You know what happens when you align yourself to an ideal or narrative in which you did not create; Hilary Clinton or Donald Trump. That’s right ladies and gentleman, all those years of telling black people they were dumb for not voting, and that “our ancestors died for you to vote” has now reared its ugly head to not be fact. Folks did die for equal rights and voting, but as we have seen election after election, they were fooled and so are we. Did we not learn about the electoral college in grade school? Did we not learn that candidates are “selected”, rather than “elected”? Al Gore? Florida? Michigan? Obama winning before the west coast votes came in? I have researched more than the items in the media, but the things in the media I thought were pretty revealing about voting for the president. I thought we would’ve known by now that this voting we partake in is a farce. The illusion that we, us, people are able to select the leader of this country. I thought maybe once Clinton and Trump were the options, we would finally reject the notion this presidential election needs us, but I was wrong. I am very wrong actually. The amount of undecided voters and conversation on why either candidate is the right fit makes my brain dissolved back into the soil. This has to be the most expensive reality show ever produced by the government and marketing.
I understand why we as human beings will fight for anything, just because we’ve already attached our name to the cause, but I just don’t get it. I don’t get why we think we have to do something because we’ve done it before. Right now it would seem that we are being taken for a joke, but that doesn’t even matter to us. We will still choose between Clinton or Trump, regardless of the fooletry that is set before us. You know how people defend their pastor, minister or religious figure? You know how people defend their religion, no matter what it says or has done? We know people who defend discrimination, racism, and other injustices. They defend them because they align themselves with a certain ideal, and once they are inside that box, there is no way for them to get out.
“I like trump because he says what he feels, and that’s what we need in this country, for people to say how they feel and be honest. There’s nothing wrong when people disagree.” Really? That’s how it should be? That’s what it has come to. Freedom of speech has allowed others to hate others freely under the guise of a “free speech America”. I see what’s happening. As long as you are honest, then there’s no reason for you to evolve as a human. If you don’t like brown people, then you can hate them, as long as you’re honest about it. Do you hate non-citizens? There are others who feel the same way, so that’s ok. If my favorite color is red, and yours is yellow, then that’s just what it is. If I can’t fathom why yellow could be anyone’s favorite color, and you can’t fathom why red could be anyone’s favorite color, then there lies an issue. We are disagreeing on semantics that can be adjusted. We are arguing for why our opinion can’t be the only right one. If you’re a racist, and I’m black, then we disagree on some things, right. So is it ok for you to stay who you are? By the “trump logic” it’s fine if you stay a racist. Does racism bother me? Yes. Does institutional racism bother me? Yes. If you call me a nigger does it bother me? Not exactly. You calling me a nigger is just semantics, because there are many other words or languages you can use to try to insult me just the same. However, I will flex because your intent was to do me harm, and therefore I must become your karma in the flesh. One of the issues with disagreements is the feeling that nobody should evolve their way of thinking after a disagreement. If I tell you about gentrification, and you disagree, what should happen next? For me, I understand why you wouldn’t believe it to be true, and I don’t expect you to just accept it on the fly. I would hope the new information would have a positive effect on your life. For you, what would you hope your disagreement to mean for me? Do you want to change my mind? Are you giving me something new to think about? Or do you just want to argue the point? We have the tendency to argue for the sake of keeping our points holy. Sometimes it doesn’t even matter if the subject is important, we will pick a side and debate it, rather than having a conversation. We believe we that our way of living is the only way to live, and since we are a “free country” we should live however we want. This is the thing: This isn’t a free country, you don’t have a free mind, and almost everything you know is borrowed info from someone else who thought the same thing. Therefore, you do not have any creative thinking or original thoughts, nor do you know how to express yourself spiritually without the guide and affirmation of an ideal or another person. That was a mouthful. It’s true though, right? What do you know that you studied, researched, and came to a conclusion, and then allowed yourself to say, “this knowledge I have can evolve. It is not complete, nor is it full”.
this is what happens when you align yourself with voting on the presidential level. It’s not much better on the local level, but change can happen when you vote locally. For me, I feel those who fought for our right to vote was more of a concept than of voting in a literal sense. How ironic that they fought, died and were jailed for us to “matter” when we see we don’t. This isn’t even a race issue to my knowledge. All who go to the voting booth are tallied the same, even though they try to succeed in not having your vote count. It’s disheartening to think that even this election won’t even sway us. We will continue to stand firm with our beliefs that we are the ones voting in the president, and somehow those that don’t should not complain when things happen afterward.
Am I voting for the president? No. I’m fine. Knowing what I know, I won’t bother myself in the pit of this decision, as if our decisions will decide anything. We aren’t hopeless by any means, nor should we feel we are. We are just caught up fighting over the crumbs they have fed us. And for many reasons, we treat these crumbs like the last meal on earth. We all know how we act when things are scarce and we think we are the gatekeepers our things: We fight to the death to keep them. I just feel the country is deciding on things that are already decided. We are pitting ourselves against each other as we defend candidates they would give two shits about us. So why do we care about them so much? Why do we care about their narrative so much? You aren’t less of an American if you do not vote. The Congress isn’t looking to us to make decisions for them.
Remind yourself of why you are voting again and see if it makes any logical sense.
SouthernFriedSushi 