Okay, I’m just gonna preface this by outwardly admitting something. I have zero credibility in regards to speaking about the abhorrent subject of the United States Presidential election of 2016.
With that being said, if you read the words I’m about to write and don’t particularly enjoy them or don’t think I know what I’m talking about, let me explicitly say right here that I know. Dude like I’m freaking out over here, so there is zero need to type loud/angry words at me to tell me what I’m already aware of.
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I just have so many feelings. Please help.
I’ve been trying to convince myself to write this article for a while now. I think I’ve been stalling because I’ve feared an impending doom associated with the internet’s riff raff in response to my thoughts.
Election day has pretty much arrived. I am terrified; like talking about this makes me all sweaty and uncomfortable. I’d rather talk about literally anything else. We could throw some fun facts back and forth. We could talk about the universe or books. We could even talk about what you had for lunch today, yesterday, or plan to have for lunch tomorrow. I’ll happily think about ANYTHING that’s not related to the fact that we have to cast our votes.
Are you terrified too? If you’re not, please tell me why I shouldn’t be. I can’t see why we wouldn’t all be. Honestly, I feel like if there was a guy on a horse racing down the street shouting “THE BRITISH ARE COMING,” a really good percentage of the people around witnessing it would be like “OH THANK GOD” and start parading behind the dude and start chanting and throwing a party.
We won’t be rescued, though. This mess is ours. No matter what we do, someone is going to get elected and half of the country is going to be pissed, and the other half is going to be super happy and rub it in the pissed side’s face. Suddenly life in America is going to feel like a playground, where half of the kids are shouting "NEH NEH NEH NEHHH NEH" and the other half is crying while shouting "IT’S NOT FAIR."
So I guess my point in writing this article is to ask just a simple question. What in the world is going on, guys? Do you see this huge divide? Do you see our ugly qualities being exposed, and nourished by some ever-present chaotic cluster of emotion?
I don't even like scrolling through my newsfeed anymore because all I see is disrespect and demagoguery being thrown back and forth. We are better than this, people. At least I've always believed we have been but now I'm not so sure. It seems that we've gotten worse, as humans in general. Come to think of it, perhaps it's not that we've gotten worse. Maybe social media is just providing us with ways to see our bad sides more directly than we've ever been able to see it/show it.
I've seen angry crowds singling out individuals and abusing them for disagreeing with the majority. I've seen individuals dehumanize other individuals on the basis of political affiliation. I've seen (both representations and accusations of) racism, sexism, narcissism, and every other kind of "-ism" you can think of, all mixed up into a melting pot of controversial pathetic appeal, sprinkled with manipulations and confirmation biases.
I've seen emotion override fact, and logic hidden by lies. I've seen lies turn into inherent truths, on the basis of perceived enemies adhering to oppositely sided lies.
The suckiness needs to cease, people. There are ways to express your opinions without being assholes. There are ways to express disagreement without denouncing your opponent's worth as a human being. There are ways to express your pride in supporting your side without shouting that anyone who supports the opposite side should be ashamed.
Treat people like human beings. Pay attention to what you pay attention to. Read between the lines of the particular biases you choose to agree with. Perhaps play Devil's Advocate and try to understand why your opponent might see things in the ways they do, rather than immediately subjecting to emotional upheaval and engaging in an endless battle of "I'm Right You're Wrong."
This election is going to end, and we are going to have to accept the result, no matter what that result may be. What happens then? What do you do with your time then?
What if the side you deem shameful wins? That sucks. That really sucks. I'm sorry. But how do you react? Like a human. Like a damn fully grown and mature adult human.
If you stop feeding the internet your bad sides, the internet will stop reacting to your suckiness in sucky ways, therefore there will be less subjective information clouding all of our newsfeeds, and maybe then we'll actually be able to get through this giant mess of an election with some clarity and a smidgen of dignity.
