I’m scared, guys. No. That’s a lie. I’m fucking terrified. I feel like I’m strapped to a chair watching the extremist religious right usurp the very institutions meant to protect the American people from the extremist religious right.
I can already hear the conservative fundamentalists losing their shit.
“The first amendment protects religion from the government, not the government from religion!” they scream, enraged.
They haven’t been in the past, but now, in light of this fucked up administration, I’m afraid they’re right. And I’m stuck here on the sidelines. I sit here in horror, fearing I can do nothing to help, hoping that I’m wrong, that there is something I can do. But I have yet to find anything that will quell the social dread encroaching upon the doorway of my soul.
Sure, I can vote. Sure, I can get informed on the issues and I can argue my perspective and I can cross my fingers and hope that it makes some sort of difference. But, realistically, I can’t do anything of practical use.
I can already hear the liberal activists. Such faith they have in this supposedly imminent “blue wave.”
“Get active in local politics!” they shout, optimistic.
What does that even mean? I don’t know how to do that. I don’t know what a county commissioner does or how that pertains to a woman’s individual right to bodily autonomy. I don’t know how to dive deep into the minutia of local political organizations and vet candidates on their reliability or partisanship. I barely figured out how to change my voting address.
I’m an introvert with high functioning clinical depression working full time in retail and customer service, the combination of which leaves me with zero energy for Google at the end of the day.
But I want to help. What’s more, I need to help.
So here I am. Tell me what to do. Help me help in some way. In any way. Don’t give me platitudes. Don’t give me inspirational quotes that don’t mean anything. Don’t tell me it’s going to be okay.
Because of course it’s going to be okay…for me. I’m white. I’m straight. I’m male. I’ll be just fine, right?
Nobody’s out to tell me what I can and cannot do with my own body. No one is saying I shouldn’t be allowed to marry whom I love because of something as arbitrary as archaic fundamentalist views on traditional gender roles. I can drive past a cop doing ten over and not fear getting pulled over and shot. I can walk around the city at night unafraid of harassment, rape, or attack based on factors outside my control.
I’ve said it before, I’ll say it again: I embody privilege. I am a member of the only protected class.
And yet, I don’t want that privilege. I would be perfectly happy to have all my “rights” stripped away if it would give the oppressed masses equal footing with the rest of us. I would commit my soul to hell if it would protect those individuals at great risk of severe mistreatment as blatant theocracy takes the political stage.
So tell me, what do I do? I’m here for you, ladies. I’m here for you, LGBTQ+. I’m here for you, religious, ethnic, and racial minorities. I’m here, but I’m lost. Please help this despondent soul be of some use.
Because I don’t want to live in 45’s America. I don’t want to live in his shithole country.