Yeah. Somewhere along the way, I really started becoming discouraged about what life is like in my own country. The typical patriotic argument goes something like this, "Look at what we have in our country. Look at all the rights and freedoms we have, the privileges and the power of democracy. You can do or be anything you want here."
And, let's face it, that's not really true, is it?
Denounce their liberalism however you wish, but if I were being treated like a second-class citizen and if my rights were just as good as any other's persons rights were being trounced, I wouldn't want to live here either. I haven't been politically aware for too long and I know I haven't survived long enough to become some authority on American history, but I can credit Bush for one accomplishment: He really cleft our country.
I knew about the differences between conservatives and liberals, but I didn't really FEEL them until now. I suppose it's because I toe that line on so many different classifications -- racially, heterosexually, culturally, or thinking about issues of gender and power and sensitivity and the implications of which-fucks-whom -- that I feel even more out of place. Zora's earlier point about people "like us" losing even a little bit of political power (or representation) makes a hell of a lot of difference, because, as you can guess, the only people who care about people "like us" are really people "like us." How can someone like myself or Zora or Jon really put a lot of stock in American leadership when people from our cultures and ways of life aren't even being considered?
I suppose I'm lucky because I can still get by "in the system" with marrying a woman and, cross my fingers, I'm not very likely to get swept up in some unforeseen draft. Even if I were, I would reinvoke the spirit of my cultural tribe, pick out my 'fro, and burn my draft card on the spot. Gonna get me? Fuck you. I've got a doctorate program in Canada waiting for me, and my bitterness and disillusionment will keep me warm, I say. Either way, I'm way, way luckier than the gay guy down the road who won't know the joy of marriage, or starting and raising a family, or having the luxury of a lifelong and publicly protected partnership.
The important question is, what can my country's leadership do for me in order to restore my broken faith? So long as the current political state panders toward pseudoreligious argumentation, Leviticus, faith-based foolery, anti-abortion, anti-choice, and spoonfeeding, I don't think I'll get a straight answer. (Pun intended.)
When those people decided to lay down their American citizenship in the name of their personal integrity, I respected their decisions because of just how bravery it took to do so. We live in a divided country with an administration that gives two-shits about only a select few populations. It's no small wonder that people who could afford to do so would want out. I can't explain it much more intelligently, but I can admit that my pride in America is shot and that I'm really, truly scared for the next four years. We're already on the International Shit List.
What's the worse that could happen?
I don't even want to know...
I just hope the containment facility I wind up in is someplace warm and sunny and guess I won't be taking my male partner of 8 years with me either. That would defeat the whole purpose of their societal cleansing project, wouldn't it. 
