Fellow White Guys, I Kind Of Get It, But You’ll Regret Voting For Trump

by Jim Duncan

I get it. You’ve always dreamed of being a decent husband, a good dad and having a job you feel proud of, but things aren’t exactly working out so far. You’ve tried to talk about it, but no wants to listen. So, to your own surprise, you now suddenly find yourself secretly debating if voting for Trump might actually be the answer. The answer for what you see as an increasingly amoral, corrupt, and for lack of a better word, nonsensical, modern world… possibly created by liberals?

I get it. But please don’t do it.

First of all, we’re all to blame for the issues with this modern world, not just the social justice warriors. And somewhere deep down inside, you know Donald Trump is as corrupt as Hillary Clinton. “Changing the system” with an “outsider” is not why you’re really considering voting for him, that’s just your public justification on Facebook to your liberal friends. And it’s not that you’re a bigot or hate women either. The real reason you’re considering voting for Trump is because you’re just sick of being barraged with non-stop progressive ideals of how you should think and feel, fellow white guy, and tired of it often seeming like everyone else matters more than you do. I do get it, but it doesn’t mean you should act on it. Feelings of frustration can get resolved, but a Trump presidency will not go away and he’s going to make everything worse.

Sometimes, as straight white males, especially if we believe in any sort of God or higher moral order, it seems as if we are the only group left in America that it is socially acceptable to denigrate. And I can hear many liberals clicking off this article in disgust right now, but before you do, please check out this week’s wonderful new video by actress Lena Dunham gleefully celebrating the “extinction of straight white men,” and just objectively think about it for a few seconds. Of course, a video like this does not justify any white guy then acting on racist or misogynistic or homophobic thoughts, but the problem is that you can’t even rationally, honestly, discuss something like this without immediately being accused of “man-splaining” or being insinuated as a KKK sympathizer or a rapist. Yet no matter how often people try to shut down any sincere conversations about things like this with the phrase ‘white privilege’ thrown in our faces, we can’t escape the nagging feeling that our life sucks just as bad as everyone else’s.

Our wives and girlfriends have cheated on us in the name of equality. Our unfulfilling job feels like slave labor. Lots of people seem ready to punish us for crimes only our ancestors committed, and there might be someone we don’t know with an ISIS flag trying to kill us. Best of all, because you are a straight white American male, none of these feelings are deemed legitimate, and absolutely no one gives a sh*t when you are in pain. No one. Except for your other white buddies, and they’re all drunk. Hell, I’ll probably never get a date again just for writing this article. And so, I do get how it might suddenly be weirdly enticing to vote for Donald Trump. You like the way he rips the band-aid off a lot of the politically correct b.s.

But don’t do it, fellow white guy. Don’t act on your worst instincts and buy into an us versus them mentality against your fellow Americans by giving the greatest power the world has ever known to an unhinged megalomaniac. A few Trumps and Lena Dunhams aside, most Americans are decent people no matter their color, gender, or religious beliefs, and if you really give Trump the presidency, the day after he wins you’re just going to feel a sickness of regret creeping into your stomach. No president has the power to actually cure racism, make your job matter, or fix your problems with women. A President Trump would however, really have the power to destroy America.

A President Trump would continue spreading vitriol and division across the country and the world. He’s been doing it his whole life. The most consistent requirement of a president is in diplomatically conveying America’s position to the world with his words, and a President Trump will absolutely, without a doubt, create conflict on a global scale. He will have this country in a “bigly,” war “like no one has seen,” “so fast it will make your head spin.” Conflict has haunted his entire life, and it isn’t going to stop on the world’s most visible, powerful stage.

And when we do have that inevitable conflict, it will also be within the ability of a President Trump’s hair-trigger personality to launch nuclear weapons in under 15 minutes, with no checks or balances involved. I know, I know, you’ve convinced yourself they’ll be lots of “smart people around,” and “they wouldn’t let him do that.” Except, that’s not true. A President Trump would only have to speak with one Admiral to launch a nuclear strike, and that Admiral cannot say “no” to the President. If you want to see how Donald Trump could launch a nuclear weapon in almost the same time it takes him to send a tweet calling someone fat, watch this video from 60 Minutes before you convince yourself I’m wrong.

But even potential of war or nuclear annihilation probably isn’t as likely as the horrors someone of Donald Trump’s character could exact at home, on his own citizens. There seems to be some cognitive dissonance allowing otherwise decent, smart people to convince themselves that even though you’d be giving a defective man the greatest power in the history of the world, he’ll somehow be kept from using it by “rational people” that will be “around him.” The reality of the modern presidency though is that through a combination of our recent technological advancements, and cowardice by Congress, Donald Trump would become the most powerful person the world has ever known.

Yes, there are supposed to be checks to a President declaring unilateral military action by Congress, and unjust police action at home should be protected by the Constitution, except… Congress has willfully given these away through things like War Authorizations, and allowing Presidents to use more and more Executive orders unhindered. And as far as the Constitution protecting your civil liberties from Donald Trump’s narcissist obsession with wealth and power, the government is already actively eroding them every day.

No matter what you think, the NSA is actually still recording, keeping and cataloging all your communication, pictures, and GPS locations. You can kid yourself all you want, but the NSA does have the ill-advised picture you sent the chick you met at the bar, and they do have the text where you asked if the IRS would believe that you have a dog-training business. Trump will not curtail this, but will actively use it to persecute those who stand up to him, or probably even if you make fun of his hair.

Just imagine if a slightly unhinged, ego maniacal want-to-be-king decided to declare martial law in his own country because of an undefined “threat of terrorism.” And before you tell yourself that could never happen here, why not just read Trump’s own words on arresting reporters.  If you don’t get why a president clamping down on reporters or political opposition against him is terrifying, then you fundamentally don’t understand how America has successfully worked for 240 years without already falling into a dictatorship.

George Washington once said, “If the freedom of speech is taken away then dumb and silent we may be led, like sheep to the slaughter.”

While John Adams once said, “Remember, democracy never lasts long. It soon wastes, exhausts, and murders itself.”

They were talking about the propensity of people to vote the wrong person into office. America was designed to be ruled by laws, not by a single man. And America cannot afford to make the same mistake as countless other democracies, like Venezuela, Turkey and Russia, by electing a dictator who consumes the entire system.

Do not get me wrong, there is no pride in a Hillary Clinton win for any sensible American. She and her husband truly are the epitome of our corrupt political establishment, and they will have four more years of getting themselves and their associates rich. But so what? It’s only four years. At least there will at least be an America still here to fight for in 2020.

And I don’t mean fighting for the Republicans going forward. Or the Democrats. Or only blacks, or only whites, or only males or only females. I mean fighting for all America. For integrity and fairness. Fighting for a new political system without hypocrites or degenerates as our leaders anymore. We can stop voting based on political party, but instead promote good, noble, individuals.

I’ve made tons of bad decisions myself through the years, and probably writing this article is yet another. But I do believe that if we just don’t go over the cliff now, in four years things can truly start to change for the better in American politics and society. We really can move past these divisions as long as we don’t put someone in office who makes them worse. Reasonable people are out there in all types, and of note, after Lena Dunham posted her bigoted video on twitter there were several people of color, and women, calling her out for erroneously labeling an entire group of people with negative judgments.

The reality is that the answers we most crave in our lives (friendship, respect, and love) do not exist in any potential demagogue; they only exist in forgiveness for those who have wronged us, and determination to take accountability for our own choices moving forward. So, instead of secretly voting for Trump, to possibly get revenge at a modern America that at times seems to want to leave you behind, why not instead just have some balls, and turn to your girlfriend or wife and tell her that Lena Dunham is a bigoted asshole (then apologize for your language, but politely mention that you would like to discuss the point further with her whenever she has the time). You’ll feel better about yourself, and maybe you won’t still need to passive-aggressively vote for Trump because you’re sick of whiny social justice warriors.

Donald Trump is a narcissist, a bully, and if you objectively look at his life. His “best” attribute is greed. So please don’t give Trump the power to end America’s democracy, before we get a chance to keep improving it for everyone.

Thanks for listening fellow white guy, now go watch some football and have a beer.

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James Duncan is the author of an exciting novel called Blood Republic, which tries to warn how partisan thinking could break the country apart into a second civil war of conservatives vs. liberals during a disputed presidential election. Started in 2012, the book has turned out to be brilliantly prophetic, arguably predicting the exact scenario America now finds itself in. However, none of you self-righteous liberals will bother to read something written by a white guy, and most Republican rednecks don’t know what a book is, so… screw it, blow each other up, I’m heading to the woods.