A Future Drastically Changed

How my life trajectory shifted direction in November 2016

Prior to the US election in November of 2016 I had the next 5-10 years of my life planned. Not every single detail, but I knew where I was going and what I wanted to do with my life. I was going to graduate from OSU with a BS in Fisheries & Wildlife Science. I was going to get summer tech positions all over the US working as a field technician collecting samples, and cataloging plants, and electroshocking fish (hopefully not), collaring bobcats if I was lucky... I was going to have adventures and make connections with professionals in my career field. I was going to work my but off moving every six months, saving up for grad school and trying to get into one eventually. After grad school I was going to hopefully get a more permanent job, preferably somewhere in the PNW, Montana, the Dakotas, Wyoming, etc... doing something in the field of predator-livestock conflict management (if I was super lucky). I was going to make a difference, I was going to try to change people's views on predators and hopefully convince them to try non-lethal control methods. I was going to be a badass female in a field and region usually dominated by men, and hopefully make a difference in the world. 

And then Donald Trump won the US Election. Aside from the whole civil rights, women's rights, social rights consequences of this new management of the US, my career field is in crisis. Environmentalists in general are seeing a bleak future for their professions and careers, but people who are in or are looking to gain entry to government organizations that deal with land management, resource management, clean energy, and environmental issues in general are now facing massive changes in their futures as well. When I graduated, I was going to apply for jobs with the Forest Service, Fisheries and Wildlife departments, Bureau of Land Management, Department of the Interior, Park Service, etc... Now that is not likely to land me even an entry level position.

We all know republicans are fond of "small government", whatever that load of tripe means. They want to take control away from the federal level ad give back control to individual states. This "small government" idea will cripple country-wide environmental work. And it will cripple important departments nested in government. Sure, each state has it's own "fisheries and wildlife department", but they are funded, organized, and staffed by the federal sector of the Department of the Interior. Shave off funding for that, and the state departments will collapse.

For years, young up-and-coming wildlife techs have been told that the "old boys club" will be retiring soon. And now they finally are. The baby boomers are almost all reaching retirement now and leaving these government positions. There is finally the possibility of promotion to long-term positions. People who have been doing tech jobs for 5+ years can now move into management positions, research director positions, department management, and other positions that are longer than 6 month gigs. And because those seasoned techs are moving up, there's entry level positions for people coming out of college. My generation actually has a shot at getting a job. And all that hope and excitement is now gone.  When baby boomers retire, they won't be replaced. That's how republicans in the past have operated. When the federal employees in management positions retire, they don't replace them. They don't hire new blood. They just shave down the department until it's so small it doesn't have a prayer of doing anything useful. And all those hopeful young people that spent 4 years in college, $20,000+ on university fees (and that's at the low end of costs), worked their butts off every summer in volunteer positions for professors and grad students - barely making enough to pay rent, let along pay off student loans - all those people are going to be unemployed. Or at least unemployed in their field.

There is some hope in the private sector. Non-profit and NGO's have made mention that there is a possibility that a lot more individual donation funding will start flowing into them to offset the lack of interest within the government to protect the environment. Therefore, people who care about the environment will pour money into these NGO's to try and combat dangerous coal and oil interests of the new government. As these organizations grow they'll hire people who know how the system works, and independent research will flourish. But this isn't going to happen nearly fast enough to offset the number of people who are going to be out of work now. People like me are not going to have a future in this "new and great america".

My future here in the US is shot to hell. The country I was born in, the country I grew up in, the country I watched from a young age be torn apart by the selfish republican interests in middle eastern oil under the Bush administration. And then Obama happened and suddenly I had a future. The Obama administration has mitigated the damage of Bush, has reduced unemployment, brought the US back from the brink of complete collapse. And now, after 8 years of hope and progress, we're going to backslide about 10 years in the next 4 under Trump's administration. My future career chances are gone. My 5-10 year plan is going to have to wait. 3 months ago I knew how my life was going to go. And now I get to struggle all over again to figure out what the fuck to do with my life.

I cannot exist in this country under a Trump Administration. I want to be the person that stays and fights. I want to stand up for civil rights, women's rights, environmental issues... I want to march in protests and vote locally, create civil disobedience, stand up for what is right, counter racist, sexist, homophobic motherfuckers that have the audacity to publicly try to intimidate others. I want to be the kind of person who fights back. But in 3 months I already feel completely hopeless and Trump hasn't even been inaugurated yet. Every news feed about his cabinet members, every tweet by him, every nasty person celebrating the new government, every announcement about repealing Obamacare and defunding Planned Parenthood, and I feel like i'm drowning in despair. I feel completely hopeless and scared shitless and I don't think I can live like this for 4 years. I can't deal with this crushing fear and hopelessness, watching people get hurt, watching people die and struggle and the environment become even more damaged and have to listen to people who care about nothing other than money running the government. I know myself pretty well, and I know my limits. Mentally, I don't think I can handle living with this kind of stress and depression day in day out for 4 years.

I need to do something useful with my life. I need to be a force for good out there in the world making a difference, however small it may be. I need to help people somehow, alleviate hardships somewhere in the world, be a symbol that not every american is a fucking selfish uneducated pig. So I applied to the Peace Corps. I am hoping to hell that I get in, that they send me to Paraguay to do something environmental or agricultural. Living in a local community, using my degree to help other people and the environment at the same time, learning a new culture, learning about people and their lives, experiencing things I would never encounter in the US. An added bonus would be a nearly complete media blackout. It's unlikely i'll have access to Facebook, unlikely that i'll be bombarded by more bad news about whatever shit Trump has done next, unlikely that I'll be faced with constant depression and hopelessness. I can exist for 2.5 years in a place where my presence is a help, not a hinderance, gaining experience, hopefully impacting other people's lives in a good way, and keeping myself sane until the 2020 election.

I want to be a fighter and stick it out, adding my voice to the majority of americans that did not want Trump as their new dictator. I want to, but I know that's not in me. I'm not strong enough to do that for 4 years. Just as I knew I couldn't be an environmental lawyer in the US with our already fucked up government, I can't stick around here for 4 years. So I'm going, getting out of dodge and keeping myself strong and healthy until I can come back and live in a country that has the same values that I have, that supports all it's citizens, that cares about the vulnerable people in society, that cares about the environment, not just increasing politicians bank accounts...

The Nightmare of Reality and Moving Forward with Purpose and Vision

Facing a world with Donald Trump as the USA President-elect...

So on that fateful Tuesday we all waited to see what would happen in the USA 2016 election. While people were vaguely concerned about Trump winning, it didn't seem likely. Then again, everything to do with this election hasn't seemed likely and yet it has all been happening. So when we then woke up on Wednesday, November 9th everything seemed like a bad dream. I myself had work at 7am that morning, so I had gone to bed around 10pm before anything was certain... Inevitable, yes, but not yet certain. So while I suspected what had happened I did not know for certain and was in denial for a good 5 hours. And then I realized that this was my new reality and I needed to get used to it. 

I probably spent the next 2 or 3 hours being quite depressed and upset, but still, things weren't too bad in my head at that point. Until I realized what a Republican President, House, and Senate would mean for the USA and the world as a whole. And then I couldn't switch my brain off. Everything was swirling like a maelstrom in my head; LGBTQIA+ rights, gay marriage, women's right to choose and abortion access and legal consequences, healthcare and access for low income families, the environment, Trump's climate change denier appointment as head of the EPA, Endangered Species Act future support, my future career choice of conservation biology... Everything that is important to me went from being supported and protected by the government to facing complete dissolution and active threats from the entirety of the government. The fact that republicans now control the executive (presidency), legislative (congress), and judiciary (supreme court) branches of the government terrified me.

When Obama was president republicans chafed under his "control", but his presidency has been plagued from the very start by a gridlocked congress. In the beginning, democrats controlled the senate and republicans the house, and Obama managed to make some progress with congress. However, then the republicans took control of the senate as well, and then Obama's hands were virtually tied behind his back for the majority of his presidency. So while republicans were not happy with Obama as president he couldn't do as much "damage" as they feared he would if congress hadn't blocked him at every turn. However, democrats are now faced with a very different situation. Republicans now control the house, senate, presidency, and will likely have the choice of the new supreme court justice filling Scalia's spot.

They prevented Obama from carrying out his constitutional privilege of appointing the supreme court justice on the basis of them wanting the next president to choose because then the "people would be choosing". Regardless of the fact that this is perhaps the stupidest argument I have ever heard, it worked for them. The president-elect of the US is Donald Trump, the republican candidate, and as such he will appoint someone and congress will gladly accept that person, and then we will have a majority-conservative supreme court that will likely then attempt to overturn gay marriage rights, abortion rights, women's rights, equal pay for equal work laws, environmental protection laws, and everything else the House majority leader that looks like a turtle has suggested so far. There are also 2 justices on the supreme court over the age of 80, so there is a possibility that they too may need replacing in the near future. Ruth Bader Ginsberg (83) and Anthony Kennedy (80) are the oldest members of the supreme court. While Ruth Ginsberg is famed (or notorious, depending on who you ask) for supporting liberal ideology and protecting social rights of people. Anthony Kennedy on the other hand is shaky at best when it comes to protecting individuals rights and the environment. While he has not voted to overturn Roe vs. Wade, he has been the swing vote that often allows more restrictions on abortions and state decisions to restrict access. He also is shaky on protections for the LGBTQIA+ community. He was the swing vote striking down measures that would actively stop gay couples from claiming domestic partnership, however he also refused to support anti-discrimination laws for gay people. If Ruth is not able to hold out for the next 4 years, we are faced with an overwhelmingly conservative supreme court, and if Kennedy kicks the bucket, he will likely be replaced by someone much less likely to support individuals freedoms.

So the stark truth of reality is now facing us. Trump's picks for "Secretary of ___" make the simple fact that he is president-elect even more terrifying. Add to that the republican agenda of squishing the light of progress out of the world, and the idea of a conservative majority supreme court and you've got my personal nightmare and the US version of the Nazi regime mixed in with dictatorship and communism in Russia. Yay.

I have spent the last two weeks in a mixture of being okay for a few hours, to the most incredible despair I have ever experienced. I spent a good two weeks getting maybe 3-4 hours of sleep each night, and what sleep I did get was interspersed with nightmares and waking up frequently. Not a good way to keep up with schoolwork. On top of that I burst into tears and had panic attacks randomly throughout the days if I thought too hard about things. I couldn't get schoolwork done. I couldn't concentrate in class. I fell behind on homework. My nerves were shot to hell. When I heard loud voices in the street outside my house I always listened to see if they were harassing anyone, prepared to fly out my front door with my pepper spray and give them hell.

I'm not even a minority ethnicity or religion. Yes, i'm female, so I am naturally worried about the normalization of sexual assault and the lack of respect for women, their wishes, their consent, etc... But other than that i've got a lot of things going for me. I will fully admit that I am privileged. I am a white middle-class female with good family support. I'm atheist, so that's not great in this country but it's not seen as an immediate threat worth being expelled from the country over. I'm i'm scared, I can't even begin to comprehend how people who are actually at risk of verbal and physical abuse are feeling. People who already experience rampant racism and hatred towards them for their skin colour, religion, sexuality, and clothing choices related to their religion, etc... People who have already lived their entire lives being targeted because of who they are, attacked by random strangers with verbal slurs, aggression, and even physical violence are even more at risk now. Trump has "normalized" the "Alt-Right" which is really just a glamorized way of representing the white supremacist/Nazi agenda.

The more cabinet members Trump picks, the less likely it looks like this government is going to work for making all americans lives better. This government will take care of the rich old white people with political ties, and pretty much everyone else is screwed. Even the people who most vehemently support Trump will in the end suffer from this election. They think he's going to wave a magic wand and suddenly they'll all be millionaires? There's going to be a very rude awakening for some people. But his supporters who overlooked or even embraced every single character flaw and lie... Will they even notice that they are suffering for their choices? Or will they continue to blame everything on the "dirty lying cheating liberals" that they see as a parasite on this country? Sadly, it's probably the latter.

I see a bleak future for this country for the next 4 years. An undoing of all the progress made in the last decade. A fall back to the "great" times of America where women, minority religions, and people of colour were subjugated by white conservative christian zealots and their backwards agenda. I see a world where we will fall back by at least 20 years into the past. We will fall behind pretty much every country in the world. America is already the laughing stock of the world. Now we are not only a global joke, but a terrifying out of control torpedo that could hit other countries and do devastating damage with very little warning or provocation.

I see very scary times approaching and i'm currently planning my escape. I'm planning how to get out of this black hole as fast as possible. I'm planning on joining the Peace Corps where I can hopefully do some good in the world, where I can make a difference in people's lives. Where I can spend 2.5 years without having to worry about my future, where I can focus on the here and now while doing meaningful work, traveling, learning new cultures and languages, and learning more about myself and what I am capable of. When I get back I'll be faced with a few months of political campaigning and then an election that will hopefully get this country back to a place of sense and caring. If not, I can then apply to graduate school in Norway, which was already part of my plan. I can get out of this terrifying place and get a foothold in Europe, hopefully find a niche there for my specific skill set and integrate with life there and not have to return.

Part of me wants to stay and fight, fight for people's rights and for those who need the help. Part of me wants to tough it out and come out the other side stronger than before, knowing that I made even a tiny little difference with my resistance to bigotry and hate. But the larger part of me is just too terrified to even consider what that kind of life would be like. My parents moved my family from South Africa to escape what was quickly becoming a tyrannical government. They wanted my sister and I to have a better life than what was offered to us there. They wanted us to be safe, to have careers, to find meaning in our lives and experience all the things they never did. And now I see that vision of theirs dying. I see their hopes and dreams for us being flushed down the toilet. Maybe not for my sister, an iOS app developer in the Silicon Valley tech hub of California... She'll likely be fine and untouched by this. But the career path that I have chosen and worked towards for nearly 4 years of my life is slowly fading and shattering. My career was going to take me to places like back-country South Dakota and rural Colorado... Places where sexism and racism flourishes unhindered. Places where I would already not be welcome as a woman working for the federal government. I was willing to work at it, to quietly prove my worth to a community that didn't want my presence. I was willing to suck up my opinions and work with people I don't necessarily agree with to try and make progress on carnivore conservation and environmental education, even if I was faced with resistance. However, I am not willing to put myself in the way of bodily harm and person attacks. I am not willing to sacrifice my morals and everything I believe in. I am not willing to sacrifice my sense of safety and happiness fore years...

So, my plan is to get out of dodge as fast as possible. I'm just sorry that for so many people this plan of action isn't an option.

Those who have fallen by the wayside...

My High School Fellow's sheer Moronity... 

If that's even a word. 

(if not, it should be)

Recently, a teacher from my high school that I keep in contact with posted something on facebook about why people were or were not voting for Trump in the upcoming election, and for people to please not drag Hillary into the discussion. There were some simple responses of I will not vote for him, and some I will vote for him's. There were of course the quintessential posts about "he'll make america great again" and all that claptrap. And then there was a post by someone stating that she was definitely not going to vote for Trump because...

Person #1: "He is a greedy racist narcissistic ignorant asshole who cares about no one but himself. He doesn't give a shit about our country, he just wants the attention and is pandering to fear"

Pretty solid stuff right? Nothing we haven't all heard before as a viable reason not to vote for Trump in the 2016 election. Nothing too unreasonable here. I continued this sensible discourse with a comment of my own, showing my support and appreciation for her beliefs with...

Me: "Agree with everything you said! He's got a media deal going for when he loses... He's so good at drawing attention it's the perfect business for him to go into next." 

Also a pretty solid reply. Not too "nasty" or anything. Just the belief that he has found his true calling and that is "media whore", but said much nicer than that. Unfortunately, as is common on Facebook, someone replied to my simple comment with an inflammatory statement.

Person #2: "What would you say Hillary is best at? Protecting our troops? Ha! Not a chance"

I was somewhat taken aback at this, as we had been talking about Trump's true gift as media central, nothing to do with the military, his position on protecting troops abroad, foreign policy, or anything relating to those. We were simply commenting on him ability to grab attention and draw people in. As I am not the greatest lover of the military in the US or the purposes to which it is used, I found myself unable to not answer such an off-the-wall inflammatory comment. Just too good an opportunity to pass up.

Me: "(teacher's name) did kindly ask people not to bring Hillary into this as it is a discussion about Trump's shortcomings, not "who is worse at ____"... But to answer your question even though it probably wasn't directed at me... Well, as I really don't think american troops should be occupying other countries because the US government destabilized those regions in the first place, no I really don't give a shit about that. And I would say Hillary is less likely to start a nuclear war, so in that scenario she is the better option for not only protecting troops, but everyone in the damn world."

In retrospect, I can see how my statement, when read by an individual who's brain runs on a very different wavelength than my own, might be construed differently than the intended meaning. When typing my response, I was thinking how I have never heard Trump say a single thing about protecting any Troops, just about how he thinks it's okay to blow up the family members of terrorists, and how waterboarding is totally fine if it gets results, and even if it doesn't, they probably deserved it. (For those not aware, the killing of innocent family members and waterboarding are considered hate crimes and torture). I was also thinking about how the last republican president sent our troops into dangerous situations in order to cause chaos and gain control over crude oil natural resources for the US to make a profit off of. So, when I was saying that american troops shouldn't be occupying other countries I was thinking that it is immoral to invade another sovereign nation for the express purpose of stealing something that belongs to them to then make a profit ourselves. A side effect of that initial action by our great president Bush was the destabilization we now see in the Middle East, the rise of multiple different terror groups - usually initially funded in part by the US government for some legitimate purpose, or supplied with weapons for something that would have benefitted us... probably. So my comment about the destabilization was just mentioning that I recognized why there were troops there to begin with, even though I don't think they should have ever been placed there. It was my way of saying that I don't support our invasion of other countries, but I kinda get why we haven't pulled out completely just yet. And then my wonderful and lyrical comment about how Hillary might just have the mental capacity to avoid WWIII, whereas I'm not so sure if Trump is sentient enough to manage that.

I then had the very great pleasure of this response:

Person #2: "youre a god damn idiot" (yes, the punctuation was missing, not an error on my part)

Now at this point I was genuinely curious as to who this person insulting me was. He had written other rude comments on other people's voting choices, and I had a vague feeling I recognized the name. Now remember, the person who started the post was a teacher that I had in high school, so I did not discount the possibility that this rude individual calling me an idiot might be someone that I had met while in high school in Bend, OR. So, as the logical solution to being curious about who someone is, I stalked him on facebook. And to alleviate any confusion that statement might incur, I mean that I clicked on his profile and started rummaging through pictures. To my not-entirely-great astonishment, I not only recognized the person's face, but I actually remembered who they were, and that we had come into contact before while in school together. Not personally as friends or even acquaintances, but interacting with friends of friends of friends... I did remember his face, his speech pattern, even the time he accidentally smacked his friend in the balls.

His pictures on the endlessly useful facebook showed an very muscled young man, who appears to be on a fire fighting crew, spends time firing guns in the wilderness, hunts, fishes, and is pretty much the usual suspect of all around country-boy conservative that I have grown to despise with almost every fiber of my being. (Not every fiber, as I reserve at least 20% of my being for the ownership of my dog, haha).

I of course could not let the challenge to my intellect go unanswered, so I responded thus:

Me: "If having an opinion that differs from your backwards notions makes me an idiot, then I will wear that title proudly. Just because I do not support invading other countries to take control of their natural resources for US profit does not make me an idiot. Similarly, thinking that Hillary is the safer option for maintaining some sort of "world peace", also does not make me an idiot. 
And you are a budding war monger as far as I can see... Do you really want to start in on personal insults? I can come up with plenty, but I really don't see the point."

Now, I was really on my high horse, greatly enjoying being on the high moral ground for not being the first to issue a personal insult. And I was really looking forward to what he would respond with, because I had already pigeon-holed him into the type of person who gets so upset when he cannot understand one's argument or see their point of view that they resort to aggression tactics and attempts to either upset or intimidate their opponent so that they win. That kind of thing doesn't really work on me as the more aggressive they get trying to intimidate me, the more riled up and aggressive I get in return. I'm that unusual type of female that doesn't cower when a man yells at her, but instead puts on steel toed boots, grabs the nearest weapon, and prepares for battle. Unfortunately, the original poster of the discussion decided that it was time to put an end to the brewing storm, and removed my old high school "buddy" from the conversation because personal insults are not nice...

So I will never know what he would have said in response to me. I do know that he was later invited back into the conversation, probably with a warning to behave, and he promptly proceeded to confirm my worst fears about republicans and rural conservatives. Not only did he rail against Hillary or use every attempt to malign her, but he also vehemently supported everything about Donald Trump, his policies, his "beliefs", his speeches, and the fact that he wore an american flag pin about the size of a penny, was apparently a great sign of support for our wonderful military. The fact that Hillary does not accessorize similarly appeared to be a great personal insult to this male from my past.

On the same FB post, another person (person #3) extensively listed why they were not partial to Trump's political stances...

Person #3:

To which that asshole person #2 just had to respond...

Person #2:



I could have summarized all that, but I really didn't feel like tainting my own soul by typing any of that utter shit from person #2. I always knew that there were backwards people out there that could not only justify Trump's skewed world view and principles, but actually agree with them. I just never realized that I might have actually come into contact with them. And now i'm struggling to reconcile this new world view, and the fact that whenever I visit home I may come into contact with this person. If I do, i'm going to really struggle not to give him the ultimate glare of death that I was notorious for in high school. If looks could kill there would be a glorious line of bodies trailing behind me, mainly of assholes like this.

I know that there's this whole "freedom of speech" thing that conservatives and liberals alike enjoy protecting their speech. And sure, I'll respect your right to say and believe whatever you want, but hell to the no will I respect what this guy believes... As far as i'm concerned, people like this do nothing to enhance their community. They sit around, drinking beer and complaining about how the liberals are making their lives shitty. Instead of working hard, educating themselves, contributing to their community and the world, they just complain about their lot in life and vote in fuckers that will only make things worse for people like them. And if things do get worse, they continue to blame the liberals, not the republicans that are actually in charge.

These people are so obsessed with military glory, with our "brave troops", with the idea that America is the "greatest and most powerful country in the world", when in reality the whole world both laughs their asses off at our backwards-ness and inability to make a smart choice whenever it is presented to us. While also being freaking terrified that we'll let someone like Trump actually rule over us, because that will have world-wide consequences for them as well. When people like this exist in the world, its really hard to look past this and see the somewhat-sensible republicans out there that are just trying to make the best out of a shitty situation in their party. I cannot respect them for voting for Trump, even if he is their party nominee, but I can somewhat see where they're coming from in that they don't like him, but are voting for their party to have control of government for the next 4 years.

But those who not only vote for Trump but espouse everything he touts from his podium on high... those people scare the shit right out of me. Those people are the ones who give the rest a bad name, who go to rallies and scream that Obama is a muslim, those are the ones whose FB profile pics show them holding big assault rifles, sipping a can of beer, sitting in their big-ass jacked up truck, with a huge american flag hanging out the window, wearing camo, and possibly even taking a selfie with a dead deer, all at the same time. These are the guys that make me scared to walk down a street at night, that make me nervous of daring to voice my opinion in a public space, who would beat up someone just because they have a different opinion, who would go down to a voter station deliberately to intimidate minorities out of voting... Those are the guys that allowed Trump to be the republican nominee, and those guys are the ones who will riot when Trump isn't elected in 7 days...

And If there is any god(s) out there that I haven't recognized as a thing yet, please intervene in this madness for the whole world's sake. If you really did make the world, surely you don't want to see everything in it burn because Trump felt insulted by a something Putin said about his hair... There are much better reasons to watch the world burn than that, I'm sure...

Who Really Owns the Media?

Bernie's Revolution... A new age of politics

We live in a country that prides itself on having freedom of speech and press, but how free is it really? Can we say what we like in the media? Yes, legally we can, but what does freedom of press really mean in this country? To me, it means that whoever has the most money and will give newspapers the biggest headlines can buy the attention of the media. That sounds like having a significant other with incredibly loose morals who will spend time with anyone who can pay for it... You can see where I'm going with this I hope.

For instance, Oregon had it's primaries this week, and as we drew closer to the 17th, the media was pushing more and more heavily the idea that Hillary Clinton actually is the favored candidate in this incredibly liberal state. All I saw on the politics pages of every major news network was how Bernie didn't really have a chance here, how his following was really just a very small (if loud) group of radical democrats, and how Clinton was obviously going to win by a landslide. But that didn't actually happen. Bernie won the primary 55% to Clinton's 44%, which is a pretty big margin. By contrast, Kentucky had such a close primary that Clinton's reported win margin so far is 0.5%. The more the media continues to claim that Bernie doesn't have a shot at this, that Bernie supporters should get with the program and switch to Clinton Camp, the less likely we are to want to compromise.

There's something about being lied to by the media that just pisses me off. I hate how impossible they find it to be impartial, or at least give due credit to the other democratic candidate running for president. They focus in on Clinton and barely even give mention to Bernie, despite the fact that for the first time in what is probably several decades, people between the ages of 18-30 actually give a fuck about primaries and are showing up in huge numbers to vote. That's a big deal, and it's not because of Clinton. The fact that mainstream media gives almost no credence to Bernie's campaign, that they reluctantly even mention it, and that even popular shows like Trevor Noah's Tonight Show fail to even mention that Bernie is running against Hillary is a problem. Bernie is running a social media campaign because the real media won't give him the coverage he needs to reach people, and they don't give him the time because they know he's not going to give them anything for it. He doesn't have the funding to buy them, so we are instead given an unequal view of the candidates. And We Don't Want Clinton. 

She does not appeal to the younger age group in this country. She doesn't show any interest in supporting our issues, or even listening to our concerns. The younger generation is increasingly concerned about developing a less toxic energy source, with harnessing the power of wind, water, and sun instead of catering to big oil companies. The younger generation wants someone to recognize that the system of continually rising education costs, the devaluation of a college degree, and the never-ending student debt that will follow us around forever doesn't work. Clinton has been in the system so long and gotten so used to dealing with the "real adults" in the world... the baby boomers, our parents generation, the immovable people who were more concerned about lowering taxes and getting out of the recession than in improving on the political system, and in looking forward towards the future.

It's not Clinton's turn. I know she's waited a long time. She thought she had it in the bag in the 2004 election, but then Obama won. Then he had a second term. How in 2016 people claim that it's her turn, that it's time to have a woman president, that she has the political experience and knows how to work the system... That's exactly what we (the millennial generation) don't want. We don't want a conformist who's going to follow the system that we consider broken. We don't want someone who is comfortable caving into and being supported by big oil companies. We don't want Hillary Clinton to be our first female president. We want someone like Elizabeth Warren someday. Someone who stands for the things we believe in, someone who is moving with the times and who is not beholden to any one corrupt entity. We want someone who remembers what it's like to be with the little people, who argues for us and our issues. We want someone we can trust, and unfortunately that person is just not Hillary Clinton. There's too much uncertainty and mistrust associated with her. She lies through her teeth almost incessantly, and that's not a quality we want in the person making our decisions for us. 

Now I don't discount the many contributions that Hillary has made to the cause of gender equality in this country. She has a place in history that cannot and should not be disputed. She is an iconic figure in the rise of women from homemakers and wives to strong people with high-powered careers just as valid as their husband's jobs. But I'm sorry to say its still not her turn and likely never will be. 

Hillary may have the media in her back pocket paving the way for her to the presidency, or at least to the presidential candidacy, but if she thought it would be an easy time of it, we've shown her that she has another thing coming. Bernie's movement is not something that will just go away if she wins the primaries. We're here to stay and if she wants our support she's going to need to change up some things, and definitely improve on her lack of interest in the younger generations. We've been woken up to our political reality and we're going to fight tooth and nail to make sure our issues and concerns are addressed. The time when college students and young adults didn't pay attention to politics is over, and if Clinton does win and doesn't change her attitude towards us, and show some interest in hearing our voice, then she'll lose herself the presidency.

Of course, I myself will vote for her if she wins the primaries, but I know plenty of democrats and Bernie supporters so disgusted by the media's lack of coverage and the DNC's lack of support for Bernie that they refuse to support Clinton in any way. They will not vote at all if it means voting between her and Trump, and that's a problem. The party is so heavily divided right now that if she is the candidate, she's going to have to put herself out there to bring in the Bernie supporters. We're not just going to concede gracefully and join her side. She's going to need to extend the proverbial olive branch or she'll go down in history as the candidate who willingly lost to Donald Trump. Unfortunately, I can really only see a few choices for Clinton here... choose Bernie as her VP running mate, choose Elizabeth Warren as her VP running mate, or some other senator that appeals to the younger generation. Unfortunately, Warren is probably out because there will be the need to balance Clinton's womanhood with a man or people will get pissy. But if Clinton rejects Bernie out of hand, then she's going to have a democratic revolution on her hands that she probably won't survive.

The Trump Campaign

The Rise of Fascism in the US

The Mirriam-Webster Dictionary defines fascism as " a way of organizing a society in which a government ruled by a dictator controls the lives of the people and in which people are not allowed to disagree with the government". Wikipedia defines it as "a form of radical authoritarian nationalism that came to prominence in early 20th-centruy Europe and is usually placed on the far-right within the traditional left-right spectrum". 

FascismUS.com quotes from Mussolini - "Fascism should more appropriately be called corporatism because it is a merger of State and corporate power"; Lenin - "Fascism is capitalism in decay"; and Sen. Huey Long's warning - "Fascism will come to America in the name of anti-fascism. I'm afraid, based on my own long experience, that fascism will come to America in the name of national security." 

This website also lists 14 characteristics of fascism:

1. Powerful and continuing nationalism
2. Distain for the recognition of human rights
3. Identification of enemies/scapegoats as unifying cause
4. Supremacy of the military
5. Rampant sexism
6. Controlled mass media
7. Obsession with National Security
8. Religion and government are intertwined
9. Corporate power is protected
10. Labor power is suppressed
11. Distain for intellectuals and the arts
12. Obsession with crime and punishment
13. Rampant cronyism and corruption
14. Fraudulent elections

The scary thing is, I recognize all of these points and characteristics as things that have become commonplace in the current US political system. Bertrand Russell warned us of the current political plight we now find ourselves in, either under Cruz or Trump:

"The next step in a fascist government is the combination under an energetic leader of a number of men who possess more than the average share of leisure, brutality, and stupidity. The next step is to fascinate fools and muzzle the intelligent, by emotional excitement on the one hand, and terrorism on the other." ~Bertrand Russell

Links:

http://www.fascismusa.com/

When the Nazi's rose to power in Germany, they began as a small group of radical extremists. They were a small and minor "official" police group in the German SA (Sturmabteilung or "storm troopers") commonly known as "Brown shirts" similar to the Italian Dictator Mussolini's "Black shirts". Both Mussolini and Hitler started out their political careers in their respective National Socialist parties, appealing initially to young, nationalistic, working class men. Both had an air of legitimacy to their bid for power, climbing the political chain more or less legitimately.

Hitler made a grab for power early on in his leadership of the National Socialist German Workers Party (Nazi for short), and was imprisoned for it. At his trial, he was so passionate in his speech about returning Germany to the world as the great nation it once was, that the judges felt sorry for him and reduced his sentence to 5 years. He was released after 9 months in part due to public sympathy and appreciation for his frankness and national pride. From there, he drew a lot of german youth who were dissatisfied with the options available to them, particularly difficulty getting work, feeling that foreigners were taking their jobs, feeling as though they were owed more and resenting anyone who wasn't as German as they were. Jews have always faced a lot of persecution, in part because they tend to have good jobs, are well respected, and have a strong community that helps them succeed in life. The working class youth saw these things that they wanted and decided they could take them from others because they "deserved" it for being more german than others were.

Fear is an amazing motivator. As Russia had a revolution in which the Communist Party took over, Germany became worried by the rising interest in Marxist ideas and communism. The Nazi party used the Reichstag Fire (some believe Hitler himself engineered the fire) to "fan the flames" of anti-communist fear and solidify his position in politics by promising to rout the group of "dutch communists" that had started a fire to burn down the parliament building. From 3,000 members in 1920, the Nazi party rose to 108,000 strong in 1929, pulling in extremists from the right wing conservative faction of german government and lower-middle class workers who wanted better pay and more jobs.

Hitler used the SA brownshirts as street thugs to enforce his ideas and destroy anyone who didn't agree with or support him. The brownshirts began as a movement of public thugs, but soon became legitimate as first the police supported their marches and vandalism, and then many police became brownshirts themselves. If a newspaper printed anti-Nazi articles, made fun of Nazi leaders, or disagreed with Nazi propaganda, the brownshirts would march in and throw typewriters out of windows, beat people up, smash windows and doors down, and steal personal items without the police lifting a finger to stop them. As the brownshirts gained followers and people joined, they began to disrupt other political parties meetings, breaking them up and even roughing up the people attending. They transformed from a small group of violent and unorganized extremists into a well-organized gang of political thugs, were given weapons and legitimate government positions and the authority not only to beat people up, but to take them away for questioning. Few returned in condition in which they were taken away, if they were ever seen again.

This all happened fairly slowly at first. From the historical records I can find, various interviews with people who survived the Nazi's regime, and Hitler's own books, it seems as though the initial stages of Nazi control were fairly subtle and unthreatening. People ignored the preliminary warning signs, thinking that there was no way sensible people in their country would ever vote someone like Hitler into power. It was all just smoke with no flame to be concerned about. Until it wasn't. Until it became real. Until Hitler did get voted into office, became a dictator, and began to slaughter millions of people from Jews to the mentally/physically handicapped.

The reign of fear and anti-semitism and thuggery in those times is mirrored in our own history today. In the US, we are constantly told to fear terrorist attacks. Ever since 9-11, even the hint of a bomb or a plane crash immediately sets people looking for a terrorist. It's like the "where's waldo" of America now. We are all so terrified of foreign terrorism, not only do we not afford domestic terrorism the concern it is due, but we overlook it entirely and claim it to be "just stuff that happens". Mass shootings are a form of domestic terrorism. Blowing up Planned Parenthood facilities is domestic terrorism. Shooting up a black church because the people there happen to have a different coloured skin is racist domestic terrorism. And yet we are all more concerned about ensuring that the TSA airport security confiscates an old ladies short sewing scissors and throwing away shampoo.

Donald Trump inspires a zeal of hatred against people of different colours, religions other than christianity, women, the LGBTQ community, and pretty much every other group apart from fat, white, middle-aged gun-happy morons and their gun-happy bible-thumping sons. He literally tells people in his rallies to go and beat up anyone who disagrees with them. He promotes violence as a way to achieve goals. He stereotypes muslims and hispanics, he is a sexist pig when it comes to women, pretty much categorizing us as a pair of breasts and a piece of meat to have sex with. He preys on the weak-minded people's fears, telling us we need to get rid of the Mexicans because they are taking all our jobs, we need to bomb the middle east because that's where all the terrorists are, we need to piss off every other major country in the world, just to show everyone how big our collective nationalist dick is.

Trump supporters are obsessed with nationalism, just as the Nazi's were. Everything is about "Making America Great Again" and "'Merica" nonsense. Wearing red/white/blue clothing, waving a flag (often the confederate flag) for no good reason, and singing patriotic songs while ganging up and  beating the crap out of someone smaller than they are while outnumbering them 10:1. Yea, really fair odds there.

And as a quick note, illegal immigrants in the US find it extremely difficult to get a job. They are not "stealing american's jobs", because you need a valid Social Security Number in order to get a legitimate job. As illegal immigrants do not have a SSN, they cannot be employed and paid legally. So instead of saying that the "Mexicans are stealing our jobs", you should really be pissed off at the American business men who are too cheap to pay a fair wage to you americans and instead pay meager pittance under the table to illegal immigrants.

The point of this blog post however, is just to illustrate how shockingly similar Trump supporters are to the "brownshirts" of the Nazi party that nearly took over Europe and destroyed the world as we know it. History is repeating itself here. The Germans were so sure that Hitler couldn't possibly be elected in a fair election, but he did. I was sure in the beginning that people couldn't really be stupid enough to believe Trump's lies and bullshit. But I guess I was wrong, because it's happening right before our eyes. If he is elected, how long do you think it will be before his supporters start setting fires to jewish and muslim owned businesses and houses. How long before they attack LGBTQ bars and meeting places because they are homophobic little creeps. How long before they set fire to women's health organizations like Planned Parenthood. How long before "free speech" is only free if it follows the appropriate mantra of America is the greatest, Trump is wonderful. How long before we go from being a slightly dysfunctional democracy to a dictatorship where the people who are supposed to keep us safe (police) turn into a fascist enforcer group who beat up anyone who doesn't hold to the status quo.

Nazi's, Stasi, KGB, Trump supporters... they're all the same in the end and they're coming for America. That's what we should be afraid of and working to prevent. Not building a wall between the US and Mexico, not waving our metaphorical penises in the air to see who has the biggest balls, and not being so obsessed with "terrorism" that we loose site of domestic terrorism.

There's more at stake here than who gets to live in the white house. I for one do not see a bright future for the US unless we really say no to the Trump supporters and start some proactive actions to ensure that they cannot turn into the new "brownshirts" pushing the Nazi regime. But the US has never been good about being proactive. We're a reactive nation that waits until the very last moment, that waits until nearly all hope is lost before actually getting up off our asses and doing something for the world, not just for ourselves. We're cowards, and probably always will be. It might just be the end of us.