We Already Understand White Rust Belt Voters

The day before today,One day, making tracks

In the prairie of Prax,

Came a North-Going Zax

And a South-Going Zax.

And it happened that both of them came to a place

Where they bumped. There they stood.

Foot to foot. Face to face.

“Look here, now!” the North-Going Zax said, “I say!

You are blocking my path. You are right in my way.

I’m a North-Going Zax and I always go north.

Get out of my way, now, and let me go forth!”

“Who’s in whose way?” snapped the South-Going Zax.

“I always go south, making south-going tracks.

So you’re in MY way! And I ask you to move

And let me go south in my south-going groove.”

Then the North-Going Zax puffed his chest up with pride.

“I never,” he said, “take a step to one side.

And I’ll prove to you that I won’t change my ways

If I have to keep standing here fifty-nine days!”

“And I’ll prove to YOU,” yelled the South-Going Zax,

“That I can stand here in the prairie of Prax

For fifty-nine years! For I live by a rule

That I learned as a boy back in South-Going School.

Never budge! That’s my rule. Never budge in the least!

Not an inch to the west! Not an inch to the east!

I’ll stay here, not budging! I can and I will

If it makes you and me and the whole world stand still!”

Of course the world didn’t stand still. The world grew.

In a couple of years, the new highway came through

And they built it right over those two stubborn Zax

And left them there, standing un-budged in their tracks.

-- The Zax, by Dr. Seuss (1953)

Now that the existential dread and Oh My Fucking Gods What Have We Done? stage of grief has passed, I'm back and I'm pissed the fuck off. Now starts the anger stage, and it's just going to keep on keeping on from there.

So to start this one? Stop fucking telling progressives how we need to understand the rust belt and where we went wrong in not coddling and appealing to the "concerns" of rural white voters. We already understand them, way the fuck better than you do.

It's not "economic anxiety." These folks do not give a rat's sweet pink ass about their financial situation. Because if they did, they would recognize that some jackass real estate mogul from New York Fucking City who built his career by not paying his bills and playing with bankruptcy also doesn't give a rat's sweet pink ass about helping them out. They voted for him because he wants to get rid of all the people they hate. Brown people, Jews, Muslims, the disabled, LGBT...literally anyone that isn't a straight white conservative Christian.

That's not anxiety. That's bigotry. And they were all too happy to vote for it. Even the ones who voted for a black guy just four years ago. Because it's a lot easier to take out your impotent rage on someone else than to fix your own shit.

Yeah, I'm fucking going there. The reason I do not feel a single scrap of sympathy for rural white America is because literally every fucking problem they bitch about is their own fucking fault. Because they refuse to adapt to a changing world, and like permanent spoiled goddamned children, they expect to get what they want when they want it and seriously fuck everyone else's priorities.

They don't want a job. They want their old job. They want to do exactly what they were doing before, nevermind that their old job is obsolete and being done by a robot. And they refuse to learn the skillset required to get a new one, because as conservatives they don't want to change. Period. End. Like literal fucking toddlers, they are going to stamp their feet and scream and demand that candy bar at checkout no matter how many times they're told it ain't happening.

Trump just happens to be the enabling grandparent this cycle, and his promise specifically is "you will get your old life back because I will get rid of those whom you've been convinced by years of bigoted pandering bullshit are responsible for all your problems." That's a sewer into which neither John McCain nor Mitt Romney was willing to crawl; even they have standards. Trump has none.

You want to see real economic anxiety? Go to the urban core. Where people are fighting for higher wages, better education, affordable childcare, affordable housing, student loan forgiveness and more affordable college, more efficient mass transit, etc. All the shit that will actually improve their lives in a tangible way. The truly economically anxious don't blame the already marginalized for their situation; they do what they have to in order to get by. The truly economically anxious adapt.

And therein lies the difference. Rural America does not want to adapt. Rural America does not want to do what needs to be done. They want to do the same shit they've been doing and just have it magically work this time. They want the rest of the world to cater to them.

They are those two stubborn Zax, and the world is not going to stand still.

RIP America: 7/4/1776 - 11/9/2016

60 million people just screamed “I HATE YOU” at the top of their lungs. We can’t undo that. We never will. Thinking it was even possible is the white rabbit that lead us down this deep dark hole.

It’s over. There is, literally, nothing left to do. It doesn’t matter how well we organize, how qualified a candidate we put forth. There are too many people in this godforsaken lake of shit that calls itself a country who would elect the very embodiment of evil as long as he feeds their hatred. There are too many journalists who care more about perceived fairness than accuracy. There are too many people who will let perfect be the enemy of sane. There are simply far too many people who do not want a better world for everyone, only for people like themselves.

I’m done fighting. I’m done hoping. We’ve reached the end. If it’s not going to get any better, then let it fucking burn.

There is nothing left to save. May nuclear war wipe us off the fucking map before Trump makes us suffer death by a thousand cuts.

Protest Votes Are Merely An Excercise In Straight White Guy Privilege

There, I said it. And now I will explain why this is not an opinion, but a motherfucking fact.

Were this a normal election, I literally would not care if a bunch of angry straight white guys in good health decided to write in Donald goddamned Duck as their candidate. But this is not a normal election.

This is an election in which Hillary Clinton not winning means we have guy who flies off on vengeance-driven Twitter crusades at 2am in charge of the nuclear codes.

This is an election in which Hillary Clinton not winning means a guy who is to stand two civil trials for large scale fraud and raping a 13-year-old girl has the power to sign bills.

This is an election in which Hillary Clinton not winning means a guy who has no idea how the government works will hold the nation's highest public office.

This is an election in which Hillary Clinton not winning means a guy who thinks he has the right to sexually assault whomever he wants to just because he's rich will have to meet with other world leaders, many of whom have wives and daughters and quite a few of whom are women.

This is an election in which Hillary Clinton not winning means a guy who wants his political opponents jailed or assassinated has the power to issue executive orders.

This is an election in which Hillary Clinton not winning means a guy who has expressed borderline incestuous interest in his own daughters has the power to pardon convicted rapists.

In other words, were the nation made up of sane, rational people, the very idea of a Trump presidency should scare the holy shit out of everyone enough to make sure he lost by a landslide, simply because we'd become the United States of Fuck This Guy. But of course, if that were the case, Trump would never have gotten the nomination at all.

So here we are.

Unfortunately, while Clinton is still leading, there is a sizeable contingent of people -- many of whom supported Bernie Sanders of all people -- who plan to either throw their votes away entirely on a 3rd party candidate, or not even bother hiding their childish tantrum and vote for the Orange Menace himself. And these people are, by and large, straight white cisgendered men in general good health, voting in a way that screams "I know I'm one of the most privileged demographics in this country and I don't give a shit about anything but my feelings."

Why? Because for them, even a Trump presidency isn't as bad as an establishment candidate since none of the things he wants to do will affect them directly. Thus, the blow to their pride that would be casting a vote for a woman is of far greater concern.

Yes, I'm going there, because the evidence is literally right in front of your faces.

Bernie Sanders has been involved in Congress for even longer than Clinton has. She was elected as a U.S. Senator in 2001; Sanders first got elected as U.S. Representative in 1991. They support many of the same policy positions. They're certainly further on the same page than Jill Stein, Gary Johnson, or Saints preserve us, Trump. And yet, Sanders is the favored anti-establishment "maverick" candidate, while Clinton has been "in politics too long" and therefore "corrupt."

They are virtually the same candidate. But only one of them is female, so obviously that one is no good.

And this is the result of Clinton being the subject of a Republican smear campaign for nearly three decades. Longer than half the electorate has been alive. There is no way in Hell that people haven't internalized that nonsense in some form.

And yes, it's nonsense. Literally every single anti-Hillary argument boils down to "she's unfit to be President because she embodies qualities we still do not find acceptable for women; she does not back down and shut up when a man is talking." Every single "scandal" she's been embroiled in has fallen apart under even minor scrutiny. Every. Single. One. But for insecure privileged white men who felt their balls shrivel up and retreat when she got up on that stage and accepted the nomination, they will cling to any excuse not to vote for her no matter how ridiculous it is. It doesn't matter that her opponent is literally a fascist dictator fanboy. They will, as Varys said of Joffrey Baratheon, "see this country burn if they can be kings of the ashes."

For those of us who are not straight white men in general good health, this election is quite literal life and death. I'm a gay woman with two chronic health conditions. I have friends who are also women, LGBT, disabled, cancer patients, black, Native, and Hispanic. People who would not survive 4 years under Trump, no matter how Congress ends up leaning. I have already voted Hillary Clinton not just because she is the most qualified candidate to ever run for this office, period, but because I will do anything I have to to make sure that the people I care about make it through the next four years alive.

This is not an election to cast a protest vote in. There is too much at stake. This is not about you. This is not about your fucking 'conscience.' Because if your conscience is telling you to vote against someone just because she's a woman, no matter what, then you need to get a new one because yours is fucking broken. This is a fucking emergency.

And I'll tell you what we do in emergencies: we break glass.