All your political posts are ways of saying, “Do you love me?”
I’ve read months of heated social media posts arguing between the candidates of the Democratic primaries. Why does the discussion of who should be our next President hold so much emotional energy?
Think about it. We are avidly following the blow-by-blow of televised national politics, while local politics receive far less of our time and energy. If we were motivated purely by the opportunity to be good citizens, local groups would get at least as much of our attention as the national news (if not more!)
I also see people investing more energy in arguing with friends and family members who definitely won’t change their minds, than they do in seeking the undecided and motivating the apathetic. If we were motivated purely by wanting our chosen candidate to win, we wouldn’t be wasting our time on people who have made up their minds. We’d be knocking on doors and ringing phones in undecided areas.
I’m not saying we don’t care about being a good citizen or helping our chosen candidate win. Those motivations are definitely part of the picture. But those motivations alone are not enough to explain the massive amount of time and energy your typical American spends reading, sharing, and arguing about national news.
The answer to the mystery lies in how we use the cultural discussion around public figureheads to explore the tensions of our everyday lives.
When smart, motivated, courageous women who are bypassed for promotions and opportunities post about Elizabeth Warren, there’s a deeper message there. As well as supporting Warren, they are asking their loved ones, “Do you care that MY talent and idealism and drive is overlooked and dismissed?” They are asking, “Do you care about the things that hurt me?” That’s why Warren’s choice to leave the race has been a real heartbreak for many: it symbolizes all the dreams of their own they’ve had to kill, as they navigate a misogynistic society.
I was silent about Warren because I knew I couldn’t handle having those conversations again. A part of me still hasn’t recovered from my heartbreak about Hillary.
People who’ve struggled to pay off their student debts and find a job in the recession post about their love for Bernie. They’re asking their loved ones, “Do you care about my future? Do you care about my children’s future? Do you care whether or not my toddler gets a college education? Do you care about the planet?” All of these are ways of saying, “Do you care about the things that kill my hope?”
A few weeks ago, I posted on Facebook about how much I disliked Bernie Sanders as a candidate, and for the first time in my prolific and verbose life, I had more Facebook comments than I could possibly answer. I basically got twenty essays on Bernie’s virtues. No one showed curiosity or asked questions about how I originally came by my suspicion and mistrust of this candidate.
As I read the well-argued points by his supporters, I had to ask myself where the depth of my anti-Bernie emotion was coming from. The answer was embarrassing: my ex-husband was a Sanders supporter. After realizing where my emotions came from, it became easier to view Sanders more fairly and objectively. But also: I was testing my community to see if I would be treated compassionately after expressing an unpopular opinion. Responses varied, but I was left with a sense that many Sanders supporters definitely cared about Their Dude, not about me.
As Biden picks up momentum, I see articles about how the black vote considered him the best chance to beat Trump — articles about how Sanders and Warren supporters don’t understand the deep fear that comes from having a white supremacist score a second term as President. I saw articles written by black people asking why progressives were calling their votes “uninformed” when the votes were strategic for survival. “Do you care about protecting me from racism?” black writers were asking. “Do you actually care, or do you just care about your own things?”
After Biden picked up steam, I posted an article about the sexual harassment accusations towards him, and got a lot of disgruntled agreement from other young progressives and some deep frustration from some people focused on building a strong Democratic coalition to defeat Trump. I wasn’t really posting about Biden though. I was asking, “Will a man’s success always, always, be more important than a woman’s safety? Is that just how the world works now?”
Over and over, each of us are posting, “Do you care about my opportunities? My future? My safety? Do you care, do you care, do you care?” (I haven’t heard from enough Trump supporters to really understand them, but I’m sure in their own way, they’re doing that too.)
You know what the presidential race has become every four years? Over and over people posting, “Do you care about me?” and over and over hearing, “No. No. No.”
I’m just as guilty of this as anyone. I feel so balled up in my own pain and hurt and anguish. I badly want to hear people say, “I wish the things that make you afraid were priorities for everyone.” And yet, I haven’t been expressing that I care about the things that make them afraid. I’ll try to do better.
