I am a boomer mom. I was a radical right wing conservative for much of my young life. I marinated in the fear and scapegoating of the ‘50s. I was a co-founder of the Joe McCarthy Memorial chapter of Young Americans for Freedom. When I say I understand the right from the inside, I’m not kidding.
And one thing I knew for damn certain: A strongman would eventually arise in America. There is a strain of fascism that runs deep in part of the American psyche, probably in the human psyche. Trump is just the genius who tapped it.
My son wanted my opinion on the upcoming election, and he taped it. I have message to Trump supporters: 1) the cultists and true believers (like me) — who buy into the-enemy-from-within -rerun of the ‘50s; 2) the traditional Republicans who really need to pay more attention to the fact that their party is gone, and 3) the transactional Republicans who are fine with selling their daughters for 30 pieces of silver in their pockets at tax time.
Then my son asked me if I had anything to say to young people who don’t feel like their vote means anything. I said: Spartacus.
I am Spartacus. When the Roman Generals offered to spare the defeated slaves from death by crucifixion in exchange for Spartacus, someone else stood up and said: I am Spartacus. Signing his own death warrant. One man. One voice. One person, saying, no. I am not going back. The one ounce of freedom I have left is my dignity. You will never take my dignity. I am Spartacus.
That one voice started a fire, a conflagration, a power that swept over the hundreds of other slaves who had to make the same choice. Another, and another, and then another, and then all the slave stood up and said, I am Spartacus. Because when you stand up for yourself — like when you vote — you are not just asserting your own dignity. Your act gives courage to everyone around you. It gives them power, it gives them meaning and belonging, it says, I am not alone, we are not alone. One person is one voice, but as we know a single ember can start a forest fire if it hits the right fuel. Your vote uplifts everyone around you, and can change the world.
I am Spartacus.
