Do You Hate Half of America?

To be clear: I did not vote for Trump. I wouldn’t have voted for him to be president of my neighbor’s dilapidated toolshed, much less president of the United States of America. (Apologies to people I love who voted for him. If it makes you feel any better, I wasn’t thrilled about the person I did vote for either. Blood has got to be thicker than politics, right?)

A question: is Donald Trump’s heart full of hatred for people of color, women, and Muslims? I don’t know. Maybe it is. He’s certainly said astonishingly careless things that seem pretty damning. But I’m not willing to make those assertions as if they’re a certainty. Saying that I know what’s in his heart is carelessness on my part. Maybe Trump is a horrible, hate-filled man. Maybe he just speaks without thinking. Again—I don’t know.

The question that I would address to my outraged, grieving, fearful-for-the-future-of-our-country, liberal-leaning friends and neighbors is this: “Do you really believe that the nearly-60 million Americans who voted for Trump are hate-filled, bigoted, misogynists?”

I sure hope you don’t. If you do, that would be far sadder than the outcome of this election.

No. Those tens of millions of U.S. citizens whose vote has you shuddering in horrified disbelief? I fervently believe that the great majority of them are people who would help you shovel your car out of a snow bank; people who would help you pick up the groceries that fell out of your torn bag as you came out of the super market; they’re people who want safe streets, peace on Earth, and good will towards men. Many, many of them are people you’d like. People you already do like. They’re your neighbors and co-workers and, in some cases, your family. They deliver your mail, they figure your company’s payroll; they may well own your company, or they may bag your groceries.

Not all of them are decent folks. Of course not. Some of them are exactly all those unpleasant things I listed. Far right and far left folks get scarier and scarier the further out to the extreme edges you go. So, yes, ugly haters are represented in both halves of the voting populace.

But please do not make the grievous error of painting every Trump-voter with the same ultra-extreme brush. Many detested some of things Trump said, but had other reasons to be compelled to vote for him according to their own consciences and what they believe the country needs right now. Maybe even what they, on a very personal level, need right now and believe Trump may help provide. You can heartily disagree with them, but please don’t despise them.

Remember this, too: if you want to banish the 60 million who disagree with you to a faraway island, then you don’t want a democracy, you want a utopia, where everyone thinks just like you. You know, the right way. But guess what? You’re living in a democracy and, hate it or love it, that system elected Trump.

I get that Trump’s rhetoric is deeply disturbing. But we must hope that, like pretty much all of his predecessors, he reels it in when he actually governs. Maybe he will. Maybe he won’t. Maybe he will be a catastrophe. Maybe he’ll be the worst president we’ve ever had. Perhaps not. We’ll see.

So far, this country has weathered filthy, bloody, unjust wars under both Republican and Democratic administrations. We’ve caught presidents breaking into their opponent’s political headquarters. We’ve caught presidents lying under oath. We’ve had to explain to our children the embarrassing, seedy behavior of politicians of both parties at the highest levels. If you want to try to pretend this isn’t a dirty game full of dirty players on both sides, you’re in absurd denial. Humans run the world and humans are NOT saints. You may have noticed. People you want to think of as liberal heroes (JFK, Bill Clinton, MLK) were certainly not saints, nor did they show much respect for their spouses (and by extension, women in general) with their well-documented serial philandering.

None of the aforementioned “inconvenient truths” excuse the appalling things Trump has said (let alone what he is alleged to have done). My intent here is to offer perspective, not a defense.

So, you’re totally ticked off and freaked out by the 2016 election results? The best you can do is use our political system to keep on fighting for what you believe. Make your case. Gather your people. Get behind a great candidate who can articulate your 2020 vision (hey, that’s catchy, isn’t it?). Defeat Trump in four years with your awesome choice.

But don’t stop loving your neighbor who thinks differently than you. Don’t assume the worst of them. If you do, well, my bitter friend, then the terrorists have truly won.