Here is my fears: that the hateful have just been empowered. That they will take illogical either/or thinking to the extreme. That they have been given implicit permission to discriminate, that they have been given permission to do it with guns drawn. That those who hold minor positions of power, like bank loan managers, property managers, and hiring managers will feel empowered to make biased choices based on stereotypical hatred of “the others.”
My fear is that POC, LGB folks, T an Q folks, immigrants, handicapped, the sick and the old will be ignored, sacrificed, tossed under the bus, and used as batting practice for those of the new Hatred Party, a branch of what once was a semi-logical, somewhat-willing-to-compromise Republican party. These are my fears.
And I’m not looking for someone to assuage them. That’s not possible, not with all the tiny drops of kindness in the world. I’m not looking to argue with someone about why these things should not be feared, because nothing is provable. But I know this fact: even in big roaring crowds of kind people, we cannot eliminate hate.
I learned about anger and pain and hate in the training for doing my career. I know that hate is a result of anger, and anger is a result of feeling dis-empowered. Once the hateful become empowered, they no longer hate out of anger, they hate for the thrill of exercising their power over people. They hate for fun.
So this is what makes me sad. This is what makes me fearful. Because that behavior has been given the green light, from the highest office of the land, to the lowliest ass-hat passing a homeless person parked on the sidewalk.
My fear is that meanness has *officially* been accepted as the normal state of affairs. It has been there all along, but it was always covert. People have always been kinda afraid to express that much hate out loud. But even masses of kind people–at the caucuses this spring, at all my favorite summer events, at all of the protests around the country–are not enough to stop the tide of hate and abuse of power that are about to come our way.
These are my fears. I also learned from my training to not argue with fear; it only makes it more resolute. Fear needs solutions, not arguments. And the only solution I can see for today is for me to implore every one of you to be kind. Be kinder than usual. Go out of your way to be kind to make up for their meanness. Be unbelievably kind.
Because that’s all we can depend on for sure.