Perhaps if we saw what was ahead of us, and glimpsed the follies, and misfortunes that would befall us later on, we would all stay in our mother’s wombs, and then there would be nobody in the world but a great number of very fat, very irritated women. – Lemony Snicket, A Series of Unfortunate Events: The End
I’m really not one to share my view on politics because I hate how much bigotry is involved in simply sharing your opinion. More often than not, people won’t stop to listen to another person’s perspective without trying to shove their opinion in your face; ultimately trying to prove you wrong in every way.
But this year’s Presidential election is different.
My one hope and request for those about to read my opinion is that you will take a moment to see a perspective that you probably won’t agree with and try to understand it instead of shutting it down and trying to prove to me why you’re right and I’m wrong.
*Disclaimer: You won’t. So, just save your breath for both our sakes.*
Let’s start with Trump, shall we?
“I don't know if you've ever noticed this, but first impressions are often entirely wrong. In the case of Count Olaf, however...they were correct.” - Lemony Snicket, A Series of Unfortunate Events: The Bad Beginning
I had little respect for Donald Trump from the very get go. The only memories I have of him growing up are all drama related from Rosie O’Donnell to various other people, places, and situations that have absolutely nothing to do with him. Trump is like that really obnoxious kid in class that feels the need to scream their opinion at everyone regardless of whether or not they want to hear it and then beats the dead horse over the course of the years to come. Drama follows Trump everywhere…and it never ends because he never lets it end. He holds grudges, never owns up to his mistakes (because he believes he can’t make one unless it’s a video of him describing sexual assaults on women) and says mean, hateful and super questionable things about people. He hasn’t changed since I was a kid. He is a vile and vulgar man who doesn’t show any sign of empathy, compassion or understanding for people who disagree with him or aren’t straight white males.
Trump’s controversial statements over the course of his campaign were more than enough of a turn off for me before the tape was released. His drive to reinforce negative stereotypes, prejudice, outgroup homogeneity, racism, xenophobia and nationalism were/are infuriating to me. He has made multiple statements depicting Mexicans as drug lords and rapists, implying that blacks are criminals and promoting Islamophobia.
I’ve spent the week looking for statistics on the crime caused by undocumented immigrants and this is what I’ve found:
There is no concrete evidence that immigrants are either more or less likely to commit crimes than anyone else in the population.
Yes, there are undocumented immigrants who have committed crimes. Is it enough for us to feel the need to build a giant wall between Mexico and the US? Absolutely not.Yes, I believe that if they want to come to the states then they should apply for citizenships and not enter illegally. But is it likely that they would be granted citizenship if they applied? No. It’s not. You can look into what immigrants have to go through to be naturalized on your own. It’s not my job to educate you on that. But here are a few things to think about the naturalization process:
- You have to pay thousands of dollars just to apply whether you are granted citizenship or not.
- You have to have partial employment. If you lose your job while waiting up to 24 months for someone to just look at your file, you have to start all over again.
- The government also puts a cap on how many Hispanics and Africans they will take into the country.
You can’t just say “Why can’t they just become citizens?” when we have a naturalization process like this one.
The building of a wall that separates us from Mexico symbolizes a much bigger and more concerning problem than immigration. The nationalism it is implying will become full-fledged nationalism once the wall is built…and by coercing Mexico into building it.
On June 12th, 2016, Omar Mateen took the lives of 49 people at Pulse Night Club. He was also supposedly tied to ISIS. Donald Trump made a statement via twitter not long after learning of the events. Instead of sending sentiments to everyone who was affected by the attack, this is what he posted:
"Appreciate the congrats for being right on radical Islamic terrorism, I don't want congrats, I want toughness & vigilance. We must be smart!"
Seriously? 49 people just died and you’re already trying to use it for confirmation bias for your campaign? It was so incredibly insensitive and disrespectful to the all of the friends and family members who had just lost or were in fear of losing a loved one.
Speaking of shootings:
"You know what else they say about my people? The polls, they say I have the most loyal people. Did you ever see that? Where I could stand in the middle of Fifth Avenue and shoot somebody and I wouldn’t lose any voters, okay? It’s like incredible." –Donald Trump
Over the course of Trump’s campaign, he has managed to make fun of a reporter’s disability who disagreed with him over his statement of how he saw “thousands of Muslims cheering in New Jersey”, he has openly disrespected fellow republicans such as John McCain, stating that McCain is not a war hero…even though McCain was given the option to leave by his captors because his father was a high ranking naval officer and chose to stay imprisoned for five and a half years in Vietnam, he has also stated that he doesn’t understand why he would ever need to ask for God’s forgiveness if he hasn’t been making mistakes, and has stated that he would bring back torture tactics “a hell of a lot worse than waterboarding.”
Speaking of supporting inhumane concepts…
Now, as concerning as all of that is to me, here is what ultimately led me to never ever wanting to here of Trump’s existence ever again:
In 1989, five black and Latino teenagers spanning from the ages of 14-16 were coerced into confessing to a crime they never committed. The case I’m referring to is The Central Park Jogger Case. If you want to know more about the case, there’s a lovely documentary you can watch called The Central Park Five that can fill you in on all of the details. District Attorney Robert M. Morgenthau’s office stated the following about the confessions of the boys:
“A comparison of the statements reveals troubling discrepancies. ... The accounts given by the five defendants differed from one another on the specific details of virtually every major aspect of the crime—who initiated the attack, who knocked the victim down, who undressed her, who struck her, who held her, who raped her, what weapons were used in the course of the assault, and when in the sequence of events the attack took place. ... In many other respects the defendants' statements were not corroborated by, consistent with, or explanatory of objective, independent evidence. And some of what they said was simply contrary to established fact.”
Regardless of the discrepancies and DNA evidence, four of the five were sentenced to 5-10 years in prison with charges of attempted murder, rape, and assault. Korey Wise, who was 16, was tried as an adult, and sentenced to 10-15 years in an adult penitentiary, under max security, with the same charges.
Almost a decade later, after the four served their time of 7 years in prison, released back into society registered as sex offenders and unable to substantially live on their own, Matias Reyes, an already convicted serial rapist and murder, met Korey Wise in an upstate New York Prison. Reyes learned that Wise was in prison for a crime that he didn’t commit because Reyes knew who had committed the crime. He knew who had committed the crime because he was the one who had attacked, raped and almost beaten the central park jogger to death. Reyes couldn’t live with watching Wise be in prison on his behalf so he confessed to the crime. Reyes was able to give an account in great detail of the events that took place on the night of the attack. It was undeniable that Reyes was the perpetrator that night. His DNA also matched the semen sample. This led to the release of Korey Wise from prison and the charges of the Central Park Five to be vacated.
What does this have to do with Donald Trump?
In 1989, when the city had learned the events of the Central Park Five case, Donald Trump made many statements against the five:
“You’d better believe that I hate the people that took this girl and raped her brutally. You’d better believe it. And it’s more than anger. It’s hatred. And I want society to hate them.”
"Mayor [Ed] Koch has stated that hate and rancor should be removed from our hearts. I do not think so. I want to hate these muggers and murderers. They should be forced to suffer ... Yes, Mayor Koch, I want to hate these murderers and I always will…”
“…maybe hate is what we need if we’re going to get something done.”
But above all of this…
He called for the death penalty.
He wanted the death penalty for 14, 15 and 16 year olds.
Children.
The worst part about that?
They were innocent.
He put 40,000 dollars into putting an ad in all four of New York's popular papers saying:
“BRING BACK THE DEATH PENATY. BRING BACK OUR POLICE.”
He advocated the death penalty for five innocent children.
He made a statement on October 7th stating that the five are STILL guilty regardless of DNA evidence and the confession given by Matias Reyes.
Days later the tapes were released of Trump bragging about trying to sexually assault women.
Do you all even realize how infuriating and disgusting this is?
He was advocating for the death penalty for these five innocent people for sexually assaulting this woman in central park and here he is making excuses for his bragging by calling it “locker room talk”.
The whole actions speak louder than words argument is a load of crap. Words are EXTREMELY powerful. People will take his hateful words and run as far as they can with them. There will be people who will act in horrible ways because of Trump’s so called harmless words.
If this is what he stands for, if this is what he believes in, if he thinks that hating people and causing society to hate others is how we’re going to solve issues that we are faced with as a country…
HE IS NEVER GOING TO GET MY VOTE.
America deserves better.
As for Clinton…
“You're alive, but you're definitely not O.K. As soon as the auction is over and the Quagmires are on their way out of the city, Gunther will come and get you, and I can guarantee that you three orphans will never be O.K. again. What a wonderful and profitable day! My former acting teacher will finally get his hands on not one but two enormous fortunes!”
“Your former acting teacher?” Violet asked in horror. “You mean you've known Gunther's true identity the entire time?”
“Of course I did,” Esmé said. “I just had to fool you kids and my dim-witted husband into thinking he was really an auctioneer. Luckily, I am a smashing actress, so it was easy to trick you.” – Lemony Snicket, A Series of Unfortunate Events: The Ersatz Elevator
I don’t really have a lot to say about Clinton because I’m just going to be really straight forward about this...because it's kind of a no brainer.
I DO NOT TRUST HER AT ALL.
To all of the women out there who are only voting for Clinton because she’s a woman…PLEASE WAKE UP. I would LOVE to see a woman in office. I really would. But, here’s the thing:
We deserve a better representative for women than what Clinton has to show for us.
She lies to get herself out of being incriminated. There’s evidence that she cheated to beat Bernie Sanders in the first debate. She advocates for women and yet she helped cover up various assaults her husband committed against many women and said some really horrible things to and about those women. She was heavily involved in the Benghazi scandal and now email scandal. If you aren’t aware of the email scandal, I’m referring to the 30,000 or so emails regarding Benghazi that were sent via her blackberry phone.
She is so dishonest and has given me absolutely no reason to trust her.
SHE IS NEVER GOING GET MY VOTE.
America deserves better.
“The Baudelaire orphans hung on to one another, and wept and wept while the adults argued endlessly behind them.” - Lemony Snicket, A Series of Unfortunate Events: The Austere Academy
To all the people out there complaining about the two candidates we have to choose from:
YOU HAVE OTHER OPTIONS.
You don’t have to feel like you are compromising your morals or supporting someone you don’t see fit to be our president. If everyone who has been complaining put their vote where it really matters, it could change the course of the election. It is NOT too late.
To all the people who have told me that voting third party or for new candidacy is a waste of my vote:
You’re wasting YOUR vote if you vote for Trump or Hilary when you clearly don’t want to support either of them. Voting with my conscious and my intuition is NOT a waste of my vote.
Voting for either them would be to go against my integrity and everything I stand for.
To all the people telling me we have to vote against one or the other to gain control of the Supreme Court:
You have both a conservative and a liberal that you can vote for: Evan Mcmullin or Gary Johnson. If everyone who has been complaining about our current candidates voted third party, it could alter our possibilities for a decent, trustworthy president.
I stand with Deseret’s statement that they published on October 8th.
I would rather stand for something rather than stand against someone.
They didn’t understand it, but like so many unfortunate events in life, just because you don’t understand doesn’t mean it isn’t so. - Lemony Snicket, A Series of Unfortunate Events: The Bad Beginning
Listening to “Secret Crowds” by Angels and Airwaves.
