by Michael Niemann
These are difficult times. Then again, which times aren’t? It is tempting, in the face of the daily avalanche of terrible news emanating from Washington, D.C., to say this time it’s different, this time is the worst. Looking back at the many years I’ve lived in this country, terrible news always emanated from the seat of government. There has been a steady stream of laws, policy decisions, and executive orders that invariably hurt some, and often many people.
Most of the time, I wasn’t affected. I was okay because I am white, male, and cis. But that didn’t mean I couldn’t empathize with those who bore the brunt of those decisions. It didn’t mean that I couldn’t try to effect changes that maybe lessened the troubles for those who were not like me. I voted (after I became a citizen), I went to rallies, I tried to organize, I learned about those different from me. I had the sense that, yes, the system sucked, but one could improve it. One could make it better.
Underneath all the clamor, all the comments about how terrible the latest news is, all the upset, and all the anger, there is something else I notice in myself – a deep and profound sadness.
At first, I couldn’t make sense of it. Why am I so sad? Is it the book I’m reading (a massive saga by a Georgian/German author in which people make decisions that seem right at the time but invariably lead to sadness down the road)? The music I’m listening to? The memories of my late first wife and the forty years we spent together? I couldn’t figure it out.
Today I think I’m closer to putting my finger on what causes that sadness. It comes from the recognition that the opportunities to make things better are rapidly vanishing. The wholesale evisceration of the apparatuses of government robs us all of the possibility to try to change things.
What use is filing a petition against cutting down old-growth forests when there’s nobody left at the BLM or Forest Service to receive those petitions? What use is filing a complaint against discrimination at the Department of Education when the department has been eliminated? The firing of Inspectors General makes investigations of governmental wrongdoing impossible. Turning Medicare into an AI-fronted denial-of-care operation will make attempts to challenge those decisions near impossible.
We are experiencing the death of the idea (okay, maybe just the illusion) that the government could be made into something that would help all people in this country. And that is deeply and profoundly sad.
