Having watched the returns come in and listened to the people commenting, I heard everything except what really spoke to this election – and probably others as well.
The United States is a racist, sexist, anti- minority country. Trump’s election says it will be continue to be so for quite some time. This country started out using Africans to do the work of building, cleaning, and doing everything else while those who called themselves “citizens” did very little of that kind of work – or any kind of work except building a culture and society which denigrates those considered to be “less than.” Africans were stolen and held in bondage being forced to work free. We are a country which had its beginnings and growth using slaves. Human Beings we stole from Africa and forced to live out their lives in the most horrible of circumstances.
Over the decades, things changed and gradually Africans became African Americans – others joined that ‘minority group’ and continued to work for very little. Their lives and talents were controlled on many levels to keep these second, third and fourth class citizen building this country and receiving little in return.
After many generations of this, we put up the lie to which all were forced to subscribe, that we were actually a country of “separate, but equal” citizens.
Today, many thought this election was going to turn things around – finally – and we would have a more equal country with the structural/institutional racism and all the other -isms which pervades everything we have/do/think would gradually fade away and equality would be Americas gift to the world.
However, some things about this election bothered us even while we tried to put them to rest. We would like to share them:
Donald Trump has been elected the 47th president of these United States in spite of his ethics and way he has lived and acquired his assets. What does that say about the people who elected him – who voted for him to be their president? His is and has been a life lived destroying others, threatening even more, taking what he wanted from those who had less than and generally moving ahead living on and taking from whoever whatever he could rip off.
One example is Trump University, which destroyed the dreams of a college education for many and took the money of people who saw their dream of a college education go up in smoke. He took their money – gave back nothing – and added their money and wrecked dreams to his coffers and his history. This was only one of many such schemes and they continue to this day. His treatment of women is abominable and he has destroyed the lives of many women through sexual assault, rape, and so much more – this now 47th President of these United States.
We could go through his life and list his sins, but you know them as well as we do and yet many of you even knowing all of that still voted to make him president of these United States. What does that say about your lives, ethics, ways of being?
Many of us thought the institutional bigotry woven tightly into this society was lessening and losing its grip as a more equal society was coming to be – BuT some things about Trump’s ‘ascendency’ still bothered us and as we see this election, our concerns were well founded.
Did you ask yourselves why the person running against Trump was always a woman? Once – when Hillary Clinton was his adversary we could push that off and look at it as just something that happened in the normal progression of our lives in these United States. But, when Trump ran again and he was running again against a woman – this time an African American-Asian woman with a Jewish husband – that was a bit much and today, the covers have dropped from our eyes so we can see clearer. – if only we will look and see and act in our lives with the knowledge of that which is in front of us.
Kamala Harris arrived on the scene of presidential hopefuls when Joe Biden clearly was losing the race. And then much upheaval around that and Joe Biden is removed and Kamala Harris is in his place. What did that do – rock bottom? It kept a white male from suffering the humility of running against someone like Donald Trump and losing. Let that role be taken up by a woman – and it was at a time when Trump and his followers felt he was winning easily. So maybe Trump isn’t the only one trying to preserve this racist/sexist society’s ways.
So the Institutional structure of bigotry against African Americans, Women, Jews, Latina’s, Gays, American Indians and so many more could be kept in place and the white male northern european ancestry people could maintain their position as “better than” for much longer because clearly Trump and his followers are going to put bigotry solidly back into this country’s structure so it remains for several more generations. Trump’s campaign and campaigners did much to restore and renovate the structural bigotry under which many live and made clear what the future will be like letting everyone know where they stood as far as the “better than” structure goes and as far as taking down those considered less than in as crude and vicious a way as possible. Remember the island of garbage – didn’t they call that Puerto Rico? And if you have any doubts as to how Trump’s time as president will go as far as bigotry is concerned, when he took to the stage and made his talk about accepting this presidency there were no blacks to be seen anyplace on that stage and no one noticed or cared. The first salvo in “cleaning up” the society that others have contaminated by including minorities as equals.
One of our hopes that minorities would be able to build multi-billion dollar corporations is now gone. We experienced the destruction of that hope when the City of Cambridge set up the Capital Network as its venture capital arm and sent the three guys who took everything they could from us and who sent others to take what they could not take at the time to destroy one black-owned company with an original idea in which other venture capitalists wanted to invest. They did invest, when Bettina Network, owned by African Americans was handicapped as much as possible and Airb&b was established by three white males, taking everything including the business plan of our owner to raise the money they needed and so, the work to destroy Bettina Network, inc. went into high gear. And this was not the only company. Three generations ago Marceline Donaldson’s family was involved in the establishment and growth of United Fruit – now United Brands and received nothing for their work, ideas, etc. And take a look at My Chart just recently. A company whose original idea was brought forward and worked on for several years by 10 Nigerians who came up with the idea; did the programming and hard work of the beginnings of a company which has revolutionized one part of health care and they received nothing for their years of hard work, but the ability to watch as their work was stolen, their company was destroyed and they were pushed aside in very ugly ways by venture capitalists who thought those were great ideas and wanted to invest, but not in companies started and owned by black folks – especially Africans. Those companies – and many others, where the ideas were original to the minority founders and the companies were turned into companies supposedly put in place by white males even though the work and ideas were put in place and were originally the work and ideas of minorities – stolen – outright stolen. And I could go on describing such thievery for pages.
The continuation of such is what you voted for when you voted to make Trump your next president.
Trump used his pulpit as he held one rally after another to create around Kamala Harris a negative black image with all of the negative and ugly stereotypes this society has created and kept around black women, while all of the vile, illegal, vicious and ugly things he has done in his life are held up for society to cover their racism and raise him up to president of these United States.
His first time as president was bad enough. His campaign brought out the ugliest parts of this society. His presidency made clear there was no mistake in who he was and there was no change in Trump to a nicer man who moved his past ways on the side and took on a better way of being. The power of the presidency only made him worse. We saw what he would do as president and today all through his campaign, he and his supporters told us who he would be as the 47th president of these United States and we voted to say YES, that is how we want this country to be and YeS all of the ugly that we saw we want continued and YES his breaking of laws and threatening to destroy these United States as we know it and how we think we want it is going to happen under this man. A man who -according to court records in his first divorce – kept Adolph Hitler’s Mein Kampf on his bedside table and read it nightly. We claim to be a society which keeps the Bible on our bedside table to read to keep us walking that straight and narrow path. This has shown that to be a lie.
This time Trump has experience. This time he is surrounded by people who clearly have no problems destroying a few hundred years of building a democracy. This time he has laid out in advance exactly who he is and what he is going to do. And this time the people who voted to make him president did so knowing exactly who he is and what he is about. Saddest of all they are willing to tell the most outrageous lies to the rest of us to get what they want. One of the worset they told during Trump’s candidacy was that he built New York.
God forgive!
