Vote or Die

or something like that.

Shame on you blogtypes who didn't vote. Go stand in the corner and think about what you've failed to do.

Ladies and gentlemen, when you don't vote, the terrorists win. I'm serious. Our ability to vote (and then gobble Chinese food while watching the returns. Or pizza, hey, that's what America's all about: choice) is the hallmark of our freedom, the tangible expression of our status as citizens, the physical form of our voice, not just as political beings, but as people. As humans we have a natural right to our free will, and when we don't vote (and don't give me any crap about "choosing not to exercise it") we literally, seriously give up that free will. We abandon our future, our lives, to the decision-making of others. Look around you, consider your acquaintances. Would you hand over your paycheck to them, to spend at will? Would you allow them to determine your ability to attend college, invest money, secure your retirement savings, obtain medical care? If you don't vote, that's exactly what you're doing. (And if you're gonna go that route, just send the paycheck to me.) Politics isn't a game played by old men in marble hallways, its the way you interact with the world, plan for your future, and memorialize your past. I am deeply, deeply ashamed of all of you who elect not to vote. I still like you as people, but I think you're making a serious mistake, and playing Russian roulette with your future.

I've been telling everyone that if they vote for Hillary, I'll never speak to them again. I've been asked if I'm serious, if it really matters that much. It does. Most of you know me well enough to know that, many of you know my family history enough to know I come from a fairly serious line of strongly active political citizens. Oppression is real, and I'll bet anything that you, personally, have a family tree full of people who swam rivers in the dead of night to escape oppression, who marched into battle and risked death to fight against oppression, who voted, organized, studied and worked so that they could vote, and become politically involved, because that is the ultimate freedom from oppression. And all those activities in the past were undertaken not only because your ancestors valued their freedom, but because they valued your freedom, they looked forward to the distant future, in which you would exist and be free to make political choices. If you don't vote, they might as well have buckled under, not even bothered.

Some of you just plain don't like the candidates, and I understand that. But that being true, why not work for the campaign of someone you do like? Write letters, create a pro-candidate web page or Facebook group. Just giving up and complaining is a terrible way to express opinion: if you aren't involved, you have to just shut up and take whatever you get. That's the choice you make by not voting.

Yes, it is this serious, even in the primary, even in small local races. No, I don't have a perfect voting record either, and I am ashamed of that. This matters, people, more than almost anything else, certainly more than what's on T.V, who wins the Oscars, what's going on in your relationship, friendships, or whether your car is in need of an oil change. Your political voice has the ability to change your reality, and craft the world of tomorrow. If you let that chance slip away, you deserve scathing blog tongue-lashings.