A conversation at lunch, a few weeks ago. Three Indians, one American.
Indian #1: What are you people doing? Trump actually became the nominee!
American: Yeah, I don't know what people are doing!
Indian #1: You need to get it together.
American: I have it together. Politically, that is. My personal life is a bit of a mess. My point is, I'm voting the other way!
Indian #2: But, there has to be some safeguard, right? Don't you people have some safeguards? To prevent such a crazy person actually winning?
American: You would think.
Indian #2: I mean, what if a mass murderer decided to suddenly run for President? Would you let him?
Indians #1 and #3 turn to Indian #2.
Indian #3: You do realize...
Indian #2: Yeah, I just realized what I said. Okay, never mind.
Indian #3: Because this is democracy.
Here's my thing, okay? When general elections in India happened in 2014, I was vocally, and consistently, against the BJP. We all knew they would be coming to power, and Modi would end up Prime Minister, but a part of me held out hope that it wouldn't happen, and wanted to bash my head against the wall when it did.
But my thing? Is this. I could see why people supported the BJP, and voted them to power. Because the alternative sucked. I didn't agree with it, because even though the alternatives sucked, I didn't think voting the BJP to power was a good idea. Two years later, my opinion hasn't changed much. I still don't see a viable alternative, but I still don't see the BJP as a good idea. But I see why others do, or did.
They seemed less corrupt. They talked of "achhe din" and all the progress they would bring. The social side of them, which is the scary as hell side of them, was ignored for the idea of all the economic development that people thought would come. And since social stands are more important to me than economic stands, very obviously I was in the minority (not that I was able to vote, but still).
So here's my thing. I don't get the Presidential election campaign going on in the US right now. I haven't got it for the past year. I don't see how, or why, the Republican primaries have gone the way they did. I don't see how this country can choose the Presidential candidate they have.
Again, in my view, if you are a Republican, your choices were, granted, all horryifying to me. But not to you, surely? So the fact that Trump is the candidate they went with, out of the 11 options (or more?) they started out with, is something I am not able to fathom. At all.
I'm so very terrified for November.
Indian #1: What are you people doing? Trump actually became the nominee!
American: Yeah, I don't know what people are doing!
Indian #1: You need to get it together.
American: I have it together. Politically, that is. My personal life is a bit of a mess. My point is, I'm voting the other way!
Indian #2: But, there has to be some safeguard, right? Don't you people have some safeguards? To prevent such a crazy person actually winning?
American: You would think.
Indian #2: I mean, what if a mass murderer decided to suddenly run for President? Would you let him?
Indians #1 and #3 turn to Indian #2.
Indian #3: You do realize...
Indian #2: Yeah, I just realized what I said. Okay, never mind.
Indian #3: Because this is democracy.
*******************************
Here's my thing, okay? When general elections in India happened in 2014, I was vocally, and consistently, against the BJP. We all knew they would be coming to power, and Modi would end up Prime Minister, but a part of me held out hope that it wouldn't happen, and wanted to bash my head against the wall when it did.
But my thing? Is this. I could see why people supported the BJP, and voted them to power. Because the alternative sucked. I didn't agree with it, because even though the alternatives sucked, I didn't think voting the BJP to power was a good idea. Two years later, my opinion hasn't changed much. I still don't see a viable alternative, but I still don't see the BJP as a good idea. But I see why others do, or did.
They seemed less corrupt. They talked of "achhe din" and all the progress they would bring. The social side of them, which is the scary as hell side of them, was ignored for the idea of all the economic development that people thought would come. And since social stands are more important to me than economic stands, very obviously I was in the minority (not that I was able to vote, but still).
So here's my thing. I don't get the Presidential election campaign going on in the US right now. I haven't got it for the past year. I don't see how, or why, the Republican primaries have gone the way they did. I don't see how this country can choose the Presidential candidate they have.
Again, in my view, if you are a Republican, your choices were, granted, all horryifying to me. But not to you, surely? So the fact that Trump is the candidate they went with, out of the 11 options (or more?) they started out with, is something I am not able to fathom. At all.
I'm so very terrified for November.
No comments:
Post a Comment