So many of us are discouraged today. So many are heartbroken. So many are afraid for their futures and the futures of their children. A few are jubilant, but I expect many more are experiencing a relief mingled with disgust. This was an ugly election in which most people felt angry at “having” to choose between these two options.
Let me say first of all that I’m sorry. If you’re afraid you’ll be deported, I’m so sorry. If you’re worried your family will be split up, I’m so sorry. If you feel that your fellow citizens have voted against you as a person of color or a woman or a member of the LGBT community, or any other marginalized group, I’m so, so sorry. You matter. You matter to me and to millions of Americans. I hope that soon you will feel safe and loved and welcome in your home.
I also hope that you will join me in fighting against hatred. There’s a temptation now to retreat behind the walls we’ve erected around our political camps. But one thing that has always made America great is that Americans are able to move past differences after an election and work together.
I remember my mother telling me, with powerful emotion in her voice, “When Thomas Jefferson was elected and John Adams yielded the presidency to him, it was the first time in the history of the world that power was transferred from one party to another without a drop of blood being shed. It is an incredible thing to belong to that country.”1
Please, friends, let’s make our founding fathers proud. I don’t expect that we’ll riot or revolt, but we can do nearly as much damage by entrenching ourselves in anger and resentment. All over Facebook I’m seeing, “If you voted for Trump, make sure to explain to your lgbt+, female, black, latino/a, Muslim friends why they don’t matter to you.” Or “If you voted third party or didn’t vote, please unfriend me. I will not forget.” A large portion of our country believes that their friends and neighbors voted deliberately for bigotry and misogyny, and I don’t think that’s quite fair. Your friends and neighbors may have voted for a man who is bigoted and misogynistic, but so many of them did it while holding their noses, even weeping at what they felt they must do.
Many of them were voting for the lives of children, believing as they2 do that unborn human beings are people and people deserve to live. Many were voting for the freedom to live a faith that Secretary Clinton has openly threatened. Others were voting for their livelihoods, with uncertain jobs and the cost of living on the rise; any change, they thought, must be better.
I can’t say I totally understand them. I refused to vote for him and I refused to vote for her. I found both of them morally abhorrent. And I understand the instinct to characterize his platform as one of hatred and xenophobia, but not everybody who voted for him was intending to vote for that. Many are so scared of life as they’re living it now that they were unable to see the threat to immigrants and people of color and women and, well, the whole planet. I have a hard time understanding that, but I also don’t personally feel threatened by the state of things in this country.
This is the trouble: we don’t understand each other. Being angry and depressed won’t fix that. But trying to love people we disagree with–even people whose choices threaten our very lives–that is the greatest act of defiance against a campaign of hatred.
America is already great. We’re great because we band together after tragedies and natural disasters. We’re great because we support each other in spite of our differences. We’re great because we celebrate the freedom to protest. We’re great because when we disagree, we still work together. Let’s honor those whose vision gave us this great country by loving each other in the midst of feelings of anger and betrayal and terror.
Whatever side of the political spectrum you fall on, you must understand that there are people who are unlike you who are terribly afraid. So whatever you feel today, fury or despondency or relief or elation, make this promise: I will not define people by their ideologies. I will love.
Then make a concrete resolution to reach out to people who may be feeling particularly attacked or endangered because of last night’s decision. Make a donation to a group that serves refugees,speak out against domestic violence, commiserate with a friend, volunteer to tutor ESL, invite an immigrant family over for Thanksgiving, keep an eye out for sexual predators when you’re at a bar, befriend a person of color who seems nervous in an all-white situation. Just find someone who isn’t like you and learn how to be an ally.
The thought of saying President Trump makes me feel ill, much though I may understand that it’s not actually the end of the world. But loathing the people who elected him doesn’t fix that. The hashtag all along has been #loveTrumpshate. Let’s live that.