As we approach the third straight Most Important Election of Our Lifetime, many of us face the same question we faced the last two times. Specifically, do we really want to vote for that guy who is old and bonkers and dangerous? Sure, he totally seems like he’s in this only for himself and would gladly throw all of us into some sort of gnashing/threshing/bone-pulping/skin-flaying machine if it would put a few dollars into his pocket. He obviously prefers the currency of fear and pain and despair. Which is fine, I guess. Everybody has a brand. And it’s not that I love that message per se, but what are we really being offered as a substitute?
Apparently, what the laughing lady and the jovial man have to offer is hope and joy. Somehow, this seems to appeal to a surprising amount of people. Over and over again, I hear, “Who wouldn’t want hope and joy for a change?” And my answer is always “Me. I don’t want it.”
Look, maybe I’m just used to the hellhole we live in. (If it is indeed a hellhole. I guess I’ll take the ridiculous old man’s word for it.) Yes, it’s very uncomfortable and dangerous, but it’s a familiar discomfort and danger. Over the last decade, I’ve grown so accustomed to the chaos and imbalance that I’m not sure I trust whatever might replace it. It could be the seven times I’ve had COVID affecting my thinking, or maybe I got one of those cool brain worms like that Kennedy guy had, but I find it difficult to piece together what things were like in the 2010s. Or truly any time before that. So it’s not that I long for a return to some sort of magical “greatness,” whatever that means. It’s simpler than that.
I just don’t care for hope and joy.
When you think about it, what does hope really mean? Not to go all “Webster’s defines it as…” on you, but Dictionary.com defines “hope” as “the feeling that what is wanted can be had or that events will turn out for the best.” A feeling? That’s what we want to bank on these days? I know I’m not comfortable with that. Also, one man’s hope is another man’s delusion. That’s me. I’m the “another man.” Hope isn’t a promise. It’s a wish. And what’s that thing that cartoon cricket said in that one cartoon? “Hope is a dumb wish an idiot makes.” I may be paraphrasing, but it was definitely along those lines. So this whole argument for me really comes down to whether I want to put my eggs into a basket called “Wish” or a chipper-shredder called “Promise.” The choice seems obvious.
But okay, I’ll play devil’s advocate for you. Let’s say I allow myself to feel hopeful or open my heart to joy. What good does that do me if at some point down the line I suffer through a slight disappointment? You’re telling me to buy into “hope and joy,” knowing that 100 percent of my hopes will never be realized precisely as I envision them? That only some of my hopes might be fulfilled? That I’ll feel joy, but only occasionally and not for every waking moment or the rest of my life at the same intensity? That sounds terrible. That’s a cruelty I do not wish to subject myself to. I’m no masochist. Rather, that’s not the kind of masochist I prefer to be. I would rather knowingly enter into a contract with a sociopath who has made every indication that the “dream” he is peddling will result in a terrible existence for everyone who is not a white billionaire. And, sure, the world we will then all live in will be bleak and filled with anguish, a desolate landscape of monochromatic horrors out of which none of us will be able to navigate.
But it will be exactly what I was expecting.
It would accurately fulfill my darkest nightmares. And while I sit huddled in the darkness, terrified for my survival, deeply concerned about my children’s futures and the future of everyone and everything I hold dear, one thought will keep me warm and give me comfort: at least I’m not disappointed.