When The Monster Wins How Does Love Triumph
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| Donald Trump |
Here’s What a Sexual Abuse And Sexual Assault
Survivor Sees When She Reads Trump Wins
When I woke up this morning and read the headlines, Trump
Wins, I felt sick. It was a feeling I knew well. It wasn’t the same kind of
sickness I experience with physical illness. It was a spiritual and emotional
malaise, a nausea mixed with a sense of coming to after passing out, but
regaining consciousness in an alternate universe, one that looks like the one
you were in before you fainted, but where the laws of physics are slightly
altered at the sub, sub, sub molecular level. It’s just different enough to
cause this sickness. Plus you’re trapped. Additionally you sense that you might
have gone completely insane. It’s the same feeling I’ve experienced after being
molested as a child, after being assaulted or abused as an adult, including
during and after a date rape. It’s the sense that wheels have been unalterably
set in motion that you are powerless against, and at the same time nobody will
believe you or support you is you tell them what happened.
Why?
Because from now on when I look at Donald Trump, when I read the words, “President Trump,” when I read headlines that Trump won the 2016 Presidential election, all I see is the face of a monster. I see my ex-stepfather’s face instead. I see the man, the monster who ended my childhood, who further fractured my already broken identity, by first actually “grabbing my pussy” at age 9 and 10, and who also once entered my bedroom, drunk, angry and dressed only in his underwear to inform me on the same day that my own mother had slapped me in the face (and not for the first time), that he could and would do worse to me, that he could beat me if he wanted to and I could do nothing, that he had all the power and that nobody would believe me.
This is the type of person I see in Donald Trump. He isn’t just a man who has harassed, assaulted and disrespected women, but a man who both openly brags about it and brands his victims as liars. This is something I’m extremely familiar with. He is a man who called on live television, one of his female opponents, a “nasty woman” after all. I know all too well what that means. I’ve often been in the position of being the “nasty girl” who grew up into the “nasty woman” for daring to violate the cultural and family rules of “don’t talk, don’t trust, don’t feel.” I violate them today by writing this. I violate them by not minimizing, by not going into denial. I violate them by sacrificing being “nice,” being “likable” for the sake of truth, honesty, recovery, strength, courage, and helping others. I violate them because I choose Love over fear, ignorance, bigotry, victim-hood and hate.
Why?
Because from now on when I look at Donald Trump, when I read the words, “President Trump,” when I read headlines that Trump won the 2016 Presidential election, all I see is the face of a monster. I see my ex-stepfather’s face instead. I see the man, the monster who ended my childhood, who further fractured my already broken identity, by first actually “grabbing my pussy” at age 9 and 10, and who also once entered my bedroom, drunk, angry and dressed only in his underwear to inform me on the same day that my own mother had slapped me in the face (and not for the first time), that he could and would do worse to me, that he could beat me if he wanted to and I could do nothing, that he had all the power and that nobody would believe me.
This is the type of person I see in Donald Trump. He isn’t just a man who has harassed, assaulted and disrespected women, but a man who both openly brags about it and brands his victims as liars. This is something I’m extremely familiar with. He is a man who called on live television, one of his female opponents, a “nasty woman” after all. I know all too well what that means. I’ve often been in the position of being the “nasty girl” who grew up into the “nasty woman” for daring to violate the cultural and family rules of “don’t talk, don’t trust, don’t feel.” I violate them today by writing this. I violate them by not minimizing, by not going into denial. I violate them by sacrificing being “nice,” being “likable” for the sake of truth, honesty, recovery, strength, courage, and helping others. I violate them because I choose Love over fear, ignorance, bigotry, victim-hood and hate.
But if you like, we can start over and go to...
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| Hillary Clinton |
The Choice Between Love And Hate
On my way home from work last night I tuned in election
results on NPR, and consoled myself that it was too early to take Trump’s small
lead in electoral votes seriously, yet already felt deja vu to the 2000 United
States Presidential election. I arrived home and my heart continued sinking as
I watched the results poor in on live television. I felt sick. It couldn’t be happening.
Trump kept winning key state after key state. Florida was on the brink, but too
close to formally call. So many states were inconclusive. My own county in
Arizona had stopped counting any votes at 4pm, leaving hundreds of thousands of
uncounted mail in ballots in sealed boxes.
I decided to go to bed with the hope that I’d wake up to a different, brighter reality, and history would be made. We’d have our first female president. Surely in spite of all divisions, the country I love, my country, America, would not, could elect a man who brags about sexually assaulting women, leers at his own daughter, says Muslims should carry special identification, wants to build a wall, admires Vladimir Putin, and who insults anyone who publicly unmasks his true nature by calling them calling liars or worse, all while threatening to sue or jail them.Obviously I watch too many superhero
films.
I decided to go to bed with the hope that I’d wake up to a different, brighter reality, and history would be made. We’d have our first female president. Surely in spite of all divisions, the country I love, my country, America, would not, could elect a man who brags about sexually assaulting women, leers at his own daughter, says Muslims should carry special identification, wants to build a wall, admires Vladimir Putin, and who insults anyone who publicly unmasks his true nature by calling them calling liars or worse, all while threatening to sue or jail them.Obviously I watch too many superhero
films.
When I woke up this morning, well we all know what happened. Trump won the electoral votes and Clinton won the popular vote. Plus many Trump supporters gloated and chanted “Lock Her Up!” and “Jail Her!” about Hillary Clinton. They bragged about Trump being the real change, the evidence that people didn’t want experienced, career politicians anymore while ignoring that in the House and Senate, people had actually voted for more of the same as before, by keeping Congress controlled by the same party, the Republicans, many of them longtime Congress members, career, establishment politicians.
I saw very little hate from fellow Clinton supporters. I mostly saw fear and sadness coupled with calls for Love and Unity to prevail. I reached out to a couple estranged family members who I knew would also be feeling downtrodden by today’s results. I couldn’t get out of bed for a couple hours. I finally crawled out of bed and wept in the shower, traumatized, finally realizing why. PTSD.
The United States is broken, divided. Where do we go from here? Is it too late?
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| Michelle Obama |
Keeping Hope and Change Alive, We’ve Got Work
To Do
The only thing we can do is unite and continue the fight. How?
We look to the midterm elections in 2018 first. We work on encouraging a strong
person, hopefully another woman, to run for president in 2020 while we work on
unifying more towards the center to center left in the Democratic Party and
stop infighting. We truly become “stronger together.” We perhaps convince,
encourage a strong, articulate, experienced female candidate and unify behind
her. We start the campaign today, now. We don’t wait. We don’t hold back. We
don’t hide.
What if we convinced Michelle Obama to run in 2020? What if she won? Maybe we can keep hope, change and democracy alive for 4 more years.
What do you think?
What if we convinced Michelle Obama to run in 2020? What if she won? Maybe we can keep hope, change and democracy alive for 4 more years.
What do you think?
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