Peter Philips
Digital filmmaking sophomore
Protesters are mobilizing across the nation. They chant “love trumps hate” and “not our president.” I wanted to be among them on the night after the election, but a thought struck me before I marched out the door. What was I going to protest, and what would it help change?
The painful truth is that Donald Trump won the presidency legitimately and with the support of nearly half of the nation’s voters. Half of us, the active citizenry, elected this man into office. Despite every scandal, every late night Twitter rant, every crazed, impractical policy proposal, around 60 million people, far more than could fit into a “basket of deplorables,” consciously chose him to lead.
This fact, though tough to swallow, is crucial to take to heart. We’re four years before another chance, but only two before yet another midterm election. These 60 million Americans won’t spontaneously combust before then, and neither will their ability to vote. This means that there’s a job to be done for those of us that don’t want America to return to this horrifying place: that job is to change the hearts and minds of mainland Americans who voted en masse for Donald Trump.
As comforting as it may be to hit the streets and share in the outrage against how far our national composure has fallen, and as cathartic as it must be to witness a burning effigy of the man who might bring into power policies or people who would do you or people you know harm, please recognize that this strain of protest does not help solve the root of the issue. The response to this presidency, as far as we can shape its course, needs to be pointed, deliberate and convincing. Now is the time to keep your ear to the ground, to pay attention, to reach people outside of colleges and big cities and to get involved with organizations for causes you believe in.
Volunteer some of your time, donate to something to which Trump might do harm, vote with your wallet and get up and vote with your ballot. Don’t preach or operate on half-truths, on rumors or on assumptions. Frankly, we’re spoiled for choice on troubling things Trump has definitively said or done, no matter how many times he’s gone back on a position or wholesale denied he ever took it to begin with.
While the Trump we saw in election season might be severely tamed, the internet is a wonderful record. With enough patience and a discerning eye, the sins of a hateful campaign can and should be brought under scrutiny. Keep your convictions close to heart, and be prepared for the future.
Should Trump enact simply a handful of the ideas he has proposed, America will lose several core components of Obamacare, have the entire government in open skepticism of climate change, lose open and equal access to the internet, resume torturing prisoners “and much worse,” begin mass deportations of children who immigrated here from Mexico and Central America as well as undocumented parents of “anchor babies” and slash funding from the department of education headed to low-income schools in the inner cities. That doesn’t even cover his cabinet, foreign policy or his lasting effect on the Supreme Court.
We’ve got four years of this deeply flawed man at the head of our nation; don’t spend them sitting down. Spend them changing the minds of our neighbors, in the face of everything. We need more of them with us if we’re going to regain our conscience.
