No matter who wins, we are deeply divided.
Things are changing by the minute, and as I prepare to publish this post, it looks like Biden will win the election. That will be an enormous relief to me and other progressives, obviously! This morning, our anxiety is finally turning to optimism and elation.
But all week, as I’ve anxiously watched the results trickle in (what is Nevada even doing?!), I’ve been reflecting on more than just who’ll win. I’m also thinking about where we go from here, how we move forward in a country so deeply divided.
Tuesday night feels like eons ago. But if you’ll journey back in time with me, you’ll recall that most of the country was feeling subdued and disappointed that night—Trump supporters learned that he’s not likely to win reelection, while Biden supporters, who had hoped so fervently for a blue tsunami, realized far more people had voted for Trump than our ill-fated polls had predicted.
For much of the week, even a possible Biden victory has been feeling like a sort of defeat to many progressives. Till midday Thursday, the most common sentiment I heard from friends was despair: How could so many people still support Trump, after everything he’s done wrong?
I’ve shared the anxiety and disappointment of these friends, but not the despair. This post and the next one will be about why, and how I’d like us to move forward no matter who wins. (For those of you following my series on dialogue with my cousin about racism, those posts will resume soon, I promise!)
There are more of “them” than we’d thought.
For me, this election is reminiscent of two others I’ve been through: the election of George W. Bush in 2000 and the Wisconsin recall election of Governor Scott Walker in 2012. The comparison with 2000 is especially apt, given this week’s uncertainty over the winner, pending recounts, and lawsuits!
But also, in both of those contests, my fellow progressives and I were shocked that so many people had voted against us. Just like this year, we thought we vastly outnumbered the other side, but on election day, they materialized seemingly out of nowhere.
Scott Walker was wildly unpopular on the left after his election in 2010. That’s why we were able to recall him: the state required us to gather half a million signatures to trigger a recall, and we gathered a million. Nevertheless, when the day of his recall election arrived in 2012, we met an uncomfortable truth: Walker was wildly popular on the right. Even after all our efforts, he was reelected.
This past Tuesday night, the left learned once again that we don’t have our finger on the pulse of the country like we’d thought. There’s a vast swath of America that thinks and votes differently from us. That is humbling and sobering.
But believe it or not, I’ve also found hope in this truth.
We’re stuck with each other—so maybe our “mandate” is to work together.
Here’s how I see it: the other side is not going away. Apparently, getting out the vote, exposing the right’s corruption (as we see it), and spreading our progressive gospel isn’t enough. A lot of people are stubbornly, loyally conservative, and they’re not budging.
Some have budged. Many Republicans did vote for Biden this year, and our efforts will probably be enough to win this critical victory. But one of my main takeaways from Tuesday is that a lot of people didn’t budge. To me, that means progressives will have to learn to coexist with conservatives and vice versa. Just as it has been for decades, the country is still approximately evenly divided—even under Trump.
I often think of Democrats and Republicans like a married couple. Like it or not, for better or worse, in sickness and in health, we share this country and responsibility for governing it. And in our case, “divorce” isn’t an option—not without enormous suffering and likely violence.
It’s in all of our interest to learn to get along, since we’re just as evenly divided as ever before. But if neither side has a mandate to ram through its agenda, that doesn’t mean there’s no mandate at all. Our mutual disappointment represents an opportunity, a “mandate” to listen and work together. What if this election prompts us and our leaders to actually start doing that?
We must turn toward each other.
Marriage researcher John Gottman is known for his ability to predict whether couples will stay married. He says that in times of strife, a couple might turn away from each other, but those most likely to stay together will turn toward each other. I believe that’s what we need to learn as a nation.
Thousands of people and dozens of groups across the country are teaching Americans how to “turn toward,” by listening respectfully instead of shaming or dismissing. This blog is one piece of that small-but-growing movement; check out my resources page for many more ways to do this good work. My hope is that the 2020 election will help more of us to realize that this is the best way forward.
