O P I N I O N
NOT THAT PROFOUND
By Nathan Graziano
My wife and I are watching television on a Tuesday night, waiting for an acceptable time to head to bed, so we won’t have to admit that we’re old.
Actually, that’s not exactly the situation. I’m watching television—reruns of “It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia” on Hulu—and she is doomscrolling on Instagram, sighing at intervals and swearing under her breath. I know she must be reading something about Donald Trump, or something related to his clown-car administration.
Her doomscrolling, however, has become habitual.
It is not only when we’re watching television. It is also while we’re driving in the car, or lying in bed, or getting ready for work in the mornings, or having drinks at a bar. My wife is constantly checking her phone for news that either angers or upsets her whenever there is a spare moment.
When “Always Sunny” goes to commercial—I’m not nearly rich enough to afford an ad-free subscription to Hulu—I turn to my wife and clear my throat, knowing that what I’m about to say is likely to incite a fight.
“Can I ask you something?” I say, keeping my voice soft.
“Maybe,” she says. “Is it going to upset me any more than the last time you asked that question?”
“It might,” I say and dive ahead. “Do you think that constantly reading about Trump and obsessing over the damage he is doing to the nation is a healthy way to live? I mean, at some point, we need to live our lives and try to find some joy, right?”
“You don’t get it.”
“What don’t I get?” I ask.
“You’re a middle-aged, straight white man, and Donald Trump doesn’t bother you because he’s not coming after your rights. He’s not going to legislate what men can do with their bodies. He just wants to control women, particularly young women.”
“We live in New England,” I remind her. “Women’s rights are going to remain protected here, and Trump is mostly bluster. The more you pay attention to him, the more he enjoys that attention. I’m trying to ignore the noise and live my life.”
“That’s because you can. You have that choice,” she says then looks at her phone. “You don’t get it.”
And maybe she has a point. Maybe I don’t get it.
I make no bones about the fact that I believe Donald Trump is one of the worst human beings in modern history1. Trump is a man of average intelligence, who imagines himself a genius; a man without any semblance of a moral code, who imagines himself a Christian2; a man with the impulse control of an 11-year-old boy, who has been handed the codes to nuclear weapons. Trump is, by every definition, a total buffoon.
But I’ve stopped giving this grifter headspace, and my wife’s point was that I—and many men in similar positions, with similar political leanings—can afford not to stop giving Trump attention. I can plug my fingers in my ears and scream, “Wait until the mid-terms.”
Women, minorities, members of the LBGTQ+ community, and anyone else who is excluded from the “greatness” that has been promised to return—or anyone who isn’t male, straight and white—doesn’t enjoy the same privilege.
For the record, I still don’t believe that spending hours on end reading about the woes of the world will help anyone assuage the anxiety that comes with a democracy imperiled. But I believe that getting away from our phones and off social media is far more conducive to better mental health.
And I continue to believe in “We, the People” and I continue to believe that this hellscape is going to end sooner rather than later.
Still, I’ll admit that there are things that I simply “don’t get.” And I suppose this will always be the case.
- I tend to share Jack White’s assessment, although not exactly his politics. ↩︎
- In fact, Trump imagined himself as Christ, and anyone who can possibly believe his back-tracking bullshit after removing the post is legitimately brainwashed. ↩︎
You cana reach Nate Graziano at ngrazio5@yahoo.com.