Yes, a thousand times yes! One more thing that drives me mad is the idea that a candidate's job is to "sell me"; while or course one needs to get out and get the word out and work turnout, it is the citizens' efin responsibility to look at positions and proposed policies and inform themselves. Making the vote into a sporting event with us as spectators, not participants? I cannot with this.
I hate that you are suffering like this because one thing I know is true: you have given and sacrificed the entire time I've known you for the greater good, for other people, for what is right. That's you, and even through all of this I know that *you* are still there, if anyone needs you. There's always: "if only this, if only that" - but in the end, here we are. Love to you.
Margie, Thank you for so eloquently articulating what I'm feeling, too. I am appalled and disgusted at being forced to face that this is who the majority of this country are. I never imagined we'd have a criminal, sexual predator, traitor ensconced in the White House and in control of the Supreme Court and Congress. I have lost all faith in the institutions. As someone also "raised by wolves", I appreciate you.
Marjie, do you know Nikki Blak's work? Sana and I do. Here's a tiny chip about what she has to say about "allyship." "charlotte, allyship is inherently performative. Well, for starters, you don't get to label yourself as an ally. None of us do.
Webster defines "performative" as "being or relating to an expression that serves to effect a transaction or that constitutes the performance of the specified act by virtue of its utterance."
Notice, it's an "expression that serves to effect" – or CHANGE – "a transaction."
In the public display and drama of all the calling folks out on social media, wearing blue friendship bracelets and safety pins, and buying all the anti-racism books, a person participating in performative activism seeks to change the transaction between themselves and the impacted group.
The objective is to make onlookers think something that isn't happening (co-conspiring, solidarity, transformation, love, sacrifice) is happening."
1) Yes. 2) Yes, they did. It's "herd immunity" thinking. My epidemiologist friend says it isn't, but that's because he registered a "protest vote", and he knows he's culpable. He says don't play the "blame game", I say I'm assigning responsibility to people for their actions. (3) Yes. (4) RAGE
Thank you for expressing my feelings better than I can. Part of me wants to watch people burn in the fires they created. But it's in conflict with the other side of me that wants to help burning people out of the fires we already created. If I was a Republican, I wouldn't have these moral quandaries. I'd have some paper towels to throw.
Again, you capture so perfectly what I'm feeling and what I couldn't quite identify that I was feeling. I'm finding it hard to even read the articles that tell me it's all going to be OK, because for whatever temporary relief they offer, I know that on January 21 all of the shit will hit the fan and we will ALL be in a world of hurt. Those same people who voted for trump because they couldn't bring themselves to vote for Hilary put us in this mess - and even seeing what hell he wrought on this country they did it again - another woman, and even more abhorrent to them, a woman of color. And I don't think that they will learn from their mistakes, even as our produce rots in fields, the research doctors at NIH are fired and replaced with people with no medical background and our kids aren't taught history that doesn't glorify the f**king white gods who raped and pillaged this country and the people who lived here before us. That's if they survive the school shootings, of course. And while I'm ranting, how is it that every state that has put abortion/women's health care on their state ballot has passed muster, yet supposedly 52% of women voted for the national abortion ban that is coming down the pike? How is that even possible? Women should have ridden his ass on a rail right out of town. The WaPo had an article a few days ago about the AR 15 (or whatever the hell it is) rifles and the damage they cause. There were graphic photos posted with a warning. How is it that a bullet hit a delicate fleshy ear and yet when he removed the sanitary napkin two weeks later, there wasn't a scar or scab? And the guy who cowered in a secure room in the White House when there were angry people outside, had the wherewithal to put his head up over the Secret Service, pump his fist and yell "fight?" I hate to sound like a conspiracy theorist, but if it walks like a duck and talks like a duck....
Fascism is so sexy to people who already bow to a sky daddy, and who also feel beleaguered because they're not getting everything easy, like they were promised...
Thank you. Your remarks about religion expressed what I have struggled to. And your rage is understood. A weak response on my part, but you are not alone.
The first few days, my only thought was "I can't even" (yeah, been hanging around with 5 year olds too much). Now I'm in the rage phase , Liz too, probably even more because we live with a RFK JR supporter who went full MAGA on us over the last year. Every day is spent constantly fighting against the anti-women sentiments on social media that someone parrots without thinking about the women and girls in the house. Maybe what we need to do is start collecting names of sympathetic lawyers...
A powerful post, Marjie. The frank, brutally honest words and tone hit me in the gut. Thank you for expressing what many of us feel. Like Kelsey, I want to watch Trump voters suffocate in their own crap and bear the consequences of their actions but the consequences would hit my children, friends, family, and people who voted Democrat. That's not going to work either. I might feel better if I thought I could do something, take some action, but I don't know what to do. Except, as you say, continue to help be and be a good person to all. This is a very, very sorry time. Thank you for the heartfelt words and for being the amazing person you are.
Where are all the effing emaciated rumper muricans that can't afford groceries?? I didn't see a damn one when I voted. Half were probably on Ozempic. Food scarcity for the population who truly live it was never part of the discussion.
Yes, I hate what this is doing to my insides, to my trust. I've cut off friends and family that voted for hate. I used to feel that I had at least my vocal demonstrating, donations and voting support but I don't anymore. I may have just voted for the last time. I'm demanding more of the men in my life. My trust has always been tenuous but I fear that I will be looking for reasons not to trust the good men in my life. Not good, but it's true. At the very least my bar has been raised. And, yeah, I do want a way to signal that I am a safe harbor in case someone I don't know needs it.
The problem is that the evil people will also signal that they're safe, just to fool folks. Just to cause harm. Just to rip away the last vestiges of trust and hope. They did it with the safety pins, and they'll do it with blue bracelets, and everything else.
The Morrigan (Celtic war goddess) brought her enemies to their knees by invoking the pangs of childbirth in them. I happen to have Celtic roots. Brushing up on a few incantations as I write...
Yes, a thousand times yes! One more thing that drives me mad is the idea that a candidate's job is to "sell me"; while or course one needs to get out and get the word out and work turnout, it is the citizens' efin responsibility to look at positions and proposed policies and inform themselves. Making the vote into a sporting event with us as spectators, not participants? I cannot with this.
So cannot.
I hate that you are suffering like this because one thing I know is true: you have given and sacrificed the entire time I've known you for the greater good, for other people, for what is right. That's you, and even through all of this I know that *you* are still there, if anyone needs you. There's always: "if only this, if only that" - but in the end, here we are. Love to you.
Love you, too, friend.
Margie, Thank you for so eloquently articulating what I'm feeling, too. I am appalled and disgusted at being forced to face that this is who the majority of this country are. I never imagined we'd have a criminal, sexual predator, traitor ensconced in the White House and in control of the Supreme Court and Congress. I have lost all faith in the institutions. As someone also "raised by wolves", I appreciate you.
Thank you. Never fun to realize we're back in the swamp.
Yes. For me, the first days were just fear and despair. Now the rage has built a little nest and is here to stay.
I'm sorry. <3
Marjie, do you know Nikki Blak's work? Sana and I do. Here's a tiny chip about what she has to say about "allyship." "charlotte, allyship is inherently performative. Well, for starters, you don't get to label yourself as an ally. None of us do.
Webster defines "performative" as "being or relating to an expression that serves to effect a transaction or that constitutes the performance of the specified act by virtue of its utterance."
Notice, it's an "expression that serves to effect" – or CHANGE – "a transaction."
In the public display and drama of all the calling folks out on social media, wearing blue friendship bracelets and safety pins, and buying all the anti-racism books, a person participating in performative activism seeks to change the transaction between themselves and the impacted group.
The objective is to make onlookers think something that isn't happening (co-conspiring, solidarity, transformation, love, sacrifice) is happening."
Ayup. I don't know her work, but I sure as shit know "performative" in that sense. I'll go find her. Thank you!
1) Yes. 2) Yes, they did. It's "herd immunity" thinking. My epidemiologist friend says it isn't, but that's because he registered a "protest vote", and he knows he's culpable. He says don't play the "blame game", I say I'm assigning responsibility to people for their actions. (3) Yes. (4) RAGE
Yes
Thank you for expressing my feelings better than I can. Part of me wants to watch people burn in the fires they created. But it's in conflict with the other side of me that wants to help burning people out of the fires we already created. If I was a Republican, I wouldn't have these moral quandaries. I'd have some paper towels to throw.
That’s the entire problem. Keeping what’s good about us intact while meting out some kind of justice…
Powerfully written, Marjie. You said it all and so many of us are grieving and angered over the outcome of November 5 and the horrors to come.
Love to you.
Oh. Yes. America is a place no one could really want to be right now.
I don’t know how it will be ensured. You are correct in absolutely everything you say. Rage is the only acceptable response really.
I’d say I will pray for you all but since I don’t believe in a God that would be a lie. Perhaps the Buddhist Loving kindness meditation instead.
It’s a horror of apathy and entitlement that even Atwood couldn’t have anticipated or written.
Yup. So much work to be done just to get to zero
Again, you capture so perfectly what I'm feeling and what I couldn't quite identify that I was feeling. I'm finding it hard to even read the articles that tell me it's all going to be OK, because for whatever temporary relief they offer, I know that on January 21 all of the shit will hit the fan and we will ALL be in a world of hurt. Those same people who voted for trump because they couldn't bring themselves to vote for Hilary put us in this mess - and even seeing what hell he wrought on this country they did it again - another woman, and even more abhorrent to them, a woman of color. And I don't think that they will learn from their mistakes, even as our produce rots in fields, the research doctors at NIH are fired and replaced with people with no medical background and our kids aren't taught history that doesn't glorify the f**king white gods who raped and pillaged this country and the people who lived here before us. That's if they survive the school shootings, of course. And while I'm ranting, how is it that every state that has put abortion/women's health care on their state ballot has passed muster, yet supposedly 52% of women voted for the national abortion ban that is coming down the pike? How is that even possible? Women should have ridden his ass on a rail right out of town. The WaPo had an article a few days ago about the AR 15 (or whatever the hell it is) rifles and the damage they cause. There were graphic photos posted with a warning. How is it that a bullet hit a delicate fleshy ear and yet when he removed the sanitary napkin two weeks later, there wasn't a scar or scab? And the guy who cowered in a secure room in the White House when there were angry people outside, had the wherewithal to put his head up over the Secret Service, pump his fist and yell "fight?" I hate to sound like a conspiracy theorist, but if it walks like a duck and talks like a duck....
Fascism is so sexy to people who already bow to a sky daddy, and who also feel beleaguered because they're not getting everything easy, like they were promised...
Thank you. Your remarks about religion expressed what I have struggled to. And your rage is understood. A weak response on my part, but you are not alone.
That's the most important part.
Thank you for this one in particular, Marjie.
Miles to go before we sleep. <3
The first few days, my only thought was "I can't even" (yeah, been hanging around with 5 year olds too much). Now I'm in the rage phase , Liz too, probably even more because we live with a RFK JR supporter who went full MAGA on us over the last year. Every day is spent constantly fighting against the anti-women sentiments on social media that someone parrots without thinking about the women and girls in the house. Maybe what we need to do is start collecting names of sympathetic lawyers...
And you need to shed the MAGA person, because they're not safe, truly. Hugs.
A powerful post, Marjie. The frank, brutally honest words and tone hit me in the gut. Thank you for expressing what many of us feel. Like Kelsey, I want to watch Trump voters suffocate in their own crap and bear the consequences of their actions but the consequences would hit my children, friends, family, and people who voted Democrat. That's not going to work either. I might feel better if I thought I could do something, take some action, but I don't know what to do. Except, as you say, continue to help be and be a good person to all. This is a very, very sorry time. Thank you for the heartfelt words and for being the amazing person you are.
Thank you.
Where are all the effing emaciated rumper muricans that can't afford groceries?? I didn't see a damn one when I voted. Half were probably on Ozempic. Food scarcity for the population who truly live it was never part of the discussion.
Yes, I hate what this is doing to my insides, to my trust. I've cut off friends and family that voted for hate. I used to feel that I had at least my vocal demonstrating, donations and voting support but I don't anymore. I may have just voted for the last time. I'm demanding more of the men in my life. My trust has always been tenuous but I fear that I will be looking for reasons not to trust the good men in my life. Not good, but it's true. At the very least my bar has been raised. And, yeah, I do want a way to signal that I am a safe harbor in case someone I don't know needs it.
The problem is that the evil people will also signal that they're safe, just to fool folks. Just to cause harm. Just to rip away the last vestiges of trust and hope. They did it with the safety pins, and they'll do it with blue bracelets, and everything else.
Hugs, friend. <3
Yeah. And, rightfully, many wouldn't trust it regardless.
Hugs and love to you. Off to try to have some semblance of a day
The Morrigan (Celtic war goddess) brought her enemies to their knees by invoking the pangs of childbirth in them. I happen to have Celtic roots. Brushing up on a few incantations as I write...
Good plan!