Politics and Chill Much?
Zen within the Clown Show of "Democracy"
I used to get emotionally invested in elections. I put a lot of effort into convincing people to vote, because I felt like it mattered. I’m not wholly convinced it doesn’t matter at all, but I don’t have faith in the system anymore.
The pivotal moment of change for me was Super Tuesday of the 2020 Democratic primarites. One minute it seemed like a fair and honest election, and the next minute the Democratic Party did some shit behind the scenes to get Buttigieg and Klobuchar to drop out right before Super Tuesday, even though there was no reason for them to.
Bernie was going to win the Democratic nomination and beat Trump in the 2020 general election. We had a real opportunity for something different and the Democratic Party said NOPE, we need Biden in there to maintain the fucked up status quo that is only good for the wealthy.
I cried on Super Tuesday, more than I cried in 2016 when Trump won. My faith in US democracy was pretty much gone. To this day, I’m jaded beyond repair.
I still vote though. Maybe that’s weird, right? Why vote if I think it doesn’t matter because of all the corruption and greed? It’s nuanced.
US politics have veered drastically to the right in the last few decades. So while I find the Democratic Party to be sickenly conservative and abysmal at the service they are supposed to be providing, the other side, the Republicans, are so far gone that it feels like with them in power, we could easily drift into Christian authoritarianism.
With the judges Trump installed during his presidential term, Roe v Wade was repealed. That’s only the beginning of what they could do. I think about things like the failing infrastructure in the US because the wealthy aren’t paying their fair share of taxes. Or climate change. Pushing the wealth gap to even scarier levels. With a Republican in office, these things undoubtedly get worse. It an entirely yikes situation. So I feel like I have to vote for the Democratic candidate, for fear of how much worse things could get. What a horrible feeling.
And I vote for more than just the president. Local elections are really important. This is why states like California, Washington, Oregon, New York, Massachusetts, Vermont, Colorado, Illinois, Nevada, and Minnesota (among others) give citizens a higher standard of living than other states. I’m not saying things are perfect in those states, but they are notably better than many other places.
I still believe in the power of the vote theoretically. I know why it matters, or at least why it’s supposed to matter. Giving up feels bad, and I’m not there yet. I have my moments where I consider not voting for Biden in this upcoming election, but I know I’m going to.
Before 2020, I used to get angry about other people not voting though. Those days are gone. I don’t blame anyone for not voting, and I’m not going to try to convince anyone to vote like I have in the past. Why not? Well, for one, when a system is so corrupt that you have to choose between two candidates who clearly don’t have the country’s best interest in mind, it’s hard to blame people for saying fuck it and supporting neither one.
Another thing I consider is this: a lot of the people who are conscientiously not voting are willing to see things get far worse before they get better. This feels legit to me. The only way to get us out of the system we’re currently in is by not supporting it, which includes not voting. Even if that means giving the election to the Republicans (Trump), the Democratic Party will absolutely not change its ways if people continue to vote. It’s a noble goal and sacrifice.
All of this is at the forefront of my mind right now, even though US elections aren’t until November, because in Mexico, we have a presidential election coming up on Sunday. People in my circles are buzzing about it. Some of it sounds painfully familiar.
The general population in Mexico doesn’t seem to feel good about their choices for president. Like in the US, they feel they’re voting for a lesser-evil rather than having the option of a good candidate. Political corruption in Mexico has been the well-known status quo for so long, and people are understandably jaded.
You know what’s nice though? Mexico isn’t so hatefully polarized like the US. Even during election season, the general political and social climate is sometimes a bit testy, but that’s all. The different sides talk to each other and walk away still being friends.
The biggest reason for this, if you ask me, is the fact that here in Mexico, the different sides seem to want more or less the same thing—they just have different ideas for how to get it. There’s some disagreement about things like immigration policy, how to deal with organied crime, and how to use tax money, but the two women who are the frontrunners in this election, Claudia Sheinbaum and Xóchitl Gálvez, aren’t thatttt different. And here’s another thing, an aside. Regardless of who wins, Mexico is about to have its first female president. That’s something.
In the US, Trump is an outright racist, misogynist, wanna-be dictator who only cares about money. Biden sucks, but he’s far from the authoritarian realm, at least. He doesn’t directly incite people to double down on their racist, sexist thoughts. People lose friends over politics in the US, because siding with Trump and a lot of the front-seat Republicans is hard to stomach these days. Like, who are you that you support these people?
Another thing is that, because drastic levels of corruption have long been well-known and widespread in Mexico, people have been seriously jaded for a lot longer. That means the energy they put into politics is lower. Anyone who has distrusted their government for a long time is less likely to fall for any manufactured polarization by the government (by way of Big Media and corporate control of social media). They’re less likely to put much stake into it.
Meanwhile in the US, yes some of the polarization is coming from what I mentioned, that it can be hard to respect people who vote for Trump because of who and what he is. But the population is also being conditioned to be so self-righteous that no one listens to anything from “the other side.” Even people on the same side are fighting with and shaming each other. And the elite in power know this is how they keep people under control. It prevents us from having conversations with one another. It eliminates community as much as possible. It erases our humanity, keeps us from seeing others as people, and replaces all of that with cold, political ideology.
This whole long-winded letter is really just to say that I feel sad about my change of heart and mind since the 2020 Democratic primaries. I wish I still felt hopeful about the political state of the US and world, but I don’t. Systemic change is the only way through, and I don’t see that happening, at least not in my lifetime. I don’t believe voting in these upcoming elections, in the US and in Mexico and in many places around the world, is not going to change much.
Clearly, I’m cynical and disillusioned about it all, and I know I’m not alone. At the same time, I recognize that disengagement might be worst of all in the long-term.
The result: I continue living my little life, writing my little thoughts, doing things that make me happy, being kind, trying my best. I’m not going to be wasting energy on worrying if people vote or not. Building community rather than prizing individualism, which seems to be the root of the solution in my mind, is not born out of shame; it’s built from acceptance, understanding, and love. Community is the real first step toward collective action. I’m not even sure that would be enough, but at least it would make the worsening conditions more bearable.
I say all of this, but I still love my life and I’m happy to be living it. I would even say I’m happier now than when I let politics and elections generate so much anger and animosity in me (when I got legitimately upset with people for not voting, when I let myself be manipulated by the planned polarization).
Would I bet on my way of thinking about all this being the “right” way? No. I honestly don’t know. But I do think that living stressed and angry isn’t the way, not personally and not collectively. We can’t be our best or kindest or favorite or loveliest selves when we’re consumed by negativity, anger, and anxiety. I’m pretty sure that just leads to violence and war. Most of us plebes can agree on a big yikes to that.