Amidst reports of massive protests in major cities to oppose the election of Donald Trump, I can’t help but have a knee-jerk reaction of “damn, these people mad.” Then my thoughts go towards the protests that are happening in cities that are in states that went red, like Chicago, Cleveland, and of course, Atlanta, and feel this empathy over the fact that it seemed like within all states, regardless of outcome, the major cities or largest metropolitan areas within them, went blue.
Places like Seattle and San Francisco can at least take solace in the fact that their states agree with dissenting populous, but those upset in blue cities in red states, it sucks to know that no matter how much they tried to create awareness over the importance of voting blue, there’s just simply too much red around them to contend.
If there ever was a time for blue collar middle-Americans to feel empowered, it’s now, since their massive numbers very much toppled and overcame large, liberal cities and their loud and influential populations and basically decided the election.
Or maybe it was sheer apathy that tanked the expected result, but that’s sadly not really out of the ordinary.
Anyway though, protests erupting almost immediately after the election of the next president; has that happened like this before? Serious question. I’m 34 years old, therefore I’ve been alive for eight elections. I couldn’t tell you without Googling it who the president was in 1982, because I’m definitely no U.S. history expert by any stretch of the imagination.
I’ll throw out the Reagan administration, because I was far too young to recollect anything about that time. I remember Bush #1 winning in 1990, because you don’t forget a name like “Dukakis.” I remember when Bill Clinton took office in 1994, but wasn’t aware that he actually defeated #1 in the process, and I certainly remember when Clinton won his second term, because Norm Macdonald’s Bob Dole impression made me remember the whole election.
If I can remember the first time I ever saw controversy regarding the presidency of the country, it would have to be the 2000 election where Al Gore lost to Bush #2, and it took days of lawsuits, recounts and other stall tactics before W was declared the President of the United States. I had turned 18 that year, and was eligible to vote, but didn’t, because let’s be real here, I was still trying to figure out my own life much less make an educated guess towards who should be president of the country.
I have memories of being 22 and watching a flustered W trying to debate with John Kerry in 2004, and thinking that I was witnessing a real life president actually showing glimpses of tilting on a globally televised debate. The pluralizing of “internets” became a meme before I even really knew what a meme was. In spite of Kerry’s cool demeanor and the popular opinion that a Democrat is what the country needed to get away from war games that W was playing, Bush still won his second term, and it was the first time that I saw people actually upset with an outcome of a presidential election. Not to mention the first time I’d seen so much gloating from W supporters, and sour grapes from Kerry guys, in the form of passive-aggressive bumper stickers denouncing the other.
I did not vote in this election, because I was still probably too young and ambivalent to the world around me. Plus, I don’t think I was registered to vote yet in the state of Georgia, and figuring out how to do an absentee ballot in Virginia would’ve been rocket science for me then.
That is, until 2008, when the country saw a black man run for President. Never had I seen a country become so divided, and with age comes awareness and perception, and I remember the thesaurus of words being used to say “black guy” without actually using the word “black.” I’m ashamed to say that I didn’t vote in this election, not because I was ambivalent, but given the divided circumstances and that I was in red state Georgia, I simply didn’t feel that my vote mattered.
But I remember seeing people literally partying in the streets, celebrating on Peachtree Street, at like 11 pm, after John McCain had conceded the race to Barack Obama. People around me, actually seemed to be happy, but I wasn’t blind to the massive number of people who didn’t like Obama for a litany of political reasons but really because he was black. Granted, this also ushered in an era of the not-so-veiled racism, and apparel makers who actually took the time to manufacture and distribute paraphernalia to denounce the president and not anything else that might actually be fashionable and/or functional.
The butt-hurt over the result of the election from those having supported the loser was higher than it was the previous time. I’m not sure if it was just improved perception with age, the fact that I was getting to a point where my generation would be those beginning to take power of the working world and that I should care, the racism of the country, or a combination of all of the above.
Things didn’t seem to get much better in 2012, when Obama defeated Romney for his second term. However, things didn’t seem to get any worse either, as the level of passive-aggressive and poorly-veiled racism kind of stayed the same. I wasn’t really a fan of either candidate, since I wasn’t really impressed with how the country was operating under Obama, and I didn’t really believe Mitt Romney was going to be any better of a choice. But I did my civic duty and actually went out and voted for a change, regardless of just how irrelevant I thought it might have felt.
One thing new-ish during this time, was just how much social media had grown and evolved; it wasn’t just for the tech-savvy anymore, just about everyone in the world had a Twitter account and/or Facebook page. Opinions were posted and shared at the blink of an eye, and the commentary about the election took to a virtual arena primarily. Some good, most bad, but tons of gloating for Obama supporters and even more outcrying the defeat of Romney.
Which brings us to present day: Trump d. Hillary. I fully understand why people are upset over the election of Donald Trump, and I think they have every right to feel scared or pessimistic over the future of the country. Frankly, I don’t feel that the country is headed in the right direction as well, and I remember the speech by Jimmy Carter where he referenced that Americans felt that the next five years would be worse than the previous five. Except I feel that at this rate, we’re currently in like year 6-7 of being worse than the 6-7 before it, but at least we’ve passed the 50% mark of non-voters compared to the 2/3 that Carter cited back in 1979.
Look, I’m not pleased with the election of Trump as much as the next moderately liberally thinking American. But protesting? I know that protesting has been tremendously en vogue throughout 2016, with there being a Black Lives Matter protest just about every other week, and depending on where you live, every few days, but the circumstances are a little different here.
I don’t think protesting against Donald Trump is going to accomplish anything, and a guy who hasn’t even sat at his desk in the Oval Office is going to be hard to impeach without having actually done anything as official President yet.
I know when the day is over, every protest is defended with the notion that they’re done to create awareness, regardless of what happens, but protesting the election of Donald Trump seems kind of pointless to me.
Why not protest against middle-America? Or the idea of mindless voting? Or accusations of sexism, for being so against a female candidate? Or the electoral college? All of those played critical roles in how Donald Trump got elected, and protesting them, might actually stand a better chance of slapping wrists and making people stop and think to think better of their choices in the future. Trump himself isn’t going to give two shits about us plebes protesting his existence, because what’s done is done, and he’s President whether we like it or not.
Unless he fucks up on a catastrophic level and gets impeached, such is going to be the case until 2020, and hopefully by then, more Americans can get over their sexism, racism, and off their asses, and make some intelligent, educated choices over who should be in charge of the country instead of Donald Trump.
But until then, I think protesting, is kind of pointless.
