Taking a Deep Breath

Welcome back, dear friends.

It's been two weeks since I checked in with my public journal of Life in Trump's America. Last weekend my husband and I went away to La La Land, where we took in some comedy, some bad ass women's wrestling, and generally avoided anything news-related.

It was great, but in the end the real world caught up to us. It does tend to do that.

I've had a lot of thoughts since returning to Real Life, and believe it or not, not *all* of them have been about the obnoxious Orange One who now inhabits the White House. Some of them have been about chocolate, for instance, and others have been about wrestling.

Indulge me in a divergent train of thought for a moment, reader. Is it weird that at the same time our nation is facing a crisis, one pillar of which is about reality itself, professional wrestling is experiencing a much-heralded revolution? Professional wrestling, an athletic endeavor whose detractors deride as being a "fake sport," is about spectacle and storytelling and seeks to wring emotions out of its followers. 

Professional wrestling is also a big business, and its billionaire administrators have ties to the White House and the Orange One himself. Linda McMahon, wife of WWE owner Vince McMahon sits on Trump's cabinet as Secretary of the Small Business Administration.

President Trump loves to rail publicly against what he calls the "Fake News Media." A very real argument can be made that he and his administration seek to shape public opinion and push policy agendas via the creation of spectacles and sowing fear and discord in our citizenry.

Is that weird? Or am I simply, as is my wont, overthinking this? Is there a connection or am I nuts?

It's weird. Anyhow. Sorry for the digression. 

Actually, no. I'm not sorry, and frankly that wasn't much of a digression. Because the rapidly vanishing distinction between what's fake and what's real--between surreality and *actual* reality--is a central problem to life in Trump's America. I'm no longer talking about the twin rise of professional wrestling and the Trump administration. I'm talking about EVERYTHING about life now. All of it.

Our President last weekend made up a terrorist attack in Sweden. In the past month, his surrogates have also made up terrorist attacks in Kentucky and Georgia.

Trump constantly refers to the media as "fake," and polls that show his low approval ratings as "rigged."

All members of the GOP have taken to pretending that the millions of Americans who now routinely protest this administration are paid agitators. At a conservative conference this past week, NRA president Wayne LaPierre said: 

“Right now, we face a gathering of forces that are willing to use violence against us,” he said. “The leftist movement in this country right now is enraged. Among them, and behind them, are some of the most radical political elements there are. Anarchists, Marxists, communists, and the whole rest of the left-wing socialist brigade.”

LaPierre also noted that “many of these people hate everything America stands for,” including “democracy” and “free-market capitalism.”

All of these activists, LaPierre continued, were funded by left-wing billionaires such as George Soros, and are also “angry,” “militant,” and “willing to engage in criminal violence.”

Read the full article here. 

Friday the White House officially banned many solid, well-respected media outlets (including CNN, NYT, BBC, and more) from its press briefing, but allowed overtly biased outlets such as Breitbart to attend.

FYI: Breitbart's twitter bio is: "News, commentary, and destruction of the political/media establishment."

For comparison: the new masthead of the Washington Post, one of the outlets banned from the White House's press briefing, is Democracy Dies in Darkness.

Did I mention that Steve Bannon, Trump's chief political strategist, was until very recently editor-in-chief at Breitbart? Or that at least two other senior editors from that media outlet now serve the administration in a national security advisory capacity? (Read the Times article here.) 

I could cite many more examples of truth-bending from the Trump administration and its advocates. But I won't. Instead I will leave you with this quote from British politician and social activist Arthur Ponsonby:

When war is declared, truth is the first casualty. 

The revolution will be tweeted. Follow me: @Literarygrrrl

Am I Losing My Effing Mind?

Greetings. We just finished the third week of our new America. We now know that it's possible for the entire nation to live in a state of perpetual shock and outrage for at least three weeks without exploding.

Today is Saturday, February 11. Yesterday I woke up with one question in mind: What horrible thing is going to happen today? What horrible revelation or new Executive Order will come out of the White House today to horrify the nation and dominate the weekend's news?

Because that's been the pattern so far. Two Fridays ago, the Executive Order known colloquially as the Muslim Ban came out and we had a weekend of detentions, deportations, and families ripped apart. Last Friday a courageous judge in the state of Washington placed a restraining order on the ban, so we got a weekend of DJT maligning that judge, and, indeed, the entire judiciary, on twitter. So I knew that something was coming. Something had to. 

And indeed it did. It came to the nation's attention yesterday that Trump's promised mass-scale deportations of undocumented immigrants have begun. As it turns out, the operation began the previous Monday, but it ramped up towards the end of the week. You can read about it here. 

Yesterday when I turned on my car and NPR's Morning Edition poured from the speakers, I heard a report about an ICE detention that happened just two hours earlier less than half a mile from where me and my family live. A family of undocumented immigrants were stopped on the highway. Why? It wasn't reported. The driver, an adult male, was detained. ICE says he has a criminal record, but they won't provide details or evidence. He and his family fought back, and an ICE officer was taken to the ER with minor injuries. I'm positive there will be repercussion from that.

This shook me. I immediately texted my husband with what little I gleaned from the half of the news report that I heard. He looked online but couldn't immediately find any other news. By yesterday evening, however, there were reports coming from around the country.

That's exactly what I thought would happen. That's this administration's pattern: dump scary or ugly news Friday evening to whip the nation into a frenzy and encourage more protests in the nation's cities. That serves two functions: it puts on a big show of force, and it mobilizes the opposition, which will play into the federal government's hands whenever they decide to go ahead and criminalize protests and demonstrations.

Do I sound crazy? Paranoid? That's what living in Trump's America has done to me. But I'm also right. Trump's administration is working hard to divide us, and they're succeeding. There are many, many Americans who will not and do not understand why we are outraged over the start of coordinated, nationwide mass deportations of undocumented immigrants. After all, the laws being enforced predate the Trump administration, and THOSE PEOPLE ARE HERE ILLEGALLY, ANYWAY. This will be the third straight weekend of large nationwide protests, and this time we've gone from marching against a ban on refugees and LEGAL immigrants from specific Muslim countries to marching against deportations of immigrants who came here illegally.

The marches, demonstrations, and protests against Trump's unconstitutional Muslim ban, border wall, and mass deportations are wonderful and amazing and I'm so very, very proud of my fellow Americans. But that's not how everybody feels. And by associating these loud, disrupting events with so-called 'Criminal Aliens' and 'Illegals' will further inflame the passions of the Americans who wish we would all just shut up and adjust to our new way of life. 

News flash: we will not and MUST NOT shut up and adjust to our new way of life.

Even if (when) things get worse. Even if (when) the new administration criminalizes protests. Even if (when) the new administration criminalizes aiding undocumented immigrants. 

We must resist. We must persist.

I ask myself at least twenty times every day if this is real. Is Trump really saying what he's saying? Does he mean what he tweets? Is Bannon really masterminding anarchy? Are they really turning our democracy into an authoritarian regime? Or do they just want us to think so, and to be paralyzed by fear? Because it's really one or the other, right? Surely they don't believe what they're doing is democratic.

I'm trying to train myself to stop asking those questions, and to stop getting trapped into the logical mazes they create. Because, in the end, it doesn't matter. In the end, it amounts to the same thing. The only reason to cripple us with fear tactics is so they can do whatever they want without challenge. 

Whether Donald Trump calls himself President or Fuhrer, and whether Bannon ever steps out of the shadows is irrelevant. They ARE what they ARE: evil, greedy, corrupt, racist, misogynist and hell-bent on a world of chaos.

Last weekend I was demoralized. This weekend I'm ANGRY. Time to #Resist!

The revolution will be tweeted! Follow me ----> @LiteraryGrrrl

Oh Shit Trump is President!

Wednesday January 25 2017

I'm really not sure how this journal is going to work.

I got the idea for this public journal a few weeks after the election night. But the idea wasn't fully formed. About all I knew for certain then--indeed, all I continue to know for certain--is that I wanted to keep a journal about living in Donald Trump's America, and that I wanted it to be public.

Forgive me for throwing up in my mouth when I typed the words "Donald Trump's America."

I expect I will use this space to vent, and to gather my courage for the continuing fight. I also want to share my experiences with you so that we can feel more connected, because I predict that the country's fractures are only going to deepen. Americans are an independent folk, and that generally serves us well, but it also works to enable an US vs. THEM mentality. The presidential campaign really ramped up that kind of rhetoric, and now that the Trump administration is installed in the White House our nation is getting a pretty clear picture of just what the government feels the official THEM look like. And how they worship. And how they vote. And who they love.

I do not intend for this journal to become a list of the horrible things that the Trump administration is doing, because there are much better sources for that kind of information. However, I do want to give you a little picture of where we are right now, in case you've been living under a rock or you're reading this from the future. (If you are reading this from the future, please tell me we make it out ok! What's it like? Do we finally get flying cars??)

Donald Trump has been president of the United States for 6 days now. Less than a week. And already things are changing. Already things are looking grim.

• Trump's administration immediately paved the way for the coming repeal of the Affordable Care Act, aka Obamacare, which provides health insurance for some 20 million people
• Trump and his press secretary Sean Spicer made overt threats to the media, insinuating that they would cut off access to the White House if they receive unfavorable coverage
• Trump and his administration continue to tell obvious and needless lies to the media and the country about such things as the size of the inauguration crowd in DC
• Trump's administration put a gag order on many federal agencies, such as the USDA, the EPA, Department of Commerce and others that states they cannot talk to the press, cannot share any information with the public, cannot make public any scientific findings, etc.
• Trump's administration froze all funding for the EPA and ordered all employees to stop working and to make no communications with anyone until further notice
• On Twitter, Trump made a threat to the city of Chicago, saying that if they didn't get their gun violence and homicide rate under control he would "send in the feds"
• The GOP is pushing through a bill with the absolutely Orwellian name of First Amendment Defense Act that would make it legal to discriminate against LGBTQ Americans on the basis of their sexuality

Remember, a WEEK AGO Barack Obama was president and America was leading the world in our efforts to combat climate change and fighting against discrimination of transgender Americans. This is nightmarish.

And this is just a teeny-tiny sample of what's going on right now. I could go on for hours. But this isn't a newspaper and you didn't come here to read a rundown of current events. This is a public journal designed to be...what?

I guess I want this to be a conversation. I want you to feel like I've taken you by the hand and am leading you through my day. Maybe we're sitting on the porch having a drink and bitching about work. I want this journal to not only give you an idea of what life looks like in Trump's America, but also what it feels like. 

So let me tell you a little about me. My name is Shana Hammaker Roy. I'm a forty year old wife and mother. I live with my husband Brandon and my college-age daughter Meredith. I am a pharmacy technician but am looking to (finally) make the move into journalism. I have lived in Austin Texas for the past four and a half years, but was born and raised in California. In between, I spent varying amounts of time living in Pennsylvania, Ohio, and Tennessee. 

I'm a high school drop out with three college degrees. I owe more than I make in two years in college debt.

I've been around. I've met a lot of people. I feel like I have a unique perspective of our great nation.

And now, along with the rest of America, my life has been upended. I feel like I'm standing at the edge of a precipice and I can't see what's below me. Is it razor-sharp spikes? Is it a sea teaming with electric eels and hungry sharks? Is it sun-baked desert sand? Is it fluffy pillows?

It's probably not fluffy pillows.

Anyhow, welcome to my journey. If you're from a nation that has already struggled with autocracy and moved beyond it, please read my worries with a gentle heart. As you know, America is a young country. We're still figuring shit out. If you're in the future, I guess you know how this story ends, which is sort of weird to think about. Thanks for taking this ride with me anyway! I plan to add to this journal as often as I can, but at least twice a week. For now, see you soon and be safe!

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