Citizens of a Nation
2017 is over. If you did any traveling this year, you likely had heightened caution for possible dangers than when traveling during previous years. From the tragedy that unfolded during Ariana Grande’s Manchester concert to the Las Vegas festival mass shooting, the news seemed to get worse as 2017 carried on, and any good news felt more like an anomaly. I went back home to visit my parents in the Chicago suburbs over the holidays, and as I made plans to see my friends in the city, my parents warned me of an increase in muggings and murders. I lived in Chicago for five years, and yes, it’s their job to warn me of danger, but as devoted news junkies, I could tell the heavy influx of negative attention and bad news had triggered their fear.
If anyone out there wants you to pay attention to the good happening in this world, it’s a little “Kenyan-born” ex-president named Barack Obama. In his first interview since leaving Office, President Obama spoke to Prince Harry for BBC Radio on the “serenity” he felt during the morning of 2017’s Inauguration Day. Meanwhile that same morning, America was divided between blue panic and red reassurance. In passing public appearances during 2017, Obama mentioned his hope in Generation Z countless times, his excitement in these days and those to come. He’s held on to the meaning of his infamous “HOPE” poster even ten years after its birth.
Obama is a pro at discharging his signature calm sensibility. Of course he’s positive. He’s vacationing on yachts with Oprah and paragliding over rising sea levels in the Caribbean. A little help down here when you have the chance, Mr. Prez? I kid. It’s not 2008 anymore. The “Hope” posters have been replaced with “Make America Great Again” hats, and those small symbols of loyalty have crevassed the political divide so far that most of this nation is not used to it. Every new day is uncharted territory, and as humans, we act on impulse as new experiences come forth. Therefore, the quality of patriotism is questioned through the act of kneeling, nonviolent protests are met with violence, accusations of racism pour out despite possible ulterior motives. Could it be possible that racism is too easy a word to hand out, like pennies we want to get rid of? When in fact, we hoard the big bills, the open-mindedness and selfless observations to see people as we see ourselves and root for something bigger? We climb into fear and judgment, and resort to a “expect-the-worst” mindset, when that’s not the truth. And when you expect the worst, it’s easy for high profile citizens to make it feel like there’s hope in glamorous public appearances and political statements to their famous virtual presence. Oprah can make a powerful speech, and Sarah Sanders will affirm that quality of the Trump Administration every day. But that’s not life. Neither America’s exacerbation, nor the Utopian triumph is real. Life is the slow trudge day to day for normal Americans, working day jobs, providing for their family, and going home with a sense of pride for a day’s worth of work as an invisible badge on their heart.
That’s the reality, but unfortunately, that’s not the window that we see into during each day. We see the window of media, clickbait, social media, attacks from both sides, and we get ferociously caught up in it. How do those of us who refuse to join the conversations of alt-right insult and far-left blame overshadow such negativity to inspire a sense of safety, a common understanding that we have to accept each other no matter what our parents taught us, to become a collective story that accepts history for what it was and binds us as one nation? There is so much we have in common that weaves together these fifty states, and that’s the exact reason we’ve held the tightened fabric until now..
If you look at history, Trump succeeding Obama is not as unusual as the nation’s shock would make it. Last year, the Huffington Post suggested that Trump is the second Warren Harding. Voters during the Harding administration wanted to go back to “normalcy,” particularly white people who feared their status quo was being threatened. Abraham Lincoln’s successor was a “bundle of contradictions.” Politico addresses the timeline throughout which Andrew Johnson changed his mind on important issues but remained self-righteous and unwilling to cooperate. Ta-Nehisi Coates in his book, We Were Eight Years in Power, explains even his mistake to think in 2008 that Obama’s win meant that we were past deep-seeded racism and could acknowledge the breadth of current times. It was a shock to the people in America who believed Hillary Clinton had the 2016 election locked down, that enough time had passed to believe that black people are no longer the “other,” or that immigrants do not steal jobs. Obama was proof. Except, he wasn’t. Coates later concludes in his book that Trump’s win shouldn’t have been a surprise.
By a blend of media oversharing, isolating ourselves with technology, and the way our minds gravitate toward negative attention, 2017 felt like pain and defeat. The uncertainty of the future and how to reconcile Trump’s win threatened our sense of belonging in this world, and it reminded us that anything can happen, and we should be prepared for our emotions to get in the way of rationale. But 2017 is over, and that means we have a whole year to improve on divisive circumstances and fear-mongering extremists.
As we move into 2018, what should we do differently? How do we learn from 2017 and take control of it for the sake of improving our lives, our children’s lives, and our direct community?
How.
To understand what we’re supposed to do, it’s good to know why we do what we do in the first place. That in itself requires heavy introspection and self-awareness, and unfortunately, our culture doesn’t emphasize the importance of knowing yourself at such a deep level. This is why people have created successful businesses on how to learn about who you are at your core so life is better and more fulfilling. I don’t know many people who I can say live with intention and remember every day that this is the only life they have, and that the world keeps turning whether they are here or not. Ken Costa, a South African born Banker wrote a book, Know Your Why, on this exact topic in 2016. Author Simon Sinek has an entire platform around his book, Start With Why. Knowing yourself gives you freedom and control to reject the pains and anger that don’t serve you. It gives you purpose, and you learn that life is better when you have a common goal with the people around you. That includes the people online that may disagree with you. They get a say in this country just as much as you do. Often, we see articles and stories like this one that steer us toward getting to know yourself, but they end up providing blanket ideas on how to carry ourselves and create an impersonal tone to a deeply personal matter.
Being the citizen of a nation generates the sense of belonging. It grants you control as such that when you belong to something, you’re invested in its outcome. You own a piece of the puzzle; the fibers of the United States are yours in some way. When it comes to public policy, taxation, who gets elected into office, it’s at those moments that your belonging is beckoned to the public surface. The country asks its fibers to reveal itself via voting, freedom of speech, and servitude. And because belonging is an inherent need, as powerful as food and water, emotions get involved, and that’s where trouble starts. Because you have control, especially in public policy, you notice that you often don’t get your way. Everyone else has a bite of control, too.
Immigrants will fight for what they were promised — a chance to achieve the American Dream. White people will fight to hold onto 300-year-old supremacy, and how can you blame them? We’re not meant to so willingly accept negative consequences no matter in what context they come from. Finally, black people were not just treated unfairly from the beginning, they were “plundered” as Ta-Nehisi Coates puts it in his book, We Were Eight Years In Power. And now with the courage to speak, to rally people in the community and on social media, they won’t let you forget slavery, murder, and mistreatment, because the dialogue affects them to this day. They want the equal rights that politicians promised, and for others to recognize that skin color is not a feature made to divide despite centuries of people thinking it so.
Our sense of belonging and control disregards each other and seeks to avoid compromise. A majority of people want equality and peaceful bipartisan decision-making. A majority of people want strong-willed and decent members of the political system. Even if we get there, I’m sorry to say that we must acknowledge that people will try to take advantage of the system either way. Some white people hold the race card to stay ahead. Some black people will steal and say it’s their history that led them down this road. Immigrants will take advantage of lenient laws to remain in this country. But those people are the real minority. It’s not the color of skin that defines minority, it’s the people unwilling to face 2018 with dignity and responsibility.
It’s important for people who have authority to listen to the voices of their constituents. As citizens, we have marginal control, and therefore must force dialogue with our politicians that represent us. We need a set of laws that govern to the strongest and most powerful country in the world, which demands that sometimes we take the hard road. If we are a democracy, people will disagree, individuals won’t get exactly what they want, but our well-being and overall happiness skyrockets. That means there’s no room for primitive attacks toward somebody that doesn’t think like you or look like you. It means that you join public council and see if your emotions are shared, and the reason why that is so. That’s the new and celebrated attack. It’s not the choice for responsible citizens anymore, that’s the way people will hear you. Noise is for the people who don’t believe in themselves and their ideals. You have to speak not as a person, but as a citizen of nation. If your candidate wins, they are now your responsibility to not only hold them accountable, but to make sure nobody is forgotten, no agenda goes unaddressed. And when you’re voting for someone, is it by self-interest, intuition, or the logic in what’s best for overall society? It’s got to be all three.
I’ll be the first to admit that it’s awfully hard to put your emotions aside, voting or not, but we’re stronger than we ever thought possible. Just like you put your emotions aside at work, in public, interacting with people you love, etc., you’re asked to do it when you serve your country. Voting is not merely an emotional decision. The United States has become an individualistic society, so it’s hard to pinpoint how exactly emotions find their way on a ballot, but that’s not what we’re meant to do and it actually contradicts the sense of belonging. People thrive in community involvement. That’s what increases the sense of belonging; the innate part of you that attaches itself to surroundings. On a primitive level, we’re attention-obsessed individuals, constantly trying to prove ourselves. We do it by what we wear, the pictures we post, the friends we keep, and it keeps going as long as profit remains the goal. But that’s not the life we’re meant for. An individualist society is no society at all. We must crave the rational and believe in it. We should self-examine our priorities and determine whether they’re actually benefiting the common man, or they’re brought on by fear of not being left behind..
We choose sense of belonging, permanence, and that we are simply apart of a grander scheme. We reject the attention that negativity craves and desperately tries to attain. We turn off the constant updates of social channels, because the attention it begs for is what hurts us in the end. That’s how we take back our year.
