Forgive me for prying, but I need your feedback. I need to know the details of how this happens to people. I need to know how it happened to you.
Do you remember where you were, the moment they broke your spirit? Don’t be embarrassed, speak up, this is an important question. Was it on a college campus? Was it on the highway? In a hospital? Where were you when you decided buying into the system made more sense than struggling against it?
When did it happen? Was it the day you said “I do”? Was it the day you got hired at the job you really wanted? When did you decide that it was acceptable to become just another cog in the machine you so despise?
What was it that convinced you? Was it a pregnancy test with a plus sign? Was it a paycheck with an extra zero at the end? What was it that happened in your life that led you to trade your dreams of epic change for the cold comforts of traditional success?
Who did this to you? Tell me their names! Was it a professor who told you that you were being too idealistic? Did your parents tell you that it was time to grow up and accept the status quo? Did your spouse tell you that it was time to buckle down and get serious, because you’ve got a family to take care of? Who told you that your niche in life was to toil in obedient silence for those in power, whom you resent and oppose? Who said that keeping your loved ones safe and secure was more important than fighting for their freedom?
I ask these questions, not to shame or embarrass you, but out of genuine curiosity. I want to avoid these traps and pitfalls that have relegated you to the margins of resistance. I want to guide others safely through the minefield of obligations that have left you unable or unwilling to stand up for what you know is right.
The one question I haven’t asked is why. I know why you did it. I know you were afraid. Who wouldn’t be? Hunger, uncertainty, poverty. There were a myriad of problems which conspired to corrupt your reason and rob you of your common sense. Fear got the best of you, and in your panic you turned to the establishment. It promised you order, it promised you peace, and all it demanded in return was your silent, obedient consent.
This year, I seek to end that silence. This year, I want to remind this country of what it has forgotten. More than two hundred and forty years ago, a great citizen wished to embed the supremacy of freedom over safety forever in our memory. His hope was to remind the world that fairness, justice, and freedom are more than words; they are perspectives.
They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety.
-Benjamin Franklin
So if you’ve seen nothing, if the crimes of this government remain unknown to you, then I would suggest that you allow the eighth of November to pass unmarked. But if you see what I see, if you feel as I feel, and if you would seek as I seek, then I ask you to stand beside me, this election day, and together we shall give them an eighth of November that shall never, ever be forgotten.