I realized today that I feel very sad for people who want to vote for the first African-American candidate for President but are not voting for Obama.
I don’t feel any sympathy for the bigots who won’t vote for someone with darker skin then them, or the idiots who believe he is a secret Muslim or terrorist or will usher in the greatest calamity in the history of the world. I know I should feel compassion for them, but it’s hard not to feel scorn.
The people I feel bad for are those who have considered the issues that they think are important, weighed the positions of the various candidates, and have selected someone else over Obama even though they realize the historic nature of this election and what it means that a man with a black father and white mother could be the next President of the United States. To explain to their children the horrid history of race in America and then try to explain why they didn’t vote for Obama strikes me as a very hard conversation. That’s not something I wish on anyone.
So if you’ve decided not to vote for Obama but realize what voting for him would mean, I can only offer my sympathy.
4 responses so far ↓
1 Friar_Tuck said // Oct 29, 2008 at 4:05 pm
The racial awkwardness is compounded by the shadows of race baiting that shadows the McCain campaign
2 Ariana wrote // Nov 18, 2008 at 12:34 pm
My thoughts on this sentence…
“To explain to their children the horrid history of race in America and then try to explain why they didn’t vote for Obama strikes me as a very hard conversation.”
This won’t be a hard conversation to have. Civil rights have never been about giving people a hand out (or a vote) because of the color of their skin, but respecting them as equal and fellow human beings. For me it is more respectful to vote for someone because of what they stand for and who they are as a person rather than the color of their skin. By the way, neither candidate on the ballot got my vote.
3 Big Sky Hi replied // Nov 23, 2008 at 5:32 pm
Hey! Other candidates took % from those thinking and anticipating a change. Back your man! Backing down may become a catistrophic ‘ism’.
4 timothy paul yenter added // Dec 15, 2008 at 11:59 am
Ariana, Nothing I said implies or should imply that I think someone should vote for a candidate because of the color their skin.
Big Sky Hi, I don’t understand what you are saying.
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