Carrying on
It's a brutal, rattling loss. But it was never going to be the end.
First of all, let me say: you should be sad. The news of Trump weaseling his way back into the White House, not by a margin but with the popular vote, should be destabilizing. How can the old, orange, convicted rapist, felon, and hate-mongerer not only win but win over more people than the last time?
We must feel that loss, that trauma, that hurt. Sadness cannot be powered through or drowned out by action. So take a breath. Process those feelings. These are just some of the thoughts that helped me sort through mine.
There was a lot of weight on this US Presidential election. For over a year, it has been brewing and stewing and souring, my whole mood towards it turning bitter and putrid in the end. I think it’s telling that so many people felt like this was the end-all, be-all of democracy. That, like a perfectly plotted movie, evil would be defeated, and the credits would roll. A neat bow placed on our civic duty before going back to regular scheduled programming.
But a presidential election is never a win (implying it’s done, sides have been called, we can all go home now). Especially in today’s landscape of environmental collapse, global instability, and encroaching war—over resources, racism, and rights. There is no relaxing when our planet is one summer away from cooking us alive. One person in office will never do enough.
So many of us were radicalized in 2016, then 2020. We are new to the game of politics because so many of us were privileged to not be affected before. But this has been a fight raging since man first claimed dominion—over each other, over the earth. And that’s true especially true here since pen first hit paper to name the United States of America.
A Trump presidency will undoubtedly be ugly, hateful, and violent. Millions didn’t survive the last one and I’m terrified to know how we’ll outlast this one. But there’s a strange satisfaction in knowing that has always been true. More often than not, politicians stand in the way of change, especially equality. That is true of Trump, and that is true of most before him.
Ask me to list presidents as bad as Trump and I’ll name 45.
I don’t say this to be controversial. I’m not trying to be flippant. I say this because power has always been built on the premise of holding someone back. Too often, that is how we measure success, influence, greatness: stepping on the necks of someone and calling it progress.
We so desperately want to believe in a black-and-white dichotomy. To know what it is to be on the “right” side of history, as if such a thing could ever come down to party lines. Democrat or Republican, moderate and liberal—power has most often been wielded to harm another. Every president acting not as a beacon of hope but a gatekeeper.
Against people of color. Against women. Against immigrants. Against religions. Against LGBTQ+.
Founding Fathers who asterisked the definition of “all men” until it was palatable to only them. Enslavers who had no issue demanding their rights while denying others’. Violent racists spinning tales of manifest destiny to steal land, commit genocide, and wage war all in some god’s name. Indifferent white men allowing the forcible removal of children from indigenous families into assimilation programs. Token good guys committing war crimes in faraway countries.
Most presidents have been anti-protest, anti-union, anti-immigration at one turn or another. And even good acts have been marred by terrible choices.
It was Lincoln who broke treaties, signed laws, and parceled out native-owned land to white settlers. It was Teddy Roosevelt who expanded the imperial arm throughout Latin America. It was FDR who sent Japanese citizens to internment camps. It was JFK who ramped up our presence in Vietnam including authorizing the use of Agent Orange.
For generations, people, communities, cultures, have been victim to policy and presidencies. Still, at every turn so many people fought for more. And still so few lived to see those wins.
Just because we as white people—as young people, as radicalized people—are late to the game doesn’t mean we can be the generation that gives up. Our awaking to politics does not and should not end based on who is in office. That’s not what radicalization looks like. Facing a loss and thinking only of the next election is not advocacy. Radicalization knows no party line. Progress is for all; otherwise, it’s just privilege.
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Like every major movement, cause, progress before us, it comes not with who is in office but how many of us are in the streets. Fighting for freedom, fighting for equal rights. Social Security, unions, food safety, public schools, child labor laws, freaking national holidays—these were all things people strived for, fought for, organized for. No president, no matter the party, ever proactively packaged progress for progress’ sake. It takes the will of the people, and it is always, always a long game.
All this to say, progress has never been a straight line. There have been gains for some at the same time as severe loss for others. It is not a mountain we are climbing; it’s quicksand we are fighting. The pull of patriarchy, white supremacy, capitalism—it’s a rot at the core of a system that does not need us to keep on turning. So, yes, this is a loss. But this election was never going to be the end.
As doss.discourse says in his video above, we need to "buckle the fuck up.” Voting—and losing—cannot be the end all, be all of your advocacy. Yes, this is a terrifying turn of events. I am worried about the damage that can be wreaked by a Republican majority actively uninterested in the rights of most. But if Kamala had won there would still be work to do. Now that Trump has won, there is still that same work to do. So feel sad, mourn and process how you must, but remember: this is nothing new for America1. It’s just our turn (white liberals) to stop giving in to complacency and privilege and indifference and pick up the mantle of good trouble2 for once.
Find your communities. Give to your communities. Invest in each other. And don’t stop screaming for what you want—in your circles, amongst your friends, with the organizations you feel empowered by. Take peace not in the notion that everything will work out on its own, but that what is life if we don’t fight for more? After generations spent fighting for every inch of freedom we have now, we cannot be the one that gives up.
Life is pain. But that pain can be productive. And change was never going to simply be handed to us. So take peace in the ebbs and flows of history and let fury nettle us forward.
Books that gave me some historical perspective: “American Midnight” by Adam Hochschild; “How to Hide an Empire” by Daniel Immerwahr; “An Indigenous Peoples' History of the United States” by Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz; and “Stamped from the Beginning” by Ibram X. Kendi
As John Lewis said, “Get in good trouble, necessary trouble, and redeem the soul of America.” Revolution doesn’t mean war or storming the capital, but it does require protest and discomfort. Figure out what that looks like for you.