Just a reminder:
What is the price we are all paying for those family and friends and neighbors who voted for Trump in 2016, or voted Green (especially in Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania— those votes alone would’ve tipped the election), or simply refused to vote because they didn’t receive the embossed invitation promising everything they wanted before voting for the Democratic candidate, or you know, there was ‘no real difference between the candidates’?
The price is this:
Judge Amy Coney Barrett Is A Threat To Civil, Human and Women’s Rights
Let’s be clear — anyone who President Trump nominated would put our rights at stake. He has been explicit in his efforts to overturn laws that protect every American’s basic ability to live fruitful lives with equal opportunity. Decades of progress in the form of Roe v. Wade, the Affordable Care Act, the Voting Rights Act and more, are now on the line in the face of this nomination. And, those who stand to lose the most are Black, Brown and Indigenous people, women, the LGBTQ+ community, people with lower incomes and people living with disabilities. These communities have already been battered by the pandemic and will continue to feel the effects of this nomination.
Elections have consequences, and adults are responsible for the choices they make.
The defining characteristics of all those who felt they could safely fail to cast their vote for Sec. Clinton in 2016?
The assumption that they would not be the ones harmed by the very real effects of their choice, which boils down to privilege and self-involvement.
We’re paying for those choices with lost lives every day, untold suffering, and the dismantling of our constitutional democracy.
Responsible adults acknowledge their mistakes, and take ownership of everything that follows from their decisions and actions.
Allowing any of them— the Trump voters, the ‘protest’ Green party or non-voters- to disavow the catastrophic effects of their conscious, adult choice, absolving them on the cheap for their culpability in atrocities, only serves to perpetuate those atrocities. This is decidedly not a ‘no harm, no foul’ moment in our history.
Their redemption can’t be bought with a single vote, which deserves neither our invitation nor our praise. They have a long road of atonement ahead, if they so choose.
In the meantime, thousands more will die, more crimes against humanity will be committed, and the continuation of our democracy is not assured.
That’s what they own, whole cloth, for their selfish ignorance.
We have a responsibility to remind them, now, and for every election that follows.