Trump’s election was closely followed by Trump tapping known racist Steve Bannon as his senior adviser. I made my disgust well known to my family via Facebook—going so far as to call out any Trump supporters who dislike Bannon as the “good Germans” who knew evil was evil, but gave it a voice anyway. A few days later when the surge in racial harassment incidents began, I went back to Facebook and really rolled in a shit grenade. I made it clear that voting for Trump was a vote to enable and encourage the racists, and I made it clear that a vote for Trump was unarguably a vote against my immigrant wife and mixed race kids. I let them know exactly how I feel about my son going to serve in their Navy to protect their asses, and then have to tolerate some racist jerk because they thought voting for Orange Julius Caesar was an appropriate means of protesting whatever economic bug they had up their asses.
Then I walked away from Facebook and let them rant at the silent spot where my profile used to be. In short I did my best to get disowned by as many family and friends as possible.
Going to Dad’s 80th birthday wasn’t ever optional. He’s a good, kind man who self-taught his way from the racist, patriarchal norms of the 1950’s to an egalitarian viewpoint today (his younger brother being gay probably had some influence on his change of heart, but I think the old man deserves credit for making the ideological trip). He and my stepmom never considered Trump to be anything other than a horror. Thus I had to go to support them, but I sure as hell wasn’t looking forward to the event. My family is a mix of low income working class folks, preppers, and religious views ranging from atheist to LDS to fundamentalist Christian. Political views go from Grumpy Cat Libertarians, to a small cluster of liberals, to whatever passes these days for conservatism. One in-law actually works for a Koch PAC.
My family and I roll up to the event with me prepped for battle. Since Dad taught me from very young to hold doors for other people, I ended up entering the community center several paces behind my wife and kids, which gave me the opportunity to see my relatives greet people before they knew I was there. When my wife and kids popped into the room, the relief was palpable. Apparently the shit grenade made its impression. I entered and began the obligatory hugs and handshakes. Some of the more hardcore Trump fans eased out of handshake range and avoided eye contact and I realized I’d hurt some people. That sucks because I dearly love them but the point had to be made that a vote for a racist is a vote against my family. That kinda knocked the battle out of me so I went around the room shaking hands and defusing the situation.
Observations…
- My favorite niece owns a small coffee stand. She thinks she’s Libertarian but her kind streak trips her up. She voted for Gary Johnson and utterly detests Trump. Since we’re Irish, red hair and faces dot the room and she kept making Cheeto wisecracks in reference to Dear Leader. We talked about how the Washington State minimum wage increase will affect her business, and the upshot is that it takes her a few more years to pay the business loan off, her own wages go down so she’s earning slightly more than her employees, and she has to let a part-timer go. She understands the need for the minimum wage increase, understands that assholes like Wal-Mart are never going to do the right thing without being legislated into it, but wishes that liberals would just acknowledge that small businesses like hers get hurt. I can agree with that.
- I’m not the same sort of gun owner as so many of my relatives and I had an epiphany as to why—it’s fear. For them, packing a concealed pistol is a reasonable precaution in a world of meth heads and random crime. For me, packing is a giant pain in the ass and outside a wilderness area I can’t justify the nuisance. For that matter it’s a nuisance in the wilderness, so most of the time I don’t fret much about cougar attacks and take the reasonable precaution of not rubbing myself in tuna fish oil before going hiking.
- Some of my uncles didn’t accompany Dad on that road trip from 1955 to the present. That’s a bitch to reconcile with the fact that these are the guys who taught me how to hunt, fish, and be passionate about stuff. I hate their racism but I love the old bastards.
- Nothing smooths over rednecks like hunting, fishing, and farming and I spent a lot of time discussing the merits of various rifle calibers, elk biology, and my brother’s bear problem (one has taken up residence in a swamp on his small farm, and he’s getting a little creeped out from repeatedly bumping into it). Being the no-fear guy, I’ll take care of the bear during the spring hunt.
- Dimples win. My daughter’s boyfriend is from Guam, and he’s got these Epic dimples. My sisters and nieces spent much of the afternoon hovering over the cute couple and ribbing my rather shy daughter about madly she’s obviously fallen for Dimples. (BTW I’ve already figured Dimples is my eventual son-in-law and since his dad and I share the passion for hunting and fishing, he passes the Redneck Test).
- Prepper World is a weirdness I just can’t get my head around. Conversations included how many rounds people have stockpiled and it’s like people I’ve known all my life are speaking Martian. I know I have a small dose of prepperness inside me—I’ve got a 3 month supply of dry food that dates to the economic collapse when I was worried that it might devolve into a profound hiccup in commerce. It didn’t, and I’ve got lentils to last me for several more years of normal lentil consumption.
Overall just a weird day. I’ll warily maintain relationships with my family, but Facebook is staying nuked. I’m done there, and the Trump fans can howl at the moon to their hearts’ content without me having to read their delusional crap.
As luck would have it, it was also Dimples’ 21st birthday so we followed up my dad’s birthday with Dimples’ birthday party at his dad’s place. Dimples’ folks are nice people and great cooks. It felt good to be sitting around bullshitting about salmon fishing while my wife and our future in-laws traded Filipino and Guamanian food recipes. Being the Ambassador from Redneckistan, I always get asked if I eat ___________________ (put weird Asian food item here). And yes, I eat that. And it’s damn good. Most important is that Dimples’ extended family absolutely adore my daughter. As does Dimples himself.