Well, Katha Pollitt NAILED IT! "I Hate People Now."

[VermontKevin]

The other day, a friend of mine, a liberal Democrat, said that he had to admit his life hadn’t changed since Trump was elected. Well, I said, It’s only been eight months. Give him time!

What I wanted to say was, How nice for you. Tell it to that undocumented teenage girl who was blocked for a month from getting an abortion while held in a Texas detention center. Tell it to the Muslim family that a Connecticut neighbor of mine saw a white guy shouting at in the Big Y supermarket parking lot: Go back to your own country! Tell it to my daughter-in-law who got the hairy eyeball from a passerby for speaking Spanish on the street to her little girl. (And this was in Bloomington, Indiana, a large and pleasant university town.) Tell it to Myeshia Johnson, widow of one of the soldiers killed in Niger, who was dragged through the mud because Trump couldn’t make a sympathy call sound sympathetic. Tell it to the Puerto Ricans and Virgin Islanders still waiting for power and clean water more than a month after Hurricane Maria.

I didn’t say any of that, of course. I’m working on suppressing my rage.

Unlike my friend’s, my life has changed a lot in the year since Trump was elected. Not materially, except for the fact that my stepson and daughter-in-law moved to Canada partly because, as non-citizens, they worried for their futures here in the US. I mean psychologically. I sometimes feel like I’m a different person now. I’m fidgety and irritable and have trouble concentrating. For months after the election, I could hardly read, except for books about Roman history, which turns out to be full of Trumps: fantastically rich sociopaths obsessed with crushing their enemies.

SNIP

But the main difference is that I hate people now. Well, not all people, of course. Just people who voted for Trump. People who do their own “research” on the Internet and discover there that President Obama is a Muslim and Michelle Obama is a man. People who use the n-word and can’t even spell it right, because—have you noticed?—Trump supporters can’t spell. Well-off people who only care about lowering their taxes. People who said they couldn’t vote for Hillary because of her emails. Excuse me, sir or madam, can you explain to me what an email server even is? People who didn’t believe Trump would bring back coal or build the wall or Make America Great Again, but just wanted to blow things up. Congratulations! We are all living in the minefield you have made.


https://www.nybooks.com/daily/2017/11/07/year-one-my-anger-management/

Yeah, she nails it. I hate the Trumpsters. And I hate the "After Hitler, our turn" crowd even more.

[BigmanPigman]

1. I would rather be an alert, rational, informed, passionate person

than a willfully ignorant robot/Stepford Wife type person. It has a price of course...health, relationships, etc. Still, I choose to remain as I am and true to myself. I have self respect.

[VermontKevin]

2. Lost a lot of friends and neighbors over Trump.

Sadly, a son-in-law, too.

[BigmanPigman]

3. Me too, but they do not realize it.

I just do not return their calls. You would think that they would get the point since my outgoing phone message says, "This is ***-**** please leave a message unless you are a Repub than please run along. Bye.". I am going to die fairly soon (it depends on how much I can afford for expensive surgeries since I do not want to live in severe pain and my ACA is no longer affordable). When I die I will leave them some of my stuff and write them letters...all of which will be fairly nice and not blaming them for their political affiliation specifically but they will know why they haven't heard from me for so long. Maybe when they vote in the future they will think of the friends/people like me who are affected by their votes.

I am sure many people will think this is rather cold of me but tough shit. This is how I have been my whole life and I am not about to change now. I am a passionate and a compassionate person but that is a two way street. Golden Rule, etc.

[VermontKevin]

4. I hope you are able to get the medical help you need.

And it is not cold of you. It is reality that many people face.

[peacebuzzard]

32. I feel for you, with the complicated health issues, and

No time for nonsense.
I have also battled disabling health issues for 3 years, but with an employer insurance, and improving status.
But I live in a deep red rural section of an old Deep South neighborhood, and do not speak with any neighbor surrounding me. They have all voiced dissatisfaction with me, on various past incidents, spanning decades.
Some things are better left alone.
It would be too stressful to attempt a conversation. I don’t even wave.

Thank goodness I find solace in wildlife, nature and seclusion. It is getting tougher as developments and property values have skyrocketed around me. My little oasis is refuge for lots of wildlife with virtually no place to go, as it is located on an isthmus. I routinely hear jackasses firing their rifles certainly eliminating the remnants of deer, ground hogs, coyotes etc. The shots are disturbing for me and my pets.
Meanwhile, the wildlife numbers have certainly plunged.

[Moral Compass]

5. Im Right there with her

I find myself even more irritable than I am normally. And I’m fairly irritable by nature.

But shortly after the election one of my Republican friends told me that I needed to give trump more time after he pretty much shit all over the country for a couple months and I completely and totally lost it. I don’t do that.

When I have a political discussion with these morons I tend to be very calm and ask them questions until they start stammering because they don’t ever know anything. But in this case what he said was like waving a red flag in front of a board. I came completely unglued.

Well, that was months ago. I just don’t have political discussions with anybody now that I suspect voted for Trump. One of the stupid is a member of my golf group and keeps bringing up NFL players taking a knee during the national anthem.

The last time he brought it up fortunately a Swede was in my group and we both looked him said let’s not talk about it. He started in again and I said “you know what we don’t come here to do is talk politics...how about we just talk something less controversial like anal sex or something like that.”

That shut him right up for some reason. But that is the only way I can cope right now. I’m furious with these morons. Anyone who voted for Trump and is not consumed with remorse is dead to me now.

The sad thing is I know I’m surrounded by complete idiots. That gives me a feeling for my country which I’ve never had.

During the Vietnam war when we were all so angry with one another I never lost hope. I could see that minds were beginning to change. When we did start pulling out of Vietnam even my father (shin served in Vietnam as an advisor) stopped talking about it being a noble and justifiable war.

But now, well, this is different.

We have enough people that are willing to destroy the country because they think they’re losing control.

This grotesque tax bill is going to go through and it is going to create a situation where in about 4-8 years they’ll be able to go after Social security,Medicare—everything they wanted to go after for all these decades.

By that time I will probably be forced to retire because I’ll be in my 70s. I’m now just hoping that by some miracle my wife and I will be able to live out our days with some semblance of dignity but I don’t really think that’s going to happen.

I have never felt so hopeless and so ashamed of my own people. Because these people that are doing this to our country are in every sense of the word my people. They are white, there are educated, and they are generally pretty well off— and they are willing to burn the whole country down to keep the monorities and immigrants from getting into a position of power.

[VermontKevin]

6. At Thanksgiving last year, my son-in-law exhorted us:

"Everybody keeps saying Trump is gonna be so bad. We've gotta give him a chance."

My daughter pulled at my sleeve and begged me not to respond. I'm now glad I did not, and son-in-law won't be at Thanksgiving this year because my daughter has had enough and is in a separation and looking at divorce.

I don't feel hopeless. I feel like Trump had drawn lines, made people speak their minds. We know who the assholes are. They aren't concealing it. If anything, we can't pretend anymore that sexism and racism are done.

I'm overeducated, and white. Pretty well off. I'm ashamed at how people in my demographic behave.

[Moral Compass]

7. It has been a long time since Ive hated my fellow citizens

I was the prototypical angry young man in the 70’s. I had hatred in my heart and was always angry and ready to fight.

Now I’m angry again and feel a burning hatred for these people.

I cycle between hope and despair.

I hope you are right.

[VermontKevin]

8. I hate them. Not ashamed to admit it. They deserve it.

[Bernardo de La Paz]

9. Replace toxic hate with stone cold loathing. Much healthier and more effective. Take care. . . nt

[bucolic_frolic]

10. I saw a Trump supporter a few weeks ago

She had worked on his campaign, and I talked with her about 11 months ago when she told me her affiliation.

Saw her recently. Would not even look at her. Walked right past. She seemed embarrassed. I don't give a damn.

[VermontKevin]

11. She should be embarrassed. Look what they have done.

[Ilsa]

12. "We are all living in the minefield you have made."

I can't help but hope these voters are feeling the shame for awarding the most important job to someone completely unqualified. But I doubt they'll own their own shame.

I hear small business folk are ecstatic over having regulations removed, but I want to know who they are so I can avoid their products.

[VermontKevin]

14. They feel no shame.

[SandyZ]

13. I do not know how to let go of fighting bigotry. This is what it is about. I can not put it away.

[Skittles]

15. I bet her friend is a "moderate", not a liberal

[VermontKevin]

18. I have no doubt her friend self-identifies as a "liberal."

[Skittles]

22. I'm saying what he is, not what he "self-identifies"

no liberal would say their life hasn't changed - just mentally alone it has changed a lot for anyone who knows how to empathize, a lot

wouldn't affect a repuke or "moderate", maybe

[VermontKevin]

23. Well, we can play the No True Scotsman game, or just accept that there are

plenty of liberals who aren't affected by Trump because of their privilege.

[Skittles]

26. they can call themselves fire hydrants

but that doesn't make them fire hydrants

[VermontKevin]

28. The simple fact is that being "liberal" does not grant immunity from "isms."

[calimary]

16. Dang! I'm feeling that same way.

Those trump supporters have EARNED the label "Deplorables." Because that's what they ARE. I'm sorry, but I've lost all patience and respect for their "point of view." Yeah. Their "point of view." I have no patience or sympathy for people who are willfully ignorant, who choose to watch and believe human lice like That-Guy-Whose-Name-Rhymes-With-Vanity, and Alex Jones, and limbaugh and the rest of the anti-American and exceedingly UN-Christian hate radio vermin.

I had a good friend who told me, all wide-eyed and sincere, that "you really have to UNDERSTAND those people who voted for trump..." because of whatever blah-blah-blah. Because of some stupid fucking grievances or some such misbegotten baloney. I told my friend - "NO I DON'T! The hell with that! I don't have to do anything of the kind! When they're proudly fucking stupid and choose to believe all this shit about Hillary Clinton - NONE of which was true - when they're pathetically naive and gullible, NO! I don't have to understand SQUAT. I already "understand" them quite perfectly, thank you very much. They're ASSHOLES. They ARE deplorable. By definition.

And as for those who just wanted to "burn it all down" or "blow it all up" merely because they're mad, or aggrieved, or some other stupid ridiculous pathetic totally nonsensical excuse, I'll bet you that not a single one of them thought ahead as far as - "what happens when we HAVE indeed burned it all down (as we have now done)? What happens when we HAVE indeed blown it all up (as we have now done)? You like the idea of having to live and cope and try to make do in the smoldering wreckage - that YOU created? You're okay with this? Seriously? Is THIS what you wanted? Happy NOW?"

And y'know what? I don't give a damn whether they're happy now or not. THEY built this. THEY made this happen. On a serving plate of steaming maggot-infested shit. They brought this on themselves through their gullibility and willful ignorance and naivete and eagerness to swallow a stupid sales pitch from a lying slicky-boy snake-oil salesman with a phony orange spray-on tan and a vocabulary of about 75 words. There's just no excuse whatsoever for what they did OR how they voted. The truth was and still is out there. WIDELY available. And they turned their noses up at it. Actively and deliberately CHOSE not to believe it. So in my opinion THEY deserve trump & comp. Unfortunately, it's all the rest of us (in the MAJORITY - the VAST MAJORITY of Americans) who did not vote for this and don't deserve it.

I find myself agreeing wholeheartedly with how some have twisted "MAGA" into "maggots". It fits. This was ALL avoidable! The truth was there for all to see. That they actively and deliberately CHOSE to disregard or ignore it is their problem, but unfortunately it now plagues all of us.

I have VERY little patience OR sympathy OR "understanding" for self-inflicted wounds.

[VermontKevin]

19. I love this post and want to buy it a beer.

I am of the belief that it's time to hunker down and save the people already inside the tent, not worry about the ones who haven't foudn their way there.

Fuck them. They built this turd, they can fix it.

[calimary]

35. And I've gotta add - I regret like hell that I feel this way!

It's FAR more upsetting to me that we've come to this point as a nation, where we're so divided that it's like a new kind of civil war. A New Century Civil War, if you will.

But what the hell do we do to REACH these people? To DISABUSE them of this shit they feel? According to the demographic breakdown, they're mostly whites, mostly males, mostly middle-age. Every time we see one of these shootings, the vast majority of them spool out the same way. Shooter is - guess what? A white man. There are, indeed, exceptions, but they're rare. So how the hell do we reach these people? Especially when what they seem to want is to turn time back so we're all living in 1950s America where Beaver Cleaver and Ozzie & Harriet ruled supreme? And - um - as I recall, ALL these "Father Knows Best"/"Donna Reed Show" families were white as - um - sheets.

From what I do understand about them, they want whites to reign supreme again, without question. There's no room at the top for anything other than white skin. It makes me even more firmly convinced that my original suspicion was correct: the biggest beef that the Obama-haters had, deep down, whether they were willing to admit it or not, was that there was a black guy in the Oval Office and he wasn't the janitor. And after that first Election Night in 2008, they woke up the next morning, or a few mornings later, with a cultural hangover as it were. Where they SAW that a black man had won the highest office in the land, beating their old white guy (John McCain), and replacing their other older white guy (dubya), and I suspect they realized that this was something they Just. Could. NOT. Accept. OR get over. OR get past. (So to speak, 'eh? Maybe I should have made it "back to the past".)

You know that old cliche about becoming "set in your ways"? Especially as we get older. "I'm getting set in my ways." I've heard that spoken, and I've seen that quote in print. About getting "set in one's ways" - usually as one ages. Shit - have they all forgotten the lessons we learned in school - about America being the "Melting Pot"? I first learned about that as a kid. That was what we were as Americans. We're The Melting Pot. Where EVERYBODY belongs, and EVERYBODY no matter where they came from or what they have or don't have - is welcome here. Where EVERYBODY no matter how they look or what color they are or who/what they pray to - has a place here. Seems like we don't teach that anymore, 'eh? The mood on that side of the aisle is to cling to the old ways, how it used to be (or how they somehow think it used to be). No wonder that side of the aisle rejects the idea of evolution...

[SharonAnn]

39. ,,,they want whites (MEN) to reign supreme again, without question.

[xxqqqzme]

17. I think every king con voter

should be registered. The damage these rabid right wingers and this President Obama hating fool will inflict on the country is going to be very expensive to repair. We need to know where to send the bill.

[Rorey]

20. I can relate to that feeling.

I've cut a lot of people out of my life. It was my only option.

[joet67]

21. Yep. There's no shortage of people to not like, and on the internet is ten times worse.

Hi, Mo! (got your number)

[Girard442]

24. I'm pissed off at the evangelicals, too.

Remember when Bill Clinton's consensual affair branded him an acolyte of Satan and there was much weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth about how the moral rot in this country was dragging us all into the bottomless pit? And then, how those oh-so-Godly people turned out in droves to vote for the thrice-married pussy-grabber and sang hosannahs to him?

Truthfully, I think Jared Kushner bought 666 Fifth Avenue just so he could sneer at their cravenness. You know if Hillary and Bill owned it, the religious right would be uncontrollably ejaculating righteousness about the Mark of the Beast but since it belongs to Jared -- no problem.

[58Sunliner]

25. It's hard not to hate, and carry rage. But it is destructive.

It's really great for those of us who have had PTSD and just need survival issues as triggers. Yeah, it's been special. I had to quit drinking and switch to tea. I love thinking about some dirt-bag Nazi type.
My heart goes out to sentient beings suffering this asshole and his policies.

[Olafjoy]

27. The Tribe has Spoken

Thanksgiving will look different at our house this year. I no longer speak to the Trumpsters we used to share a meal with. I was floored when they let their racist craziness out and embraced the dotard. Who were these people?

I work at a large, public university in the southwest. I have invited DACA students to come break bread with my family on the 23rd. I anticipate a lovely time will be had by all. Planning on packing lots of leftovers for our guests to take home with them.

Looking forward to meeting new friends. I will add them to the awesome friends I met at the women’s march in DC and the great new people I added to my friendship circle from my resistance group.

I don’t care about the few deplorables no longer in my life. They have been replaced by so many people who ARE SO MUCH BETTER!!

[GrapesOfWrath]

33. Welcome to DU

and you have the right approach I think... Make new friends, have new relationships. My younger brother and I are no longer on speaking terms since I learned that he voted for The Dotard. I just feel so sad about it. I hope he sees the light soon.

[Madam45for2923]

29. In the meantime we got helpful people telling us that people are not happy with the DEM party.

[VermontKevin]

30. I really could give a shit about everyone's fee-fees about the DEM party.

Seriously, with the Orange Menace running amok, whining and bitching about electoral reform in some far off 2020 primary is navel-gazing in the extreme.

[The Polack MSgt]

36. Thank you for this.

Btw My current thread started as a reply to this OP, but as I kept typing and typing, it just got too long - so I put up as a stand alone.

Anger is my current state of grief and it has been for quite a while.

[Justice]

31. I could have written this article (not nearly as well but feel every bit the same)

[niyad]

34. I know exactly what she means. living in fundieville, the area is littered with trumpians. I try

my best to avoid them.

[Corvo Bianco]

37. I just had to terminate a 7 year friendship. I told him not to use racial slurs

around me. He became enraged and wrote me a novel in defense of his need to use racial slurs--all backed up by Russia Today (really).

I can no longer be bothered to offer kindergarten lessons of tolerance to grown men. They have grown up in this world and they ought to know how the world works. I've got a life to live and coddling racist children has never once been fulfilling.

[ancianita]

38. I hate how gullible people are to the self-serving opinions of the rich, too.