My post election state of mind is very different currently than it was after the 2016 election. I was a sophomore in high school for the election of 2016. I cared about politics a lot, and I was brokenhearted to see Trump win the election. I remember that morning the results came out, my mom and I both watched the news and cried. In retrospect that was both dramatic and completely warranted. My material conditions in the last four years have worsened, but I'm not sure if it's been proportionally worse than it would've been under a Clinton administration. Aside from the handling of the pandemic, I genuinely do not see a huge difference, in regards to marginalized communities' lives, between either party's victory. After the 2020 election, I am more disillusioned than ever. I am relieved, of course, to have Trump out of office. But I am not particularly happy about having Biden there either. I am more determined today than I was November 11, 2016 to improve the world I am forced to live in. I have clearer goals than I had four years ago. The pandemic we have been experiencing for the past 8 months has given me more hope in community efforts, as opposed to relying on state reformism. I think the scariest thing that can come out of this upcoming Biden presidency is complacency on the left. I think a lot of people, now that Biden has won, feel like their efforts have succeeded, like they can go back to their daily life of ignoring those suffering under the the violence of the state. So I feel better overall about this election than I did in 2016, but now more than ever our fight is needed.
Weekly points:
This essay
I understand your point about marginal communities, but speaking as a bourgeois liberal Democrat (I've been reading and discussing Richard Rorty's philosophy with my MALA class, he proudly owned that language), I'm pretty sure a second Clinton administration would have been far better for everybody. I hope you'll give Uncle Joe a chance, I still think he has an opportunity to do good things for the climate and for the dispossessed. If progressive reforms are once again rebuffed by a recalcitrant GOP, that's where the revolution must begin and that's where the principal blame must be lodged. Meanwhile, I'm glad you're still in fighting mode.
ReplyDelete