Politics Won't Save Us

Trump, politics, and the future.

Well, that didn’t go quite how I wanted. I’m not going to pretend to have some sort of special insight into why things went the way they did, nor am I going to assure you that the next four years are going to be just fine. I hope they will be. They might be! But I’m not in the business of predicting the future and after last night, I think a lot of people who are should be looking for new businesses.

We turn to politics to save us because politics seems to be attacking us. The threat seems to be political, so we fight fire with fire. Fascism and its minions come dressed as politicians. We send out our own politicians to push them back. Its logical. It makes sense. And I don’t even think it’s entirely wrongheaded. Politics are important and insofar as we can take action politically, we should.

But it’s not working.

Politics, by itself, is clearly not up to the magnitude of the threat we’re facing. We know this, intuitively. Even if Harris had pulled out a win, we were all aware of a deep and seemingly uncrossable gulf between us and the other half of the country. We knew that gulf would not be bridged by a Democratic victory. The fact that she resoundingly lost certainly makes for an uncertain future, but it does not change the material reality of the core issue. Half the country voted for a man who ran on hate and fear — fear of immigrants, fear of trans people, fear of public school teachers, fear of journalists, fear of good public officials just trying to do their jobs, and so on. That is the reality of the threat, and I do not think that is something any politician or political party is capable of healing. That much seems obvious.

So if we cannot turn to politics to save us, what do we do? What we can.

For my part, I plan on remaining invested in my local community, being kind to everyone and especially to the marginalized, working for change for my city and the people who live in it. On that front, there are actually some encouraging signs. Last night, Nashville passed a massive transit plan that will add a bunch of sidewalks and bike lanes, cut down on traffic and make it easier for people to get around the city without driving or spending a ton of money on Ubers. A lot of people worked hard to get this plan across the finish line. My wife is one of them, and it’s a big victory for the city.

Transit is boring stuff, but it is the sort of meat-and-potatoes political issue that is going to make people’s lives better and show how politics can be a strategic force for practical good when it’s not being used as an existential weapon to destroy evil forever.

And while I don’t think loving your neighbor, being kind and all that stuff are explicitly political, they have political impact. Over time, they transform us into the kind of people who make good choices, foster good movements and organize around good leaders who win elections. Over time.

Politics cannot save us. But if we fix our hearts, we can become the kind of people who do not need political saving.