I was kept up late last night by a constant sound of crashing. Ugly, grinding crashing.
Turns out that's what the sound of echo chambers crashing into each other sounds like.
That's what months, even years, of talking at people and past people instead of ~to~ people sounds like. When you long ago couldn't even and now it's there in front of you.
And now we've gone past and are flying out on our own vectors again.
In the shock of the crash, I'm seeing people asking the same questions.
Making the same assumptions.
Spitting the same hatreds.
Want change? This is where it starts. Or somewhere down the line we start crashing into each other again.
But that's the long term, and the abstract.
Time is for the here and now and the practical.
And the here and now is that a lot of people are terrified, for legit reasons.
And yeah, for some illegit ones too. Remember the last eight years of rolling eyes at Obama coming for their guns? And how he had a supermajority and a senatorial voting record that should've made such things a top priority? And yet it never happened? Stop, breathe, and consider that before invoking Godwin on Trump yet again.
The win and the gains are slim by anyone's reckoning. They're wins, yes. But far from being mandates.
When I was a teenager, I had a bunk bed even though I had my own room (no small feat with three siblings).
The bunk bed was used because I had a mild habit of bringing home strays with nowhere else to go for a night.
And my parents, despite being pretty solid right-wingers, never batted an eye about it. If someone darkened the door early enough, they got fed, too. They never asked what brought them to our door, nor would they have cared had they known. All they asked was that they know they were there (which kept dad from thinking they were intruders and shooting one) and that they called whatever equivalent of a parent they had to tell them they had a spot to crash. Didn't have to say where (this was before caller ID), just that they were safe. Even the shittiest parents appreciated the gesture.
The moral of that story is that more than one kid kicked out of the house for coming out of the closet spent the night safe because we cared more about people than politics.
It's influenced my habits a good bit.
Scared?
I'm here. I'm armed. I know all sorts of fun tricks for dealing with someone bigger and stronger, I'm a decent teacher of all sorts of related actions, and I have nothing but contempt for bullies.
Call if you need to.
Unfriending? Blocking?
I'd appreciate the courtesy of a goodbye go-fuck-yourself, as nobody during the campaign had the guts to bother. But fair winds to you either way.
Turns out that's what the sound of echo chambers crashing into each other sounds like.
That's what months, even years, of talking at people and past people instead of ~to~ people sounds like. When you long ago couldn't even and now it's there in front of you.
And now we've gone past and are flying out on our own vectors again.
In the shock of the crash, I'm seeing people asking the same questions.
Making the same assumptions.
Spitting the same hatreds.
Want change? This is where it starts. Or somewhere down the line we start crashing into each other again.
But that's the long term, and the abstract.
Time is for the here and now and the practical.
And the here and now is that a lot of people are terrified, for legit reasons.
And yeah, for some illegit ones too. Remember the last eight years of rolling eyes at Obama coming for their guns? And how he had a supermajority and a senatorial voting record that should've made such things a top priority? And yet it never happened? Stop, breathe, and consider that before invoking Godwin on Trump yet again.
The win and the gains are slim by anyone's reckoning. They're wins, yes. But far from being mandates.
When I was a teenager, I had a bunk bed even though I had my own room (no small feat with three siblings).
The bunk bed was used because I had a mild habit of bringing home strays with nowhere else to go for a night.
And my parents, despite being pretty solid right-wingers, never batted an eye about it. If someone darkened the door early enough, they got fed, too. They never asked what brought them to our door, nor would they have cared had they known. All they asked was that they know they were there (which kept dad from thinking they were intruders and shooting one) and that they called whatever equivalent of a parent they had to tell them they had a spot to crash. Didn't have to say where (this was before caller ID), just that they were safe. Even the shittiest parents appreciated the gesture.
The moral of that story is that more than one kid kicked out of the house for coming out of the closet spent the night safe because we cared more about people than politics.
It's influenced my habits a good bit.
Scared?
I'm here. I'm armed. I know all sorts of fun tricks for dealing with someone bigger and stronger, I'm a decent teacher of all sorts of related actions, and I have nothing but contempt for bullies.
Call if you need to.
Unfriending? Blocking?
I'd appreciate the courtesy of a goodbye go-fuck-yourself, as nobody during the campaign had the guts to bother. But fair winds to you either way.
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