46.9% of our American electorate did not bother to vote in the 2016 presidential election, https://www.cosmopolitan.com/politics/a8265143/almost-half-eligible-voters-did-not-vote-election-2016/. For whatever reasons one doesn't vote there are ten reasons why they should. First and foremost is to protect the right to vote. I know many held the belief that voting for the lesser of two evils was a waste of time. Well those who thought like that were hoodwinked into believing a lie. In no way shape or form was Clinton an evil of the nature of what trump is. Yet our large, always looking for a shortcut population, fell for the lies of people they choose to blindly trust instead of verify.
Then there are the rabid believers who watch fox news like it is a staple of life. I shake my head at that one because they truly are sheep like. I learn my own facts about subjects, right or wrong, I let the facts dictate the truth. I don't abdicate my own reasoning, again as a shortcut, so that I can appear to know what I think is the truth because it fits what I want to believe. I let the chips fall where they may given the truth of things, not my hope for the truth. Yet too many of us rely on fox news as if it was a daily blood transfusion. How did we become a nation of people who hate rather than try to understand? Why did we choose to create problems instead of solving them with dignity and respect?
What I mostly see is the will to have no will about what really matters in life, our emotions tied to our well being. Many choose not to care about anything that doesn't affect them directly. The old selfish saw of "only me and who cares about you". Well that may be a symptom we are now living with but there is a cure for it and the cure is to practice and perform good will. Good will goes an extra effort to try to make things right instead of making or letting them become worse. Good will is patient and truthful when the sacrifice of the one benefits the many. Or even when the sacrifice of the many benefits the one. As my many years on this planet have taught me, good will is nurtured within those who know what it feels like to have been beaten down by the takers and then lifted up by the givers with compassion and respect. I love the feeling good will brings and no other feeling is quite like it.
Then there are the rabid believers who watch fox news like it is a staple of life. I shake my head at that one because they truly are sheep like. I learn my own facts about subjects, right or wrong, I let the facts dictate the truth. I don't abdicate my own reasoning, again as a shortcut, so that I can appear to know what I think is the truth because it fits what I want to believe. I let the chips fall where they may given the truth of things, not my hope for the truth. Yet too many of us rely on fox news as if it was a daily blood transfusion. How did we become a nation of people who hate rather than try to understand? Why did we choose to create problems instead of solving them with dignity and respect?
What I mostly see is the will to have no will about what really matters in life, our emotions tied to our well being. Many choose not to care about anything that doesn't affect them directly. The old selfish saw of "only me and who cares about you". Well that may be a symptom we are now living with but there is a cure for it and the cure is to practice and perform good will. Good will goes an extra effort to try to make things right instead of making or letting them become worse. Good will is patient and truthful when the sacrifice of the one benefits the many. Or even when the sacrifice of the many benefits the one. As my many years on this planet have taught me, good will is nurtured within those who know what it feels like to have been beaten down by the takers and then lifted up by the givers with compassion and respect. I love the feeling good will brings and no other feeling is quite like it.
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