The past four years have been, what some people would like to call, bad. We have been living with an ineffective president at best, and at the end of his reign, we saw the worst of his followers. Only recently have things really begun to change, with Joe Biden taking office and immediately planning a schedule to fix several issues in our country. Though, we can’t just sit back and pretend what’s been happening for the past four years has never happened at all.
You’re probably wondering what I’m talking about. What I’m referring to is the intense idolization of political figures, which culminated in the raid of the capitol on Jan. 6. Donald J. Trump has been incapable of fulfilling the demands of his position ever since he first stepped into the oval office. We all knew this, but, for some reason, there was no action being taken against him; a lot of republican and conservative senators have been twiddling their thumbs and defending him because “he’s not really done anything wrong.” It’s almost like when someone defends a terrible person who’s an athlete because they like the team. In fact, that’s exactly what it is.
Celebrities have engaged in politics for several decades at this point, with Donald J. Trump as the newest in their ranks. However, politics itself never seemed to succumb to the flair, drama, and flashing lights that television provided until recently. Long gone are the actual politicians, skilled in their field, and instead, celebrities have stepped in and taken over, seeing who can make a bigger stink and stir up the most drama. Politics essentially went from baseball to wrestling- a sport all about putting on a show. That’s not what politics should be, though. Politics aren’t just a silly game of “who wins/who loses.” In politics, you are deciding the fates and lives of several million people across the country. Yet everyone, every day, can’t seem to get over this idea that politics isn’t about people’s lives- it’s about winning, and they can’t get over the need to prove that they’re better than everyone. It’s about proving that your side is superior and WHY. The mere existence of “winners’ parties” proves that more than anything- you’re celebrating because “hooray! The democrats beat the republicans!” instead of celebrating “hooray! Now my gay son can buy a house without being discriminated against!” It’s not celebrating the accomplishments; it’s celebrating because your team won.
Going to go back to what I said earlier about the idolization of celebrities and athletes, Donald J. Trump has been accused of multiple accounts of sexual assault, spread lies about the election for at least two months, encouraged an attempted coup, and refused to tell the terrorists to stop (even going so far as to call them special and say he loved them- talk about snowflakes,) been impeached, he’s set to be impeached again making him the first president impeached twice, and still has not been technically removed from office. He’s not in the White House anymore, of course, now that Joe Biden has been inaugurated, but he’s still able to run again in the future. Trump has continually used racist slang, defended confederates, Nazis, the KKK, and he still is able to run again in the future. Why is that? Well, to put it frankly, it’s because of his team. Republicans- and Republican senators, especially- have had a notoriously hard time admitting that other republicans can do things wrong. Some, in recent weeks, have come out saying how disappointed they are in other republicans, yet still, some refuse to come out and say Donald J. Trump has done anything wrong. They have too much pride in their team and don’t want to say that it doesn’t have very good players.
Politics aren’t sports. This is more than admitting your team isn’t playing well, this is more than winning and losing; people’s lives are at stake. If you can’t realize that, then maybe you need to take a step back and not post on Twitter or Facebook for a while.