(ThySistas.com) As a community, we understand how important it is to use the power of our vote. Our ancestors fought and died for the right to vote and to make sure that their descendants had the right to vote. For the most part, Black women never disappoint when it comes to rallying together, organizing our community and making it to the polls. However, this upcoming election is a bit different. It doesn’t matter whether we like Vice President Kamala Harris or whether we feel she can meet all the needs of our community. The only thing that matters is that as Americans, Trump cannot be allowed to become the next president. The way we avoid that monstrosity is to make sure we not only utilize our right to vote, but that we encourage our community to do the same. You may be thinking that this is redundant, given black women’s dedication to voting. However, if we pay attention to our younger generations, they are questioning whether they should vote at all.
Given that neither side, Democrat nor Republican, tend to address the needs of their community fully, some of our young people have decided that if they cannot see a plan that will directly affect our community, they just shouldn’t vote at all. The problem with this logic is a no vote position is just as good as a vote for Trump in this upcoming election. We’re not voting for a party. We’re voting for the democracy of the United States to continue to stand so that we may continue to advocate and fight for the rights and needs of our people in this country. Because of this, it is time we come to terms with the fact that we must have sit downs in our community about why we must vote together. We’re going to have to start reaching out to our sisters about the voting matter, because it’s clear that within the black community sisters are not all sold on saving democracy. Some of us are saying no vote or unfortunately, they’re saying why not Trump?
As black women, we must take the time to have the patience for our own demographic to talk to our sisters on the left and right of us and explain to each other the importance of why this election matters and what we expect from it. Having conversations about managing our expectations of the political process and the candidates that we are presented with helps us to not be disappointed, to continue to be able to move forward in grassroots and community service activism, and it also helps to keep. This can also help keep our mental health shielded from great disappointment, distress and depression. If we are fair, election time is a very intense stressful period in America, and it is even more stressful for African Americans.
Since we’re talking about our demographic directly, African American women, we’re constantly thinking about how to best serve our people. We are concerned about how the election can affect us individually, our homes, our children, our partners, our families as a whole, our education and rights to it, and of course how elections will affect our physical health and mental health. It’s very easy to get frustrated when the sister that we’re speaking with does not understand what we feel to be the common sense answer.
No vote can mean a plus for Trump so we must be clear in our intention and vote against Trump. However, we must have the patience to understand that we are not the only individual that’s mentally stressed out about this election. Even the person voting against their interest is stressed out as well. This is where we must come together and help each other understand what’s on the ballot. We must continue to talk even when we feel like our voices are not being heard or we are not reaching the sisters that are voting in opposition to our best interests or claim to be. We must continue to speak. We must continue to share information. We must continue to encourage our own people to vote together. We have to continue to encourage each other to stand in a united front. That’s not easy, but we must summon the will and the patience to do so.
There is not a lot of time left before elections, but there’s still enough time to bring the community together. There is still enough time to have sister circles where we discuss what we want to see for our community and for our people and how we plan to get there. We still have time to organize with our church groups and book clubs, with the organizations were a part of, with our family members and with our neighbors so that we can talk about, and understand, why we’re voting against Trump. We are not asking out sisters to vote blindly, but to cast that with understanding as to why Trump must lose. This may be the hard part but invite the Black women that you know are Trump supporters or that have stated their voting for Trump to the table to discuss.
The goal is to dismantle misinformation so that they have something else to think about other than the rhetoric that they’ve been fed. When they go to the polls you may think that you’ve reached no one, but the truth is you have no idea come Election Day which sisters mind you have changed and have been encouraged to vote along with us when they walk into the voting booth. That’s the goal. We must find a way to have positive discourse, meaningful conversation, that will allow us to vote together so that we can continue to move our people together. Black women are not a monolith, but we can be of a like mind when it comes to the needs of our families, ourselves, and our community.
Staff Writer; Christian Starr
May connect with this sister over at Facebook; https://www.facebook.com/christian.pierre.9809 and also Twitter; http://twitter.com/MrzZeta.