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Dispatches from behind enemy lines

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We used to leave our doors unlocked. Morning, night, whether we were at home or not. I’ve never felt unsafe in my town. There have certainly been times that I’ve felt unsafe from threats made on the internet, but those threats were coming from other places. Not here. Not in our little rural village.

I open Facebook. I see mugshots of people who share my DNA; two second-cousins I’ve not seen in years. I remember them from childhood: chubby, with bowl cuts, totally indistinguishable from any of the other kids at our middle school. Bill was behind me on the slide ladder at Uncle Junie’s pool when I got stung by a wasp. I didn’t know what to do, so I went down the slide in silent shock. I’ve never trusted hollow, duct-taped aluminum railings again. Both those former kids were arrested as part of a plot to kidnap Governor Gretchen Whitmer.

I check Twitter. There’s the sheriff of my county, giving an interview defending white supremacist terrorists, specifically the white supremacist terrorists I attended family reunions with. The sheriff and I go to the same dentist. Once, during a routine cleaning, I heard Sheriff Leaf two chairs over, complaining that he wished someone would run against him for the job, which he no longer wanted. When someone did oppose him in the next election, he fought back. My white supremacist second cousin sent threats to people who campaigned for Leaf’s challenger. Less than twelve hours after his disastrous defense of my cousins, Dar Leaf changed his mind again, scrambling desperately to distance himself from the “militia members” he proudly stood with to protest Governor Whitmer’s restrictions.

Over a dozen arrests, spanning several counties. A plot to abduct the Governor, transport her across state lines, and execute her for “treason.” All because bars and gyms were closed to slow the spread of a dangerous pandemic ravaging the country. All because a stubborn barber decided to keep his shop open and was stunned to learn there would be consequences.

My cousins’ sister, whom I’ve remained in contact with via social media, posts an ultimatum: if you believe that they’re involved, unfriend her. They did nothing wrong. If you’re not willing to rally to support them, to raise money for their combined $500,000 bail, if you won’t put a sticker on your car expressing your support, you can unfriend her. I fulfill her request with a click of my trackpad. The last I see of her anger is a vow that she stands with the Michigan Liberty Militia.

The founder of that group hails from our village, where everyone  tempers their gossip with insistence upon the boys’ innocence and pleas that we not trust the media. Wait until you see the evidence, they warn. Things aren’t what they seem.

The Detroit Free Press runs an article about the people involved in the plot. Above the section about my blood relations, they’ve used the heading, “‘redneckery’.” They describe rural white conservatives as some kind of wronged people, whether they intend to, or not. Testimonials from neighbors and descriptions of bleak rural yards strewn with beer cans seem sensational or horrific, I assume, to anyone who’s never lived among the rural working poor. But we all live like this, I think, looking out at the remnants of our weekend campfire in the driveway. There are cans here. And a car that hasn’t moved in years. And we haven’t joined a militia.

“I have hard time wrapping my head around the fact that these guys have dropped everything to help [my step grandparents] and your grandma when they had trouble with their houses,” my mom says in a Facebook comment. But militias? Anybody in Michigan understands those.

I was twelve years old when I learned that the government is out to get us. Not from anyone in my immediate family. At the local pizza place one night, my uncle got into a tense conversation with my grandparents about a family in Idaho who were murdered for exercising their second amendment rights. To him and every other single-issue voter in town, Democrats lurked around every corner, just waiting to take our guns. The FBI, the ATF, Federal Marshals were the enemy.

Yesterday, “President” Trump boasted about U.S. Marshals carrying out an extrajudicial execution in his name. The “president” of this supposed “land of the free” bragged about his death squad killing a civilian while his supporters cheered him on. The same family members who felt the government overstepped in Waco, at Ruby Ridge, now they admire the intelligence of a leader who views not just the U.S. Marshals as his own killing force, but who courts those very militias that are supposed to oppose the extreme fascist actions he’s taken.

Many of the men charged in the terrorist plot against Governor Whitmer are hardcore Trump supporters, but since the ringleader once referred to Trump as a tyrant and owns the same generic anarchy flag found in every metalhead’s basement lair or suburban garage hang-out space, the plot was carried out by Leftists. By Antifa. By BLM. By Democrats and liberals, all howling for the fetal body parts of aborted white, Christian babies. Don’t believe the evidence before your eyes. Believe that the right is right, the left is evil, and it’s perfectly normal to storm the state capitol brandishing two semi-automatic rifles with high capacity magazines because face masks are itchy and you can cure a virus by screaming “freedom” at it.

On October 9th, my mother shared a conservative meme about Covid-19. The text warned that living like you’re afraid of dying means you’re dead already.

Last night, she called to tell me that my seventeen-year-old brother tested positive and has had a fever for days. My eighteen-year-old sister is symptomatic. Not my mother, who voted for Trump and still intends to vote for him. Not my stepfather, who also supports Trump. My siblings, who didn’t have a say in whether or not this man was elected, have been condemned to wait and see if they’ll recover fully, partially, or at all. And on November 3rd, their parents will walk into their polling place and cast their votes for the man who did this to their children. The man who, according to another Facebook post shared by my mother, is fighting a war on behalf of Christians by killing so many of them.

Last week, my friends and I made a lot of uneasy jabs about the cottage across the road from the Airbnb we stayed at. The ramshackle little house needed new gutters. A broken down truck half-covered with blue tarp sat in the driveway. An American flag hung in faded tatters beside a crisp, new “Trump 2020” banner. We joked that the occupants might be responsible for that kidnapping thing we’d heard about in passing.

Not long after that, I stood on the porch of our rental and watched that “Trump 2020” flag hang stiff and cheap in the breeze as my grandmother told me over the phone what the “little shits” had done. When we drove away from our trip, my friends joked that at least we were going to be away from that Trump house.

But that same, cheap nylon “Trump 2020” hangs in pride of place over my neighbor’s porch, as well.

We lock our doors now.

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30 Comments

  1. Gretel
    Gretel

    I don’t know what to say because I understand the fear, despair, and anger you’re feeling because I share them with you. I’m sorry that some of your family members are…who they are and believe what they believe. Saying sorry sounds hollow but I mean it, from the bottom of my heart because I know how it is to have family members that are so full of hatred, their heads warped by racism and white supremacy that it’s become impossible to deal with them.
    It’s just not save to keep them around.
    Although this case is incredibly serious and horrendous. I’m relieved they were able to stop them before anything happened but sadly, I’m sure it won’t be the last attempt and I fear for the next escalating point.

    My mother, who has always had very…let’s say ambivalent views, has even grown more extreme during the pandemic. I’m not like others who think that this shift into rw-extremism “comes out of nowhere” and you can’t blame F*X N*ws because we don’t live in the US. It’s a culmination of held beliefs that get more and more violent and dellusional. Such beliefs don’t start with genocide, contrentations camps, or coup d’etat – they start with “inocuous” things. It builds up, accumulates over time, creates a system.
    Anyhow, my mother believes the virus exists (which is something) and agrees that measures to protect people need to be taken. But then she rants about “the Chinese”, that’s it’s engineered because of 5G, that Gates and S*r*s are behind it, that They want to replace us (White people) but also it’s M*sl*ms, etc. etc.
    It’s a conspiracy hitlist and I know it’s futile to talk to her because their belief of these conspiracies has become their identity.
    And you stand by, watching them destroy themselves and everyone around them, knowing that the best thing you can do is distance and protect yourself, to stand up for others but not engage with their BS directly.

    I feel your pain and…heck, I don’t know what else to say.
    I live very far away from you but I’m thinking of you and sending you virtual hugs and support. <3

    October 16, 2020
    |Reply
    • AdAstra
      AdAstra

      I will never wrap my head around the “Black people want to replace white people” nonsense. I have read up about it and still don’t get it. How can anyone seriously believe that?! I imagine this was a made up argument used to further white supremacy and control non-white people especially those who are Black. The fact that so people have fallen for it and believe it is a legitimate threat just beggars believe. Humans have caused so much damage to the planet, now we seem to be heading towards self-destruction…

      October 16, 2020
      |Reply
      • Sam B
        Sam B

        It’s because some experts have said that in the future black people will outnumber white people in the US or something like that. So racists are freaking out that the white race will be “diminished.”

        October 17, 2020
        |Reply
        • Monica
          Monica

          And there in lies one of the other motives for overturning RVW.

          Satisfying the religious right is one goal, but preventing white women, particularly of the worker bee variety, from aborting children protects the white majority.

          Of course, depending on the degree to which actual freedoms are restricted, white women of means have and will continue to take…vacations, but that’ll be neither here nor there.

          Sterile couples will enjoy a steady supply of white babies to adopt as the eugenics program continues to chip away at “undesirable “populations.

          I absolutely love that the same people willing to resort to kidnapping and murder in the name of freedom are a-okay with women being forcibly sterilized and/or forced to give birth to babies they don’t want.

          I’d chuckle at their abject terror and status anxiety if they weren’t so deadly to me and those I care about.

          From where I’m standing as an African American woman with multiple disabilities, Trump supporters are not good people, and no one and nothing will convince me otherwise.

          October 18, 2020
          |Reply
          • Gretel
            Gretel

            “Satisfying the religious right is one goal, but preventing white women, particularly of the worker bee variety, from aborting children protects the white majority.”

            Absolutely. It wasn’t a new concept to me but I recently read a nonfiction book called White Christian Supremacy and the author does a fantastic job at summarizing how White Christian protestantism is married to white supremacy and how this affects everyone else. The concepts she explains are nothing new to people who have experienced the racism and discrimination she describes but it’s a fantastic resource for conversations and I’ll be recommending it to friends.
            I always like reading books that formulate ideas and thoughts I’ve had in a clear way so that I can build my own arguments with the facts and vocabulary I need and then also present people with a resource.

            “I absolutely love that the same people willing to resort to kidnapping and murder in the name of freedom are a-okay with women being forcibly sterilized and/or forced to give birth to babies they don’t want.”

            Yeah, it’s very telling how the lives of some people is cherished while others aren’t even seen as human or worthy of respect, decency, and human rights. Of course, the fear is twofold with abortion: one being the white supremacist and eugenisist conspiracy of replacement and the second is pure misogyny as they don’t want women to control their bodies in any shape or form.
            I’ve also realized that for conservatives unwanted pregnancies are seen as a punishment for a transgression, e.g. having sexual freedom while not being married. In the cases of pregnancy through rape, it absolutely is about shaming and punishing the victim. They usually don’t say it out loud but it’s the believe that rape victims are at fault for the rape and so the pregnancy is their punishment for being “too sexy”, etc. Pure and simple gross victim blaming.
            It’s insidious. And nothing shows you more how little they actually care about children than the concentration camps they’ve built. The atrocities committed there, to women and children, are not only tolerated, they are intentional.

            “I’d chuckle at their abject terror and status anxiety if they weren’t so deadly to me and those I care about.”

            I know what you mean because for their “logic” to work they have to bend reality, their own morals, and facts to a pretzel. The leaps and bounds they have to take to make sense of their dehumanizing politics is on an Olympic gymnast level. Just because they’re scare that other humans might be treated equally, fairly, and with decency.
            Observing that from an outsider perspective, I’ve had a few moments where I almost laughed, if it wasn’t for the fact that they want me dead.

            “From where I’m standing as an African American woman with multiple disabilities, Trump supporters are not good people, and no one and nothing will convince me otherwise.”

            I really hope that November brings the change in administration that you all deserve and need.
            And I agree with you wholeheartedly. You can’t be a good person if you want others to suffer and die. What good does it if they’re kind to their own family (which I doubt because usually that kind of toxicity spills over to every aspect of your life) but so horrendously evil to the rest of humanity.
            There can’t be footnotes and exemptions for kindness. And it was this exact position that led me to denounce my religious upbringing. “Be good to everyone! Except to [group of people] because they’re evil.” – nope, no thank you.

            October 18, 2020
          • AdAstra
            AdAstra

            This is just madness. I am so sorry it has been and is still happening. I am not going to try to convince you that Trump supporters are good people, I am very much against him and those who are on his side. Well, some of them might ok people, but if that’s the case, they are just too ignorant to understand what’s happening and/or brainwashed by religion. Either way, it is bad.

            “preventing white women, particularly of the worker bee variety, from aborting children protects the white majority” – I have never looked at abortion (which I fully support) that way, thought it was more about controlling women, but what you wrote makes sense, thank you. Makes sense in a way that it explains what’s happening, not because it’s actually sensible. I can see how those who are afraid of Black “supremacy” are the same people who actually really want to maintain white power. Not only they benefit from that and enjoy the power trips they experience that way, but can imagine are also very afraid of the tables being turned. Because then they would be on the receiving end of the horrendous treatment they have been dishing out to those who are not white…

            Also, going back to abortion, those very much against it often quickly change their minds when they or they daughters are affected conveniently performing various mental gymnastics to justify why it’s ok for their families, but completely evil when other women do it. Guess the underlying reason there is what you mentioned in your comment.

            October 21, 2020
        • AdAstra
          AdAstra

          And that’s one of the reasons why education should be free and widely available. So many more people could use their own knowledge and critical skills to diminish ridiculous claims like that regardless of who made them. But hey, that’s not going to happen as uneducated populations are easier to control and abuse. People stupidity and the way they allow themselves to be manipulated really scare me. COVID doesn’t exist, masks are oppressive, unconstitutional and attack on one’s freedom, vaccinations implant tiny robots in peoples bodies for control and tracking purposes in addition to causing autism, immigrants steal jobs and black supremacy is a real threat. Yep, all sounds legit. (sarcasm).

          October 21, 2020
          |Reply
  2. Gayaruthiel
    Gayaruthiel

    Im so sorry, Jenny 🙁

    October 16, 2020
    |Reply
  3. Katie
    Katie

    I live in the suburbs of Detroit and there’s one street in my neighborhood I try not to walk down.
    When Whitmer first locked things down I walked by with my dog and heard the woman who lived in this house talking on the phone about how “Whitmer is a tyrant and she needs to be impeached.” Her house had huge Trump banners hanging from the porch. I looked over and she was an older, morbidly obese woman. I’m not medical professional, but that combination is high-risk based on everything I’ve read. And this is just my observation walking by her house. Who knows, she could have asthma or a compromised immune system, or maybe no health issues. Either way, she’s at as much of a risk as any.
    Then George Floyd was murdered. And BLM signs started going up all over our neighborhood. It was nice to see all the support. Her house suddenly sported a confederate flag. I stopped walking down her street.
    Fast forward a few weeks and I took the dogs back down that street. Someone had written a message against Trump in chalk in front of the house next to this woman’s. It was mostly washed off, but the sentiment was clear. The woman hung a sign in sharpie on her door about bad neighbors and graffiti. The confederate flag disappeared though.
    Now her confederate flag hangs on the garage in the back, along with a QAnon flag and a Blue Lives Matter flag. Her Trump banners remain up, even as one neighbor hangs a huge BLM banner against her.
    It BOGGLES my mind someone can be so filled with hate. Because that’s what a vote for Trump is. This is not just a difference of political opinion anymore and it’s scary as fuck.

    October 16, 2020
    |Reply
    • AdAstra
      AdAstra

      “It BOGGLES my mind someone can be so filled with hate. Because that’s what a vote for Trump is. This is not just a difference of political opinion anymore and it’s scary as fuck.” I completely agree. As much as I would prefer not to, that’s exactly what’s happening. The situation in the US (and other countries where nationalism, homophobia and racism are on the rise) very much reminds me of the situation in Germany before the II World War started… And history tends to repeat itself when people don’t learn from the past. Hate only leads to more hate.
      I am UK-based, but dreading your next election. It will be even more difficult time ahead if Trump gets reelected. And the fact that someone like Kayne West, another mentally unstable individual who knows nothing about politics, is trying to take part (hopefully it won’t come to that!) makes the whole situation not only even more scary, but also very surreal. I have to admit that I have massively limited the time spend on reading news as it is not good for my mental health. Stay safe.

      October 16, 2020
      |Reply
      • Sam B
        Sam B

        Kanye is only running because he wants to get black voters to vote for him instead of Biden (because, he thinks, they would rather vote for a black man than a white man), thus increasing Trump’s chances. Unfortunately for him, black people aren’t that stupid and think he’s a shitty person, so they’re not falling for it.

        October 17, 2020
        |Reply
        • AdAstra
          AdAstra

          I really, really want to believe he is not going to get anywhere. Seems impossible, but then having Brexit and Trump as president seemed that way and yea, we are where we are ‍♀️ PS. That type of meddling should not be allowed.

          October 21, 2020
          |Reply
  4. AdAstra
    AdAstra

    I am so sorry this is happening. I hope you will find yourself in a better place soon and that there are positive things in your life you can focus on. Apart from that, I am lost for words with all the shite happening everywhere. Hugs.

    October 16, 2020
    |Reply
  5. European anxiously watching the USA
    European anxiously watching the USA

    Fuck, Jen, that is chilling. Thank you for sharing.

    October 16, 2020
    |Reply
  6. Jane Doe
    Jane Doe

    Wow, just wow…I’m sure there are crazies is every family. Sorry to hear about the situation in yours. You know the funny thing about those white “supremacists”? is that they know nothing. Once, out of curiosity because every time I fill out paperwork under “ethnicity” I can find myself, but under “race” I only ever see “white” “black” “pacific islander” and sometimes “other” and wondered “Ok, so I am of Mexican descent, but what race is that?” And my trusty friend Google says I’m technically “white” which if you think about it makes sense. Most hispanics (if not all) have European (mostly Spanish or Portuguese, maybe French) blood/ancestry and aren’t they (Europeans) white? Look at Argentinians, they are some of the whitest Latin American hispanics you could find. Anyway, back on tangent, there are a lot more “whites” than those “supremacists” think and I think it’s laughable. Like I cannot wrap my head around all those Covid deniers or conspiracy theorists. Do they seriously believe there is any government in the world that likes what is going on? It’s not just affecting some economy, it’s affecting all economies.
    As for the mask-complainers “it’s not all law!” they say. Um, the government implicitly tells us we must wear clothes in public, restaurants have signs that read “no shoes, no shirt, no service” so how come nobody has been up in arms about that? Oh right, because the people that have led us have had common sense, or at least sense enough to pretend to know what they are doing. This one? A pedantic, narcissistic man-child on a power trip. Anyway, we have a long, hard road ahead of us to try to regain some “normalcy” after Covid and after (hopefully) a circus-like regime.

    October 16, 2020
    |Reply
  7. Humanitarian Misanthrope
    Humanitarian Misanthrope

    It’s beyond awful that you’re living through this.

    I hate the world we’re living in, where people would rather believe that COVID-19 is a leftist lie than drop support for Trump. It’s awful that in Nevada, where I live, people are more upset with Governor Sisolak for the restrictions in place trying to keep COVID under control than they are about the fact that he called the National Guard on BLM protestors.

    Damn all of these callous people to hell.

    October 16, 2020
    |Reply
  8. Eclairmaiden
    Eclairmaiden

    I’m sorry this is happening to you.

    October 17, 2020
    |Reply
  9. Sarah
    Sarah

    I’m so sorry you’re going through this.

    October 17, 2020
    |Reply
  10. Monica
    Monica

    I am so, so sorry to hear that this sociopolitical dumpster-fire of a president is tearing your family apart, Jenny. ☹

    As for the wicked warlock of the West Wing and his flying monkeys, here are some interesting insights linked below:

    https://whatever.scalzi.com/2012/05/15/straight-white-male-the-lowest-difficulty-setting-there-is/

    https://whatever.scalzi.com/2016/11/10/the-cinemax-theory-of-racism/

    At this point, if you are a Trump supporter, you are a pro-covid spreading bigot not worth speaking to.

    I hate to have to label and dismiss tens of millions of people, but that’s the only way to keep safe and sane.

    I’d happily unfriend a white supremacist who advocated for white supremacist domestic terrorists, family or no, but I understand how difficult it can be to cut off ties with people you care about.

    Unfortunately, I fully expect to have to do so in the next little while, because a vote for Trump is a vote against me and mine.

    Anyone who regards abduction and assassination as handy political tools is beneath contempt and should be ostracized. Full stop.

    I tried to give these people the benefit of the doubt, but I’m all done.

    They are a bunch of genocidal hypocrites working ruthlessly to “cleanse” land they stole in order to retain power they didn’t earn and don’t deserve.

    Women are being forced under the knife to have their reproductive organs removed.

    Separated by force from their parents because they’re brown people from “shit hole countries,” children molder and die in concentration camps.

    Nearly a quarter of a million people are dead because Trump and his ilk are treating Covid like the Orkin Man.

    You are right to lock your doors, and it probably isn’t a bad idea to stock up on weapons and supplies.

    If Trump has to be dragged kicking and screaming out of the White House, his merry band of rabid brownshirts are going to launch Kristallnacht: The American Edition.

    If he manages to curb stomp our representative republic into a bloody pile of theocratic bigotopia, Kristallnacht will be the new, new normal and white supremacist domestic terrorism will be codified into law.

    Every. Single. One of his voters is responsible for the current state of things and will own the coming carnage.

    They scream about communism and socialism but haven’t the faintest idea what those words actually mean.

    None of them can articulate a clear or persuasive argument for Trump’s reelection; there preferred stance is “Biden is bad because (insert helpful thing he’s done for marginalized groups).

    It’s the marginally intelligent ones that are a bigger cause for concern, as they’ll likely aid in monitoring people and reporting back to dear leader.

    I strongly suspect that the enemies of the state are going to be in the millions and of the left-wing persuasion.

    They’re all over my community, too; there’ve been several Trump parades up and down major streets in my neighborhood.

    People have reported having been spat on, hit and threatened with knives.

    For the first time, I’m halfway agreeing with militant friends’ rants about white people, and that breaks my heart.

    October 17, 2020
    |Reply
  11. Tsunami
    Tsunami

    I am so sorry about this. It’s so hard to see the type of cognitive dissonance in America today.

    October 17, 2020
    |Reply
  12. Monica
    Monica

    For some reason, I remain in the moderation cue; do I need to edit my post or something?

    October 17, 2020
    |Reply
    • Tez Miller
      Tez Miller

      Moderator here – just got online.

      WordPress seems to automatically put comments that include links in the Pending section, rather than being automatically Approved. It’s a spam-prevention thing. Sorry I was late getting online today to approve your comment.

      October 18, 2020
      |Reply
      • Monica
        Monica

        No worries, Tez.

        I just wanted to make sure I hadn’t posted anything out of line.

        October 18, 2020
        |Reply
  13. Monica
    Monica

    Aggregated post here as reply buttons are inaccessible:

    @Grettle:
    Agreed 100 percent.

    Even more gross are the twin notions of paternal rights and compulsory womb donation that underly a lot of anti-choice (I think pro-life is a related rather than synonymous term/ideology) legislation.

    See the jerk who defended rape and incest as viable modes of propagation and the politicians who think rapists ought to have a say in whether or not their victims get to opt out of nine more months of assault.

    The party of “won’t someone think of the children” thinks a 14-year-old girl should have to face and fight her attacker in court to keep from rewarding him with the fruit of her violation.

    And to add insanity to insanity, this same party is all about leaving children born to impoverished women to fend for themselves because “personal responsibility.”
    No wonder my faith in humanity is on life support.
    @ AdAstra:

    The two objectives work in tandem and are ultimately rooted in the need to control women; women in general pay with their wombs for “amoral” and gender transgressive behavior while women from “undesirable” populations are hobbled in their efforts to “replace” desirable ones.

    Teamwork, amirite?

    The eugenics program is about more than fear of (insert non-white group) supremacy, it’s also about the preservation of “American culture and values”

    Simply put, too many of the wrong kind on this land=the imperilment of the white identity that was forcibly superimposed over it when the first European refugees (not unlike the current “guests” of Trump’s…resorts) docked.

    The other thing to consider is that for a lot of them, everything is a zero-sum game.

    Also, “black supremacy” is a fear-based straw man argument racist toss out when cornered about systemic racism and the profound and far-reaching consequences thereof.

    Equally fear based is the ridiculous notion that, once outnumbered, the “majority” will become what they were and commence to enslaving, lynching, raping and imprisoning them because vengeance.

    The outraged part of me wants to smile very, very slowly at that particular worry and go “well? Karma Jackson has been known to make the odd appearance now and then.”
    Then I remember who and what I’m dealing with and stick to countering with logic, reason and votes.

    October 21, 2020
    |Reply
  14. Rebeca
    Rebeca

    What are the chances you can change your mother’s mind on their presidential vote? They haven’t voted early, there’s a week left…

    It might help. I don’t know. I try to level with people, try to get them to see how he’s hurt them, specifically, rather than try to point out ALL the shitty things he’s done. It sucks to know they don’t care about 200k dead or rollbacks on human rights protections or environmental protections. But I show them info on how he’s hurt the middle class, even before the pandemic. I try to find common ground. I know some people are so far entrenched into their delusion nothing we can say or do will change that, but I try anyways, with cited sources.

    But it can also be so exhausting…I need to step away most often.

    I wish you all luck. Go out and vote.

    October 26, 2020
    |Reply
  15. Jen J
    Jen J

    I’m so sorry. I had to disown my Trump-voting, fanatically anti-choice family (both parents, 4 of my 5 siblings, all aunts and uncles but 1 couple) 1 1/2 years ago. My pregnancies are so agonizing that they cause suicidal prenatal depression, and YEARS of postpartum depression and PTSD. And the two children I tore my body and mind apart to make are girls. My “family” could not care less if their preferred polices torture women and children to death. They could not care less if their policies torture MY children to death.

    They just don’t care about facts or evidence or suffering at all. Which blows my mind every time I think about it.

    Bob Altemeyer explains conservatives (right wing authoritarians) in his classic book, The Authoritarians. They’re just a mob looking for a victim so they can enjoy self-righteous schadenfreude. I miss thinking that most Americans are decent human beings, but it turns out that 30-40% of them are irredeemable monsters. It’s heartbreaking, but you can’t save them.

    October 29, 2020
    |Reply
  16. Monica
    Monica

    In tears right now.

    Can’t believe what’s happening.

    I’m hoping the numbers are wrong but…

    I just can’t with this country anymore. 🙁

    November 4, 2020
    |Reply
  17. Julia
    Julia

    I get this. My mother is a nurse who sees COVID every day. She’s seen people die from it. She’s had to stay overnight at the hospital because she’s too busy to come home. And yet my extended conservative family doesn’t take it completely seriously. They think that mask mandates inhibit “freedom”. But I care about them and am worried that they will get sick.

    I am an atheist. Only my immediate family knows. Some of my extended family thinks that prayer should be in schools, that there is a crisis of faith, that faith should be in government and should be used to push right-wing policies. Needless to say, I never discuss my true beliefs.

    They oppose the Affordable Care Act. That Act has a provision that prohibits insurance companies from discriminating against people with preexisting conditions. I am autistic and have another preexisting condition. Incidentally, this other condition makes me high risk for COVID.

    I could go on.

    December 28, 2020
    |Reply
    • Monica
      Monica

      ((((((Julia))))

      Your mother is my hero; please send her my deepest thanks, for all that’s worth.

      Never forget that you, not they, are the sane one in the equation.

      I hope for your sake that your right wing family members’ reckless behavior doesn’t catch up with them or harm others;I am almost certain that the explosion of cases, as well as this newer, more dangerous strain of Covid can be put down to selfish, politically motivated and rock-stupid Thanksgiving bashes.

      I have a sister who is covidiot-ish in her refusal to give up hangouts with her friends and co-workers.

      She is 24 and thinks she’s in the clear because social media has told her that Covid only seriously sickens and/or kills old people.

      We share our living space with two elderly relatives with pre-existing conditions that would mean certain death if covid were to come calling.

      She thinks she’s bullet proof and gets her “facts” from half-baked FaceBook and Instagram randos who get off on projectile vomiting conspirasy theories all over the incurious!

      Sigh.

      Between the anti-science, pro-genocide covidiots and the privilege protectors, this country is in for it.

      December 28, 2020
      |Reply
      • Julia
        Julia

        Thank you so much. I’ll tell her.

        But yeah, my right wing relatives are probably going to get hurt. (One of them thinks that the coronavirus was caused by Bill Gates and the Democrats, and the vaccine might have microchips in it.)

        It’s frustrating.

        I hope you are okay too.

        December 31, 2020
        |Reply

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