Here is reality. No one can take your freedom unless you surrender, unless you submit.
You are as free as you dare to be, insofar as you have the courage to be defiant.
That isn't saying there will not be a cost, there always is, and someone pays it, whether it is the soldier who defends it in wartime, or the civilian who has the guts to ignore unjust laws, someone pays the price.
Sometimes the price is cheap, going to a hearing here, a meeting there, and standing up and saying 'no'. Sometimes the price is much higher. If people don't care about their freedom enough to do the former, the price goes up. The longer you wait, the more it costs.
But the decisions can't be made just on emotion, and while one side is cool and calculating (despite using emotional appeals in their ads), the other is just running on angry.
Sometimes the price of freedom is just a matter of doing a little due diligence, a little research, and sorting out who is what. Unfortunately, that was not done at the start of this electoral fiasco, and now the price goes up.
There's an elephant in the room that most of these Trumpists would rather no one notice.
I noticed a long time ago that most, though not all, of the loudest people for Romney were pretty quiet as 'conservatives' on existential things until they got a liberal into a position of potential power, Suddenly, as if by magic, they became full throated right wing battering rams for patriotism, freedom, the 'Murcian way and prophets of the end times, should all who have ears to hear not immeadiately and without thought, jump on board.
Never let a good crisis go to waste. I heard that somewhere.
What do we see with Trump? The loudest people pretty quiet as 'conservatives' on existential things until they got a liberal into a position of potential power, Suddenly, as if by magic, they became full throated right wing battering rams for patriotism, freedom, the 'Murcian way and prophets of the end times, should all who have ears to hear not immediately and without thought, jump on board.
And they have a tendency to set their sights on actual conservatives that have NOT been quiet over the years about existential matters, conservative ideas, patriotism, freedom and the rest.
What we have here is a classic Liberal gaslighting operation, executed extremely poorly, by liberals with no knowledge of their subject matter, no effective trolling skills and a complete inability to con people to their cause. The result is pretty obvious.
Several people here already who were either 'on the fence' or self proclaimed 'reluctant Trump voters' have been driven from that position into the nevertrump camp not only because of Trump's own actions (which are more than enough on their own to make any sane person question their life choices) but because they don't want the stink of crazy people to taint their reputation both online and in real life.
When this election is over, it's not going to be like other elections with Carter, Clinton and yes, even Obama voters just 'forgiven and forgotten', the whole thing compartmentalized into the recesses of a bad memory. This time you have dangerous people out there attacking others that protest their candidate, tied at the hip to white supremacist groups and threatening the very fabric of the American electoral system setting up conspiracy theories to legitimize the entire process.
The best thing anyone can do is get these people out of your/your families' lives entirely for the sake of sanity and safety. Their comments here and elsewhere are not mere words. They are the exposition of seriously disturbed people with their threats of 'hunting down with dogs' and 'remembering' who non trump voters are. And the Trumpists that arent actually making those threats are either denying them or minimizing their importance. They arent condemning them. They are excusing Trumps sexual assaults of women by his own admission.
People better think about what that elephant is actually doing in the room and how we collectively we can get it out out of the house of conservatism before it destroys the place beyond repair.
