First things first, I PJ, would like to state up front that I can talk about my mama, but the rest of you people cannot. Cool? Cool. Also, I am lucky enough to have two mothers: this piece speaks of my mother in Michigan, who is originally from France. And white. And awesome so put some respeck on her name because my "delete-finger" game is mean, b.
With that being said, I’m not 100 percent sure, but I think my mother is voting for Donald Trump. And the reason I say I’m not 100 percent sure is because she’s never come right out and said it, but I’ve got an inkling. It’s as awkward to type as it is to read. Let’s talk about how we got here.
My mother hates Hillary Clinton. Not dislikes, but a real, visceral hatred for Hillary. It’s so palpable you’d think they knew one another and Hillary stole her man many moons ago, but my mother has never met her. She’s never seen her in person or been in the same room as her. My mother just hates her. She hates her ankles. She thinks Hillary is going to take away her guns, freedoms, pets, land, home, etc. I’m being facetious, but that’s how it sounds when talking to my mother about Hillary Clinton.
My mother is also a "gun nut", which just means she believes fervently in her 2nd amendment right to bear arms. She’s an active member of the NRA and attends conventions. Once, she found “the token Black guy” at the convention and took a picture of him and sent it to me, framed, to prove that Black people are part of the NRA since I found that hard to believe. Obviously Black folks love our guns just like every other American, but the NRA seems not to give two fucks about Black people. I didn’t realize it at the time, but taking the picture and sending it to me might have been one racist ass thing to do. My mother isn’t a racist but she has definitely joked about taking me to a plantation. To my friends. Who all attended an HBCU with me. We have a fun relationship.
I will say that I do not think being the mother of Black/bi-racial children does not preclude you from being racist. I also think there are quite a few well educated racists who don’t realize that they are. This isn’t my mother. For the record.
As you can guess, my mother is a Republican. On her home refrigerator is a magnet of George W. Bush amidst other Republican-ideal magnets and cartoons. My mother, a native of France who is now an American citizen, is a card-carrying NRA Republican. I don’t mind her being a Republican by the way. I do find it humorous that this foreign woman who has two bi-racial children who are pretty Black-fist with it happens to be pretty ultra conservative in her ideologies, but the truth is, she really cares about two things: Obamacare and guns. And on both of those, she’s pretty anti-Democrat, and specifically anti-Obama. To be fair, my mother and step-father were one of those folks who got fucked long and hard by Obamacare.
My family is an interesting one to say the least.
Let’s get back to my mother voting for Trump. Now, don’t get me wrong, my mother doesn’t actually seem to like Donald Trump. I was in Michigan over the past week and a half and even while driving around her area of southeast Michigan, every time we saw a Trump sign, or barn painted with “Make America Great Again”, etc. she remarked at her surprise at living in Trump country and hasn't exactly spoken of him in glowing terms, at all. So her potential vote for Trump isn’t even about…Trump. By the way, I saw way more Trump-supportive signage and messaging than I was expecting to see considering that my mother lives only an hour west of Detroit.
Nope, she’s one of the anti-Hillary crowd. She hates Hillary Clinton so much that there’s almost zero chance that she could find one iota of a reason to cast her ballot that way. I doubt she would ever entertain voting for Jill Stein or the other guy, which means its either Trump or not voting at all. And because she became a citizen so she could vote, I can’t imagine her NOT voting, or skipping the most important section on the ballot.
Full disclosure, I pretty much can’t stand anybody up for election. I don’t care for Hillary even a little bit and well, Trump, shouldn’t even be here. But these are the options and there’s no way I’m going to chance my vote. I can totally understand being anti-Hillary. There’s enough non-sense on both sides, I think, where American people should be able to request new candidates, but that’s not how this works. That’s not how any of this works. And I’m also not one of those people who thinks that Trump winning might spark the political revolution we need. While I don’t think my personal life will be ruined if Trump were elected, I also don’t want that man being the face of my nation since I feel like we might be on the brink of World War III – MXV if he were to be president. Still, voting for Trump seems patently absurd to me.
And I do think Hillary is going to win, even if my mother does Bush the button for Trump. But still, Trump isn’t supposed to be here but he is so the idea that voting against Hillary could result in a noted bigot taking the oath of office is troubling on many, many fronts.
And yet here we are. My mother, the woman who birthed me and who I love very much, might actually cast a ballot for a man asking white people for the Black vote by telling Black folks that America is pretty much shit for us so what do you have to lose? A man who has openly mocked several minority groups without a second thought because she somehow thinks that Hillary Clinton will exercise some power that she does not have and send the National Guard on a raid of homes nationwide and take away her guns.
This is my family.
Thanks, Obama.