I’ve already mailed in my ballot, and I volunteered to be a poll worker (though they haven’t gotten in touch). With a week (maybe two) to go before we get the result, I feel caught in a limbo. It feels more important to me to be copying my important documents and organizing go-bags to be ready for a crisis than it does to do anything at work. I also recognize that that is probably a reaction to stress and anxiety and isn’t helping me. That said, I’m part of many groups that the right-wing hates and is openly threatening, so feeling unsafe doesn’t feel unreasonable either.
How are you all holding up out there? And tips for me to deal with this better?
Planning my Amerexit. I don’t want to leave, we have a decent country, but if Trump wins this place is going to go to hell fast.
Where are you planning to go?
Depends how quickly things devolve. If things get bad too quickly, I may move to China for a bit. Yes, really. I know that’s a bit ironic. But I have family there, so getting residency is trivial for me. Day to day life is chill there, just don’t piss off the party. In America, I’d be considered a political enemy if the Republicans go full fascist, so ironically it would be safer for me.
I’d hate to lose American working opportunities, salaries, my house, my friends, and my family. But if things devolve really quick I don’t want to be here and that’s my fastest way out.
If there’s a fair bit of time to move, Japan, Spain, Netherlands, even Germany would all be decent picks for me.
My long term goal is honestly Japan - competent society, free and open, outstanding food, low pollution, safe for kids to be independent with good educational opportunities, few drug addicts, and high social respect.
Not the person you asked, but I’ll give my answer: I don’t know where I’d go, but I’ve been learning French for the last few years, in part, to increase my options.
(The other reason I picked French is that I’ve also been considering getting a sailboat and becoming nomadic, and France owns a whole bunch of tropical islands.)
We survived one term, this one will be worse, but if we stop being idiots and let them distract us with 1000 tiny controversies then we can solve anything.
He had nearly unlimited power last time and we did OK, though McCain helped and that corporate tax cut was brutal.
I think America has become politically lazy, sometimes you have to take a stand for your principles, and we’ve gotten used to expecting the idiots on TV to do that for us.
If he ‘wins’ and we put 10m people on Pennsylvania Avenue, I think we can make it clear that he serves us, not the other way around.
But we won’t do that, we’ll expect everyone else to instead…
Last time there were a lot more guardrails, though. It also wasn’t entirely clear if he was going to be a fascist either.
Honestly a reasonable person in 2016 could consider Trump to even be a moderate Republican (yes, really). Corrupt and lazy, sure, but I was expecting the American equivalent of someone like Rob Ford, not some insane idiot who is begging people in his party to literally rig the vote in his favor.
And it seems like Canada isn’t far behind us either… Though maybe there will be a backlash up there once they see what Trump is doing down here.
I doubt it, Trudeau really has pissed off most Canadians and their Conservative Party is also corrupt as hell. It’ll be better than here for a bit but Canadians in general feel politically stuck and that might not end well. Similar issue in Germany.
Come to California. We’ll be the center of any resistance.
Thank you for fighting, unfortunately there are millions of morons who think Trump is amazing and I don’t feel having my family get caught up in dying for this bullshit.
I’m going to be in Hawaii for Election day. I already voted. Nothing more I can do personally. Gotta focus on the controllables in life. Going to try n enjoy paradise and tune it out as much as I can.
I used to be worried about having to idle on a hill while driving a manual transmission vehicle. Like backsweat.
But I got used to it. Time and practice. You start to see all the subtle motions and patterns; you start to know what you didn’t know you didn’t know.
Now it is just a basic part of the driving experience. It’s a road condition, like weather. Voting, especially in federal elections and especially the general one every four years for president, is not the only or even the main course of politics.
Same story with parallel parking–which would be, I dunno: primary voting in this metaphor. Where the promise of a better way gets crammed between two other poorly parked cars and you always end up a few inches too far from the curb.
Alcohol, cannabis, and limiting my exposure to news/politics. It’s working wonders, TBH.
That actually sounds like you’re not doing well at all.
Yes. Substance abuse is not healthy. Source: child of an alcoholic.
There’s abuse, and then there’s taking the edge off
Someone using substances to avoid reality is, by my definition, abusing them.
Source: child of an alcoholic.
I respect the struggle you went thru and your choices for yourself. As someone who dealt with alcoholism you were exposed to the worst of it. However, some of us like to enjoy life and get a buzz on without hurting anyone and I don’t think that’s abusive.
Alcohol is a central nervous system depressant.
The mitochondria is the powerhouse of the cell. Neither of these statements make it impossible for someone to regularly enjoy alcohol or cannabis without hurting people.
Yes, but we’re not talking about taking the edge off, we’re talking about substance abuse here…
This is what we do outside of election season as well. We, as a people, are not doing well… But at the same time, i think we’re doing the best we can considering the state of things.
Our society is sick.
I’m playing a lot of pinball, but that really hasn’t changed.
Woo, pinball!
STOP
I have automated scripts to send that to any political text
Yo, save the complaint
For a party conversation
The world is loaded
It’s lit to pop and nobody is gonna stop
As shameful as it may be, I’m reducing my stress by reminding myself that I, personally, will be fine regardless.
But I fear for many friends, loved ones, and strangers who may not fare as well.
This is where I’m at. I’m part of every majority group, but I can’t feel comfortable because I know that anyone who’s not is a potential target.
Bottled water and prepping the generator. I fully expect the racist fucks out here to cause real problems, regardless of outcome. We already have daily parades of giant lifted trucks covered in Trump flags doing burnouts and screaming the n-word at people. In 2020 we had some protesting high school kids get attacked and beaten by adult Trump supporters, cops looked the other way. My town has a giant painting of a Nazi on its largest building, which is a Mason hall. I hate this place.
Damn, where do you live?
SoCal, maybe an hour away from San Diego. East County is a white supremacy hotspot. It’s all rich white fucks who crow loudly about hating California but stay and make our lives miserable because red states are shit holes and they know it.
I wish we could just banish these people to their own continent like the British did with Australia. Why didn’t we let them stay seceded?
Shit I thought HB was bad.
A particularly insidious strain of Christianity trained me to resign myself to a premature death when I was still a teenager. Hasn’t happened yet, and I’m in no hurry, because I care deeply for others. While I hate religion very much, it did instill in me very little fear of death… I’m afraid for the fate of humanity so much more than my own.
Until the election happens I’m going about my life as normal, because I’m not about to self destruct while she still has a chance. If she wins I’m going to celebrate that I can keep living as I am.
In the meantime, I’m also making my exit plans in case Trump wins. I’m an openly leftist, transgender, neurodivergent, latina immigrant and performance artist. I’m going to be in the first wave of people rounded up.
Is trump planning to round up artists?
I assume the reason they brought it up is because artists commonly publish their work and are therefore easier to find. If they decide to express themselves they then are far easier to find than others.
He’s openly talked of rounding up illegal immigrants, and changing the laws about what makes immigrants legal. If he acts on even half the threats he has made, a lot of people are in danger.
Yeah, I know. I asked about artists though.
Erm ackshually can you stop being concerned for your mortal safety? You made a minor error in your statement and I insist that you verify my counterargument is correct 🤓
What the hell are you talking about‽
I just wanted to know if trump has made some more stupid statements. I had just not heard of any attacks on artists and wanted to know more.
My apologies then. I assumed bad faith.
While I’m not a drag performer, I don’t trust these troglodytes to be able to tell the difference between other kinds of performance art and drag. I also expect them to define any performance art created by a trans person as drag, and we’ve all seen how they treat any form of drag
Well, my folks and I will stay in that night. We’re in a heavy Trump area, and I’m more concerned about if he loses than wins. I honestly never thought we’d have to deal with Trump after his horrible presidency, so I’ve been on high alert since he was confirmed their canidate. My mom has all of us renewing our passports as well.
I know this is dramatic, but I may actually stay home “sick” if Trump wins. To reconcile with the fact that people would vote this absolute embarrassment in again would make me so terribly disappointed in my countrymen. And this was the campaign I really put my money where my mouth is: I volunteered, donated (when I could) , even protested. It’s not so much that I like Harris, but the future that Trump and his cohorts has painted has been horrific. I would need some time to “grieve” so to speak.
Election night, I plan to have good weed when it’s all said and done, because good God. Even if Harris makes it, this whole thing had been exhausting. And it won’t stop. If Harris makes it, we still have so much fucking work to do, and just thinking of that wears me out.
People outside of US have the right to worry about this election as well imo. It’s one of many currently on-going battles of autocracy vs democracy and this election will heavily shape the battlefield.
I wish all of the luck to my American friends and really that’s all non-americans can do so I’ll just grab a joint and catch up on the new season of What We Do In The Shadows until this blows over.
People outside of US have the right to worry about this election as well imo
this is just american exceptionalism, i don’t really care, nothing would really change, just more wars, rapes and destruction from the US empire
ah you’re from
.ml, feel free to ignore my comment entirely. Didn’t want to ruin your day with non-extremist world views sorry.nicked you right in the balls, 😅😅
“Loosen your shoes
Don’t listen to news
That keeps you up at night.”- Chris Smither
You just get an upvote for Chris Smither. Leave the Light On, Time Stands Still, his cover of Visions of Johanna, plus a dozen others… all brilliant.
Leave the Light on, for my money, is a perfect song. But I have a new favorite on his new album:
I’m just going to do what I’ve always done in all the other elections I’ve partaken in.
I’m going to mark my choices, I’m gonna submit the ballot, I’m going to resume life as normal. Then when election day comes, I’m just going to go to sleep. I don’t want to be up to see the polls.
If Harris wins, then great, because that just means that we’re not going to have another nightmare circus for 4 more years.
If Trump somehow wins, then I will mute myself from the world almost like I did for the 4 years we had with him. It was just a blur.
Bold of you to think it’ll only be 4 years of Drumpf, or his appointed successor.
I’m going to go drop off my ballot and sit back and wait for the results. There is nothing more I can do so there’s no sense in worrying about it. Focus on things you can actually change.
