The New Disenfranchised

Welcome to the new America.  I think most of are still in shock.  Some of us are trying to figure out how to fix it.  Some of us think life is about to get better.  Some of us think we can just wait it out.  Some of us have just given up.  And some of us are just trying to figure out how we got here.

I fit in both the first and last categories.  I look back to the last year of the presidential campaign and now I think I should have seen this coming.  As Republican candidates dropped out of the race, Donald Trump endured for some reason.  That certainly wasn't because of his behavior.  Even the most dedicated Trump supporters couldn't say that this man has above average intelligence, the grace of a great leader, or even an acceptable level of maturity.  Yet they still voted for him in the primaries and then again in the general election.  Why was that?

Trump certainly didn't wow us with his knowledge of foreign policy or a deep understanding of the Constitution or a tough but compassionate demeanor.  In fact, every time he spoke we all found it difficult to make any sense of his ramblings and to separate his views on policy from his seemingly endless and shameless self-promotion.  How did he divorce so many Americans from their common sense?  I think there were two reasons.

First, it is easier to appeal to peoples' emotions than to their common sense.  He played on their emotions rather than providing anything of substance.  Any time a person can convince someone else to let their emotions guide them instead of common sense, that person can be made to do anything whether it makes sense or not.  Once Trump had struck an emotional win, nothing else mattered.  The phrase "Making America Great Again" was a stroke of genius. Who doesn't want America to be great?  Although most people were better off than they were in 2008, the "Again" made it sound to them like their lives were actually in decline and that Donald Trump would reverse that decline if elected.

Although the first reason doesn't do much to inspire confidence in voters, the second reason is even more sobering.  Since Trump's win, his supporters have been more vocal about their frustration with our legislative branch, their financial situations, and their desire for change.  These are all things that can be fixed, but we have to use our heads to get it done.  These people reject the notion that we can think our way to solutions to these problems.  This is compounded even more by the fact that Trump appeals to their emotions, not their intellect.  This has become acceptable and is indeed becoming the norm.  Americans are being groomed by our president to make decisions based on our emotions rather than our intellect.  In fact, some of us think this is a better way to make decisions and openly criticize those who use logic and common sense to and form their views on everything from foreign policy to immigration and race relations.  This is a dangerous trend and has been called "the dumbing down of America."

So what about disenfranchisement?  One of the definitions of disenfranchisement is to deny participation or take away someone's voice in something.  I think that we are all becoming disenfranchised.  Our participation in the determining the destiny of us as individuals and the destiny of our country is slowly being handed to a small group of elites.  Anti-intellectualism is the reason why this is happening.  We are, more and more, just accepting things that we know are wrong because some sound bite has spurred an emotion within us.  It takes less effort to really think  about it than it takes to feel something about it.  We are slowly losing our voices in government, our financial security, our collective compassion and empathy, and our control over how we will live our lives and how our children will lead theirs.  And the sad part about all this is that we are giving it away voluntarily.

The American people are becoming the new disenfranchised and we're doing it to ourselves by not questioning things when they don't make sense and by not speaking up when we see something that we know is wrong.  There's still time to turn this trend around, but we need to take action right now before it's too late.