I was born in the USA. A long time ago. But until I left it, I didn’t see its truth. I lived in the silo of shared thinking, democratic social focused values, going to school with families from financially mobile families, going to church with mostly white neighbours. My boyfriend, unusually, was the black High School football (US Style) Quarterback. Evenso, my silo was quintessential institutional racism, misogyny, patriarchy, all-right-for-some culture. I was part of the some it was all right for. I didn’t see any of that until I grew the power of hindsight/distance sight. When I traveled outside of the borders of the US, I was part of the only 25% who had passports. Now the number is around 20%. I learnt so much, I could never go back. Wimp.
I tell you all of this to help put in context even the idea of Donald Trump’s impending second term as president of the USA. The vast majority of those in the USA only know their own silos of culture. If you live in a farm twenty miles from another, only see the same people at the same stores you can get to in an hour’s drive, read only what that known community tells you, you are likely to form certain similar opinions as others in your silo. Your chance of changing those opinions is limited; it depends on your capacity to risk losing the very community which raised you. If you are a city dweller, stripped out of any fair rents, relying on rogue landlords and having no social security to pay the bills which are raising, you are not going to trust the government to understand your predicament. Why would you believe now? As one of the two countries on the planet with no statutory maternity pay, why would any candidate be believable now? We in the UK have to understand the almost immovable context of the USA, built as it is on oppression, racism, patriot mythology and all-power-to-the-wealthy. The USA enabled Donald Trump. It got what it made.
Yes, and yet. A huge number of people are now very angry. A huge number. Very, very, substantially, hugely angry. Think of that anger as the birth pangs of a new age. The new age is critical. It never arrives easily or smoothly. It requires us to pay attention to the signs and face up to our role as part of the angry energy which looks to reshape, not to exercise revenge. There is no single group to line up for revenge - the whole 250+ years of the greedy culture of the USA since the 1700s has no single perpetrator or agency.
If, like me, you are part of the angry brigade, hurrah. Let’s focus that anger on doing anything possible to help other people understand the context of people who have been so indoctrinated in unjust cultures (like ours), that change to what we can blatantly see as the ‘right thing’ to do is too hard. Let’s focus the anger on energy to be patient. Let’s focus the anger on the single steps we can take each day to help someone see someone else’s point of view. Anger is fabulously excellent when it energizes justice. It’s a holy divine power. It is ours to use.
