I had hoped to be writing a very different blog post this morning. But the election results are in, and Donald Trump has been elected the next president of the United States.
The New York Times is still showing Hillary Clinton as having won the popular vote. And so discussions about reform of the electoral process needs to occur, as it has for a long time.
But more importantly, Trump’s victory shows that the fears he played on, that the election is rigged and that powerful conspiracies are at work to keep the little guy down. Those fears have been used to manipulate people for a very long time, and have led to some of history’s worst atrocities. Trump’s victory shows that his claims were false, does it not?
As I look for something to cling to, as the future looks dim and uncertain, I grasp at the possibility that perhaps, if this makes the privileged who felt disenfranchised feel less so, perhaps they can let go of some of the uncritical thinking and xenophobia that has left them open to manipulation in the manner that led to Trump’s victory.
That is probably just wishful thinking. But it is all I have left this morning…
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