Good Grief

He won. He actually won.

Leading up to this whole thing, I was hopeful. Hope had replaced all my anxieties. It seemed impossible that Kamala Harris could do worse than Joe Biden did, so what was there to be worried about? Americans would come through. Americans have actually started caring about each other after the pandemic.

I forgot that the American Experiment does not operate under logic. Under no circumstance did I believe that his base had grown, but here we are. 71 million people (and counting) don’t care about the threats. 71 million people don’t care about the concentration camps. 71 million people don’t care about the felonies, the unpaid working class citizens he’s ripped off for decades, the rape jokes, the racism, sexism, xenophobia, homophobia, transphobia, propaganda— the incoherencies. 71 million people don’t care that he’s an 80 year old man who is not quite all the way there (which is just, perfectly reasonable for an 80 year old, by the way; just not reasonable— in my opinion— to lead a nation), and rambles on stage about immigrants eating dogs while fellating a microphone. All they see is a dumb, conniving black woman. And they hate her. He lets them hate her. The only thing that 71,000,000 Americans (and counting) hate more than a rapist is a woman.

I understand the imperfections of Kamala Harris. I just can’t believe that 15,000,000 Americans that voted for Joe Biden in 2020 could be so vindictive. I will never understand how so many people could feel that their best choice in this election was emboldening the only person who has made it clear that he is out to do harm. Irrevocable, devastating damage.

I’m in Ohio. So my heart is particularly broken today, because I have a semblance of care for the place I was born. He not only won here, but so did Bernie Moreno, so did 3 conservative state supreme court justices, and so did the conservative plight to forbid congressional maps from being drawn fairly. Bernie Moreno simply ran on 1.) Hating transgender people, and 2.) Loving Donald Trump. He bullied employees at his businesses. He destroyed incriminating evidence that would convict him of illegal acts. He is by all accounts unfit to represent me and my interests in government.

With 3 conservative justices (an overall concept that dumbfounds me since I have always thought that judges where supposed to be impartial and unbiased, but whatever—looking at you, SCOTUS), the Ohio Supreme Court is now 6–1; in a state where a very large portion of the population is not conservative, certainly more than a feeble 16%.

And to top it all off, the conservative secretary of state swindled voters by writing such a blatantly misleading amendment that it failed. A majority of Ohioans were snookered into allowing conservatives to continue to cheat and draw congressional maps that only serve their reelection. And it was perfectly fine for him to do that, because our supreme court said so. (Fuck Frank LaRose.)

Josh’s family home falls in a map currently that includes suburbs of Cleveland, Dayton, and Columbus. His parents can’t afford to put his declining grandfather in full time care. His aunt and grandmother have lived off of social security and wellfare for a major portion of their adult lives— it is their main form of income. Their representative, conservative Republican Jim Jordan, was implicated in a major scandal at the Ohio State University involving the sexual violation of students. He supports the conservative effort to halt medicare, wellfare, and social security. He got reelected, too— because his district has been gerrymandered so effectively that he only serves himself. He certainly is not serving folks like Josh’s extended family— but they sure voted for him like he does.

Albeit all, Ohio does not have nearly as large of a progressive population as I’d thought or hoped. It’s dwindled in the vote the last few cycles. But it certainly is not small enough to have 100% conservative senate representation, 80% conservative congressional seats, and an 83% conservative majority in the state supreme court. Our voice does not matter here. We get no meaningful representation. The 2,500,000 people who voted for peace, calm, decency and an optimistic path forward, do not matter. We get nothing.

I think that is what I’m so upset about. I can’t be upset that there are people in my world, in my country, in my state, in my county, who don’t think like me. They have the same right to exist and be heard as I do. But across the board, they are unequivocally heard more than what’s fair. Even though 45% of the population voted for progressive candidates, progressive Ohioans have no effective representation in any governing body on the state or federal level. They can’t do anything to stop any legislation from moving forward that may harm their progressive consitituents.

I’m not saying we should have more representation than the conservatives right now, because it is very painfully clear that they won. But, we should have a fighting chance. We should have representation that reflects the population. I think the buzzword here is proportional. Ohio should have a 55% / 45% share of representatives, not 95% / 5%. But no one cares, because being fair doesn’t keep you in power. It feels like even democrats are not that mobilized to stop it, because maybe the scales will tip in our favor someday— right?

I desperately want to believe in this country— all the good, kind people in it— but it does not feel possible. The mountain is taller than I’d thought. They have stacked so many cards in their favor to the point that there are no more left play. They’re all gone. We’re gone. I wrote a line once about small children being massacred in their elementary schools, lost little seeds in a cosmic jar of jam.

I can’t stop thinking of all the promises that the conservatives made— the lofty, slobbering campaign sweet talk that can actually come to fruition now. They will end Medicare for all. They will end social security. They will end welfare. They specifically said the words concentration camps. They will end climate change mitigation. They will end technological advances that serve their people. They will ban abortion and women’s healthcare. They will repeal gay marriage. They will obliterate any chance of queer youth and adults receiving healthcare that they need. They will do all of this under the guise of “letting the states decide,” while the states have been commandeered by politicians that the federal level has ordained. They have hijacked the rule of the people.

And those are just the conceivable things. I’ve seen fearmongers online warning of what’s to come like tuna out of the docks; things like the repeal of the 14th amendment, through a new mandate requiring voting to be limited to one household. They’ve already made voting more difficult with requiring an I.D. in Ohio and various other states (which I personally believe to be flagrantly illegal as it is a form of poll tax, but what do I know?). They hate women. They hate women. I’ve seen talk of abortion policing, rolling back gay marriage (and by proxy, interracial marriage), and certainly more that I haven’t even thought about. They will not stop until there is no more money left to milk from our misery.

I just got a delivery for my business. Greeting cards and gift cards. Because somehow, I have to encourage people to spend money on my art through the rest of the year so I can survive. Survive. I am not sure how I will do that. I will never have children. I will never get married. My savings are going to be gobbled up in efforts of resistance. In this moment, I think it will be a miracle if I make it to 40. My quality of life will be destroyed by the facism that this country pretends to be so intolerant of. This country built upon intolerance. And I am fully aware that I am a lucky one. I am a white man. I have privileges that the people I care about do not have. It has always been like this. People have been suffering on American soil before this country was formed.

My heart aches for every woman that I have known. For every black person. For every immigrant. For every gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender, or non-conforming person that has made me feel safe. And to the countless others that I have yet to or never will meet. We are all so beautiful and so necessary. We can get together and overcome horrible things. History repeats itself without picking or choosing.

I have decided to make a concentrated effort to not be angry. Being angry makes you stupid. You make terrible decisions. You drag your kid out of bed at 11 o’clock the night before his ACT because you’re too drunk to go pick up more liquor. You throw bricks at the black kid on the sidewalk. You become the thing you are angry about, just in a blue shirt instead of a red one.

I am going to continue. To make, to write. I have been humbled to get this far with my business and give thousands of people some warmth by sharing my work. I know that is important, even when the world is spitting in my face and telling me it doesn’t matter. It does matter. Especially now. I will continue making work that celebrates the magic our little world is full of, and the incredible people that make this place worth saving. I will make work that celebrates love, life, nature, queerness, culture, ethnicity, and femininity. I will channel my privileges as a gay white man into supporting my community.

Being an independent creative is going to continue getting more difficult by the day. Please know that any support you throw my way— whether just viewing my work for free or supporting me financially— it keeps me and my business alive. I’m on my own here without you. Thank you for being here and giving me a reason to keep it all moving.

And please, rest. Hug your friends— your sister, your mother. Demand accountability from any conservative voter that you know. Do not let the bad in the world make you believe that there is nothing left to fight for.