Touchy Subjects (DW Survivor)

[eeyore_grrl]

Vote Here: https://therealljidol.dreamwidth.org/1087412.html?view=85353396&posted=1#cmt85353396

                  Touchy Subjects



“Men are afraid women will laugh at them.
Women are afraid men will kill them.” – Margaret Atwood


they used to say never discuss politics with friends
but how can i tell if you value my life without such discussions
particularly now
	with Trump at the helm
	waiting impatiently for...


if they had gotten in when congress people still filled the hall
the mob, the riotous crowd,
	intent on their revolution against this country
there would have been more than five dead
	more damage, more death
		more rape

i know this because i’ve heard the threats against strong women
					        against women in power
i know this because 
			i am a woman

i know this because i’ve seen people
	so ready to explode
		at the slightest touch they explode their anger
			it spills from them like niagara falls
		taking hold however they think they know how 
	i’ve seen men explode in anger

anger and politics and violence against women
	they breach their own security and are out in the open
	white supremacist at the helm
		leading us not into temptation
			but into anger
	
i do talk politics and i do prejudge 
if his name speaks with sweetness from your mouth
and if you talk about her emails i will scream 
to the ends of the earth
and we will not be friends still, again
	because your politics are my life
	and i prefer my friends to care about me and mine
i breach social protocol 
		and here we are.

See and hear me here:

Watch on YouTube

Comments

[adoptedwriter]

“... leading us not into temptation
but into anger...”
This! Right here! This! Yesssss!

[eeyore_grrl]

Every now and then the church going child sneaks into my poetry...

[swirlsofpurple]

Brilliantly put.

[eeyore_grrl]

Thank you.

[gunwithoutmusic]

This was well-written and quite a good case for talking politics with your friends. I'm generally apolitical myself - that is to say, I of course have opinions on political subjects, but I can't stand that politics has become something more akin to team sports and how divided we all become because we'll do or say anything to see "our team" win. It's abhorrent to me the way many people will completely disregard the lives and well-being of their fellow people in the name of "winning."

[eeyore_grrl]

I had a friend whose friends all used "faggot" and "gay" as insults. She ended up voting for trump in the 2016 election. Honestly, I am sad we aren't friends still, however she voted for someone who could hurt me and mine. That's not okay and I find it hard to forgive.

[gunwithoutmusic]

And that right there is the problem I have with the two-party system (and the fact that our system is set up to not reasonably allow third parties to even show up). We shouldn't feel forced to choose "all or nothing" when it comes to these things. I would like to see people in government representing all interests as much as is possible (obviously that comes with some qualifiers such as I wouldn't consider someone that says, "My life would be improved without minorities around," as having a valid need to be represented). We should be trying to lift each other all up, not bringing each other down.

I'm not saying, of course, that you're not justified in dropping that person as a friend; I would do the same. I just find myself wondering how many people would have voted for and stayed loyal to someone like Trump if we weren't all so obsessed over the little "R" or "D" next to the name. My parents are in that situation and I wish I knew how to get them out of it; they are Republicans because they've always been Republicans. But if you asked them policies they supported while being party-agnostic about it, they'd probably fall more in line with the Dems than not. It's so hard and upsetting for me to watch people being boiled down to what political side they are on as if that's all that there is to them, but these are trying times that we live in.

[eeyore_grrl]

I know several people (republican for most of their lives) who went either independent or Dem after the last 4 years. Blind faith is what helped the holocaust. I'm not a fan of blind faith, particularly when the faith is put in a "leader" who had no clue how the fuck to lead. And was dangerous.

[halfshellvenus]

because your politics are my life
Yes!

This reminded me of a political essay by a black voter in a swing state in 2016. He was a Bernie supporter who was voting for Hillary, and the other Bernie bros wanted him to vote for Bernie anyway. "I do not have the luxury of a protest vote," he said.

I do not understand people who say, "I don't see that much difference between the candidates, so why does it matter? It won't affect my life much anyway." Is that the very definition of privilege, if that's really true? And how can they NOT care about how the outcome affects other people's lives?

There are so many people in this country for whom the outcome of a presidential election is not, and has never been, simply "theoretical."

Well said.

[eeyore_grrl]

Exactly and thank you. The Bernie Bros... *eyeroll* -- they seem, in the end, to just have some level of misogyny that kept them with the bro from vermont over a woman...

[flipflop_diva]

This is SO well written and so good and just so relatable right now. I am especially fond of this part:

i do talk politics and i do prejudge
if his name speaks with sweetness from your mouth
and if you talk about her emails i will scream
to the ends of the earth

There are so many people, after these four years, that I will never look at the same. People who used to be my friends (we haven't necessarily been friends in a while since I knew them years ago but it still makes me sad).

Politics is life, especially lately, and I don't understand people who can't understand that.

[eeyore_grrl]

RIGHT?! Politics IS life... like you said. I understand your feelings. And thank you for the compliments. This was a hard one to get written.

[murielle]

As always, your poetry is passionate and hard-hitting.

Brava!

[eeyore_grrl]

Thank you!