I'm Going To Preface This By Saying: If You Aren't Ready To Regulate After What Just Happened With The

I'm going to preface this by saying: if you aren't ready to regulate after what just happened with the election, keep scrolling! You don't have to rush your horror at what happened and immediately get back up and at em if you truly aren't ready. But if you find yourself falling into doomerism and your emotions AREN'T temporary mourning (or you're ready to hear something other than doomerism), maybe this post is for you.

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If you think this election means we're "past the point of no return", you haven't faced a lot of failure in your life, have you? You haven't read a lot of history about social movements and revolutions, have you?

Do you think we just started working for this election alone and now that it's over...the buzzer has sounded and the game's over? I know that's a minimizing comparison, but really, what other situation do you know of in real life where if the outcome you didn't want occurs, it's over, no coming back, can't fight against it?

Was there 'no coming back' for Germany after the Nazis took power? Was there 'no coming back' from the Trans-Atlantic slave trade? Did the oppressed and their allies just say 'well, we tried to make the slave trade illegal and it didn't work - how is everyone still working as abolitionists?? Do they not know how damning this is??' No. Well, probably some of them did, but the others - the ones who had been fighting before any sort of legislation was ever conceived, they took the hit but kept fighting.

Just because the fight is hard and you don't succeed every time you try something doesn't mean it's over. We just elected the first fucking trans woman to Congress! But because Trump won the presidency, that all of a sudden doesn't matter? You think you can just throw in the towel?

Grief and horror and dejection (yes, even plans to escape the country if you're part of the most affected groups) is 100% normal and good to feel. BUT never ever ever let that balance tilt to full-on doomerism that paralyzes you and makes you stop fighting forever. Take the time you need to process, but telling everyone that we're 'past the point of no return' is doing the work of the oppressors for them.

When I was getting my degree in criminal justice (criminology: law and society undergrad and full on CJ masters), I read enough history to understand that we're crawling up a mountain of shattered glass. Those before us bled to death crawling up that mountain so that their bodies could shield us and allow us to crawl up a bit farther before we start getting cut. Which allows us to crawl that much farther and lay down ours so those after us can be protected from the glass that cut us.

Is that inspiring to know that you're planting seeds in a garden you'll never get to see? Never knowing if those seeds will truly come to fruition despite the pain and horrors you faced? Nah, probably not. But the alternative? Giving up because you didn't get everything you wanted (and deserve as a baseline for being alive) in this one election - that doesn't mean it'll never happen. You know what's a guaranteed way to make sure it DOESN'T ever happen? Deciding we're past the point of no return and paralyzing yourself.

I'm not suggesting we wait till next election and try to get them then. I've been working outside elections a long time - everyone who ever made a difference in the cultural landscape worked outside elections. Maybe it's time you started, too.

You'll face a hell of a lot more failure than just one big blow every 4 years, but if you get back up after each failure and keep at it, you WILL make a difference.