{"id":2428,"date":"2017-02-06T08:55:17","date_gmt":"2017-02-06T16:55:17","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/iwasmisinformed.com\/?p=2428"},"modified":"2017-02-09T08:59:40","modified_gmt":"2017-02-09T16:59:40","slug":"what-if-were-not","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/iwasmisinformed.com\/?p=2428","title":{"rendered":"What if we’re not?"},"content":{"rendered":"

I keep seeing one phrase come up over and over again: \u201cwe\u2019re better than this.\u201d I understand what people mean by it, or want to anyway. We\u2019re not a country that hates. We\u2019re not a country that keeps people out. We\u2019re not a country that relies on ignorance or stupidity or racism or general shallow foolishness. \u00a0Here\u2019s the problem: that statement, \u201cwe\u2019re better than this,\u201d is aspirational<\/em>. It\u2019s not descriptive<\/em>.<\/p>\n

Think about what\u2019s in living memory for us. Jim Crow. Dogs and firehoses. A world where a grown woman needed a husband to open a credit card for her. A world where it\u2019s okay to fire someone because of marital status – and not just what gender you marry, the fact that you got married at all. George W. Bush re-elected despite a polled majority opposing him. Trayvon dies and Zimmerman walks. California – California<\/em> – elects Arnold Schwarzenegger twice<\/em> and then votes to outlaw gay marriage. The kinds of people who blew up my mother\u2019s high school are still alive, and they all voted for Trump.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The fact is, if you look at the reality of America in 2017, we\u2019re\u00a0not<\/em>\u00a0better than this. We\u2019re just not. If we were, we wouldn\u2019t be in this spot to begin with. But there were enough people willing to absorb lies and misinformation and deception and just let them slide, and enough people to buy it without question, and now matters are worse. A majority of the public disapproves of the accident in the White House, but not enough to hold their nose and vote for the one person capable of preventing it. There was an obvious solution, but enough people were indifferent or were too good to vote for \u201cthe lesser of two evils\u201d or too consumed with \u201cI got mine, fuck you\u201d to do what it would take to prevent this.<\/p>\n

Tommy Lee Jones, in\u00a0Men In Black<\/em>, nailed it.\u00a0Nailed<\/em>\u00a0it. \u201cA\u00a0person<\/em>\u00a0is smart.\u00a0People<\/em>\u00a0are dumb, panicky, dangerous animals and you know it.\u201d And for fifteen years – going on twenty – we validated dumb and panicky. The average person on the street didn\u2019t stand up to the fear mongering. They didn\u2019t stand up to the lies. They didn\u2019t stand up for majority rule when it was threatened. They didn\u2019t stand up for the truth. They didn\u2019t reject prevarication and bullshit and made-up internet garbage. And instead of rejecting birtherism, they elected the Head Birther In Charge to replace Obama.<\/p>\n

We\u2019re not better than that. We aren\u2019t. Stop pretending we are. All we can do is try to come up with a way to survive despite. And maybe in a couple generations, we can hope that we\u2019ve bent the curve enough to be better than this.<\/p>\n

But probably not.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I keep seeing one phrase come up over and over again: \u201cwe\u2019re better than this.\u201d I understand what people mean by it, or want to anyway. We\u2019re not a country that hates. We\u2019re not a country that keeps people out. We\u2019re not a country that relies on ignorance or stupidity or racism or general shallow … <\/p>\n

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