The World Unfiltered

I know this post is different than what I normally do, and I will go back to my normal posts after this and the next one. Disclaimer: I don’t speak or think ill of those who supported any of the presidential candidates. I have friends and family who voted for each of them. While I may not agree with someone’s choices or why they made them, that doesn’t make me love anyone any less. If anything it heightens that because we need love now more than ever. This post is my being upset with the system in general, which isn’t news. The next post will be about people and how we treat each other. Then I’m done and will go back to my travel related posts. And so, without further ado, let’s get to it. 

An idea. Whoever gets the majority of the vote, whether I support that candidate or not, should be president. The people vote, the votes are counted, and such is that. That is democracy. This is a weird twisted I don’t even know what.


I have tried extremely hard throughout the whole thing to keep quiet about how I feel about everything. But I can’t do that anymore. This is not about a specific party or specific person, this is about our country as a whole and who actually decides what happens to it. 
Yes we could use a change to the system but what happened throughout this recent election process was not quite what I hope people had in mind. However, what happened is what happened. We cannot change or deny the issues that have been exposed. How people generally deal with conflict, controversy, and fear of the unknown and fear of the different. 
We can stand together and fight for what we believe in as we always have. 
The key is to stand together. “United we stand” doesn’t really seem to be the case here unfortunately, in light of all the hatred (not directed at just one party by the way). 
Right now it is more apparent than ever how divided we are. Right now the statement “divided we stand, united we fall” is a more accurate description of the situation. And fall we will, unless we as individual human beings regardless of party come together and do what is right for the country, and for all of the people who make up the country. 
Everyone has friends who are people of color, lgbt+, women, men, immigrants, hard workers, lazy a$$es, people of all sorts of psychosocioeconomic backgrounds. They are our friends! 

We are all people.
At the end of the day we are all humans. Every single one of us. No matter the race, gender, sexual orientation, or any other experience of life. We are human beings and deserve to be treated as such, AND it is also our responsibility to treat others as such also. Treat others the way you want to be treated should always be top priority. No exceptions. No excuses.
On the note of a change…how about a change to the existence of the electoral college. Even members of the electoral college are unhappy with the existence of the electoral college. I know it is not that simple and other adjustments need to be made as well. Yes change is scary. It always has been and always will be as we are typically creatures of habit. Side note: completely wiping out everything that has been done the past eight years is not a humanistic approach at all. Why can’t people just build off of what their predecessors have done, rather than discrediting everything without close examination of the pros and cons and how doing so will affect not only this nation but how doing so will affect the entire world?
My thoughts of what democracy is or should be have always been that people discuss all sorts of sides, opinions, stances (hopefully supported with extensive research and consideration), and then people vote for what they agree with and/or believe in. The votes are then tallied up and then whoever person/whatever proposition received the most votes is who/what takes effect. 

That is not the case in this country who claims to be so great with the best system of democracy in the world. Whether or not that is the case, we still have a lot of progress that can still be made.
While I understand the reason behind the existence of the electoral college when it started, I disagree with its existence now. Things are different now because things do indeed change all of the time. Social Darwinism. People vote, people decide.

 To quote Monty Python’s Life of Brian, “we are all individuals!” That is trumped (pardon the word choice) by the electoral college for the second time in 2000 and the fifth time in presidential history. The popular vote doesn’t always win. But the people are the popular vote. I thought the people decide, not some small portion of them. 

The electoral college’s purpose is not really necessary anymore. Some people want to be progressive but others don’t and that is understandable. 
A lot of the people I’ve talked to are/have been voting for whichever candidate and basing their decisions on what they think a party has been based on for so many years. But that has nothing to do with how we can change and grow as human beings in a changing and growing world. The world is changing and we should adapt to it (socially, psychologically, economically, environmentally, etc). The two party system perpetuates that. 
You shouldn’t vote a certain way just because of the way you’re expected to by who or what you associate with. You should vote based on your own personal and EDUCATED opinions. Opinions validated by objective nonpartisan and scientific research. (Global warming for one example. Saying it’s a hoax created by China is just stupid, sorry).
The parties’ stances don’t seem to be malleable enough to change at the rate required to transform our society into one of love, acceptance and progression. One in which we don’t jump to insults, violence, human rights issues, and other acts of hatred. That only comes from the population and their opinions on specific issues that should not all just be decided by one person or one party. We the people, ALL of the people, should be able to and should decide what kind of environment and world we live in. 
But people’s opinions and choices don’t matter all that much when the final decision comes down to an extremely small percentage of the population. 
I don’t think many people realize that when they are voting for president, they are not actually voting for president. They vote for the electoral college representatives who then make their own personal choice of what they think is best. So then what’s the point? Let’s bring the point of voting into action and let the people actually decide. Ending the existence of the electoral college won’t reduce the amount of deeply rooted hatred that exists in people it exists in, but it will make our country’s process for choosing leaders a much more truly democratic one.