The point of view on voting that assumes black people vote Democrat in loyalty to a political party really aggravates me. I didn’t really see the rise of this argument until the 2016 election which in my opinion was the election that started to escalate the racial division among American people. In 2016 the subtle voice of racism started to become more boisterous and it has continued to do so over the last four years bringing us to the complete breakdown of race relations in 2020. This is clearly just my opinion and I do not speak for all black people so don’t use this as an excuse to classify a whole race of people based on an opinion.
For me personally I have always leaned toward voting Democrat because those have been the candidates that I believed to be neutral enough to not implement laws and regulations that made a big impact on the middle class community. The candidates that I have used my voice to vote for have been people who show compassion and understanding to Americans as a whole without showing a preference of one race or social class over another.
I do NOT by any means think that all Democrats are good. I also am NOT saying a black candidate is better than a white one. During Obama’s second campaign there was a black chick that I knew from college who had a strong stance against Obama. She is a member of the Democratic Party and runs her political campaigns as a Democratic nominee. I didn’t have an issue with her being against Obama, but I was very confused by her arguments as to why she was against him. I won’t get into a story debating differences of opinions here. I am only telling this story to make a point. The fact that she was a black female that I had spent some time around during my college years running as Democrat didn’t automatically give her my vote. If I would have been in her district she would not have been getting my vote because her point of view was way different from what I would want to hear from a candidate that represents me.
Now that we have social media you can get a decent feel of a candidates integrity and mission based on the things they post about. I usually do google searches and dig up all the information I can on a candidate before making my decision. They will tell you a lot about who they are in YouTube interviews and in a 280 character tweet. If the candidate is not talking about topics that relate to me then they most likely won’t vote favorably on topics that are important to me. A candidate can have a campaign message that says they are for the people, but if they are not talking about what the people are interested in then that is a lie!
I am a very strong minded individual that stands firmly on what I believe. So a weak candidate would not interest me. In this current political climate a candidate can choose to be safe and avoid certain topics to keep from ruffling feathers of potential supporters. I am not a politician so I don’t understand this strategy. I have a real problem with people who are afraid to be 100% who they are.
Hateful people who hide their prejudice mindsets behind politics are beyond aggravating to me. They make social media a very annoying place to be. Don’t throw the rock and hide your hand. Be who you are. You can’t support someone who is constantly spewing racist rhetoric and then argue that you are not a racist. As we have learned in the last couple of months if you are not anti-racist you are racist. Condoning bad behavior makes you just as guilty. Silence, smoke and mirrors just say that you are a coward that can’t stand on the truth of the hate that you have in your heart.
In conclusion you should now understand that black people don’t have the privilege of voting for a candidate because of a political party association.Black people have to vote for candidates that will hopefully be interested in making sure they stay alive and have a chance at thriving in a system that was built to keep them oppressed.