I’ve been meaning to write about this since the day Trump
got elected and Leonard Cohen died. Seemed fitting somehow that Leonard would not
want to live in a Trumped world. He no longer belonged. His vision and
compassion was no longer wanted. I was filled with a deep sadness on both
counts, and part of me wanted to go wherever Leonard went. Follow class and
dignity to wherever it resides.
Like many have shared I felt something died the day Trump
was elected. It was as if I awoke from a dream that was revealed to be a sham.
I had been living believing that slowly we were progressing as a species.
Sounds stupid and naïve to write it, but that’s honestly how I felt. I felt we
were evolving, and Cohen was the embodiment of that. I felt we were making
progress in being more compassionate and understanding with each other. It was
not OK to bully people; being gay was OK – nearly; the position of women had
attained something approaching parity; cultural differences and the value of
diversity were being slowly recognised as an asset to a country, to a company,
to the planet; most nations had agreed on some kind of action – however small –
to negate climate change; the world was moving towards clean energy.
And then someone who believes in none of these things was
voted in as the president of one of the world’s most powerful nations. 28% of
Americans voted for a lying, ignorant narcissist, and thumbed their noses at
women’s rights, blacks, gays, climate change, etc in the process. They simply wanted
to return America to a time of near full employment (cars, manufacturing) and where
men could abuse any woman they wanted with impunity.
Clearly a quarter of America’s population felt left out of
the political process as they saw their lives slip into underemployment and
poverty. Mexicans and Muslims, and anybody else who looked different to them,
were taking their jobs and they’re angry. They have every right to be. I
realise now that it’s one of the many failures of democracy and its elected
representatives to adequately explain what is going on – what globalisation and
automation are doing to the job market; why jobs are disappearing. No support
offered in terms of meaningful retraining, and certainly no longer term vision
of where retrenched manufacturing workers might fit in a new economy once
traditional sources of employment dried up. People outside of politics who weren’t
concerned with presenting false promises that everything would be OK had been
saying for years that traditional manufacturing industry in the West was collapsing,
and that alternatives needed to be explored. But nothing was done, government
subsidies propped up dying industries and then the GFC blew it all apart. No
conversations with affected workers took place about what the future might look
like and what their options were. They were left high and dry by the political
classes to fend for themselves and fed up with the whole goddamn business they voted
for Trump. No matter that he had 5 kids from 3 wives; no matter that he’s
filthy rich and a compulsive liar. It
really didn’t matter who Trump was, what he said, or what he believed, as long
as promised to stick it up Washington and bring back the good old days.
It’s hard to see how Trump is going to keep this miserable
28% happy. Infrastructure projects might do it for a while. But the bigger
picture for me is where to from here for the planet; where to from here for
do-gooder lefty leaning liberals in Western countries like Australia. For people
like me. How do we reclaim the agenda? How do we get things like the rights of
minorities back in focus? How do we bring back compassion as part of a nation’s
psyche? Somehow we need to talk with these people who are angry; we need to
acknowledge their anger; and we need to present them with viable alternatives
so they don’t feel like all those ‘others’ are wrecking their life, and taking
away what they see as rightfully theirs.
OR
Maybe they’re kind of right. Maybe as a species we simply
don’t act to save ourselves until we reach crisis point. That’s what we’ve
always done. Maybe we need a war. Maybe
we need to see and feel the results of massive dislocation of the economy due
to climate change. Maybe when Tuvalu and Kiribati disappear the rest of the
world might take notice. Maybe most of us are simply unable to think about
others and the future for more than few well meaning minutes. And not until
shits hits fan will we act. We can only focus on ourselves and the present. Perhaps the ability to foresee the
consequences of our collective actions merely screens the inward looking
shallow nature of our true selves?
Maybe we can entertain notions like equality and gender equity
when most of us have adequate employment and a living standard that is pretty
comfortable. But when things slip back towards the poverty line we revert to
self-preservation mode and inherently blame ‘the other’ for our woes.
I have never felt this way before. I’ve generally been
optimistic about what the future holds. But I don’t like the circling China is
about in the Pacific. I don’t like Trump’s disregard for old alliances and his reckless
willingness to discuss using the US’s nuclear capability. I don’t like the
hopelessness of the UN as a body without any clout. (Israel routinely ignores it
and does what it likes and always gets away with it.) There is no global political
leadership. As eloquent and articulate and loving as Obama obviously was, he
too was unwilling or unable to effect widespread meaningful change. (Except
inside America’s border with Obama care. And what of a people who seem angry
that someone dared to help those who need a hand paying their medical bills???
What is with these people???)
It seems quite feasible to me now that a large war is not
too far away. It’s not Trump’s fault. Our ineptitude has bred his success. He’s
just another card in a collapsing pack that adds to the instability – he doesn’t
have the intelligence to be part of any solution.
I was in Vanuatu working with vocational educators when
Trump was elected and Cohen died and I was desperate to talk to someone about
it. I broached the topics with the people I was with. Their response? Is there
an election happening? Who is Donald Trump? What’s wrong with him? And they’d never
heard of Leonard Cohen. So there’s another kind of naivete that exists in many
parts of the developing world. Their world is far from perfect but they are not
tormented by the horrendous and sad stories that our 24/7 media world feeds the
globally connected citizen. Trump and Cohen are irrelevant to them. They go
about peaceful lives doing what they can to make a living and feed their
families and don’t seem any less happy for it. They certainly don’t have the
material means to travel but their disconnected cocoon of a tropical paradise seems
to deliver a kind of peace and resignation that is far from the angst that my newly
discovered naivete wreaks upon my being. Perhaps I’d have been better off being
born in Vanuatu.
