Trump empowers whiteness: The good, bad and ugly about the election

Ten great things happened across the country on election night. Like really wonderful. I’m going to tell you about them and I want you to hang onto them and let them lift you up and help you understand that this country is not as rotten as it can seem. But first, we’ve got to talk about that bullshit.

“I don’t understand why anyone would vote for him!”

That’s that bullshit.

Yes, despite the countless think-pieces and human interest stories regarding the economic priorities of the rural white voter, the years and years of left-leaning polls and various other types of democratic hubris, the presidential election is still up in the air.

Yes, the president’s actions have led to hundreds of thousands of dead Americans. Yes, his policies have led to the destruction of families and further bankruptcy of American industries. Yes, his neglect has led to new levels of corruption and failure so high as to defy any means of measurement. And yes, even his supporters know this.

And yet even more people voted for him this time than in 2016. How could this be? What is he offering that could possibly measure up to all that he’s cost them?

Their identities.

It’s a common misconception that white supremacy is about Black and brown people. It’s not. It has nothing to do with us at all. It’s not called Black and brown inferiority, it’s called white supremacy. It doesn’t tell white people that we are worth less than them, it tells them that they are worth more than us. There is a difference.

White supremacy is a part of white people, in their identities. Now, some white people keep it beside the part of their identity that likes Coke over Pepsi. It’s easy for them to cast it aside, see what the world actually is and go get a nice Jamaican ginger beer instead.

But some white people keep it real deep inside. Some of them keep it right between their fight-or-flight response and the love for their children. They need it; can’t even begin to imagine a world without it and would do anything to defend it—even vote against every other possible interest they might have.

If you still don’t understand and you are white, perhaps you don’t fully understand the power of your whiteness. In this country whiteness not only prevents you from being stopped or falsely incarcerated or murdered by the police for your race, it not only allows you greater access to health and wealth, it doesn’t just give you all benefits of all doubts. It gives you control over your entire reality.

I’m not only talking about racial realities, either. Yes, if you’re white you get to deny the existence of racism, but you also get to deny the existence everything else. For example, if you’re white, you get to just make up your own science. You can believe in things like eugenics or that climate change isn’t real or that masks make pandemics worse. It doesn’t matter what the actual reality is because this is America and you can’t tell me what to do!

Whiteness is the most valuable thing in this country, especially if you happen to live in a part of it that offers you nothing else. Protecting whiteness is the only thing that the president has ever truly offered, and he’s kept his word. And guess what? Biden ain’t offering the same thing. He’s offering the opposite. Whiteness is gonna be a little less special under a Biden administration.

So, what’s the answer? The answer is to redesign district maps, engage voters, eliminate the Republican Party (at least in its current hellish incarnation) and do everything else you possibly can to value the citizenry and disincentivize the adversarial relationship between us.

But, you know, that’ll probably take a while.

So, for now, check out this list of ten truly incredible things that happened on election night!

The Squad won again!

Oregon decriminalized drug possession!

Oklahoma elected its first Muslim lawmaker!

Vermont elected its first-ever openly transgender lawmaker!

Delaware elected the country’s first-ever transgender senator!

New Jersey legalized recreational cannabis!

So did Arizona!

And South Dakota!

Utah and Nebraska finally took the goddamn slave language out of their constitutions!

Incarcerated citizens in California regained their right to vote on parole!

*BONUS*

Portland passed 4/5 of the referenda!


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