the country. If large numbers of people are interested in freedom of speech, there will be freedom of speech, even if the law forbids it; if public opinion is sluggish, inconvenient minorities will be persecuted, even if laws exist to protect them.”” via Facebook
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Sometimes I forget who I have been, and who I am now.

I forget the kind of person I used to be.
And I’m glad I do, because he wasn’t someone that I’d want to know, now.

I am often unaware of the difference between how I’m seen by people who know me see me, and those who don’t.

Because not having to give a fuck about what people I don’t know think about me is one of the ways I exercise my privilege.

Yesterday, I got a reminder of that when I nearly punched out a plate glass window when my own reflection in it startled me. I put it out of my mind and sort of chuckled under my breath. Just one of those moments that we keep to ourselves, mostly because they are both a little embarrassing, and a little ego feeding.

For my friends who are scared and upset right now, it may be useful to remember that I have your back. That I’m a phone call away. That no matter who you are, #IllGoWithYou

and I look like this: via Facebook
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