Shawn Vestal: citizenship a responsibility now, and in the future

Nov. 7, 2028

To my son,

I write to you from the other side of 12 years ago, and I am deeply anxious about what the country will look like when you read this, on Election Day 2028, when you have the chance to cast your first vote for the president.

How’s the weather? Not unbearably hot, I hope? Have the jetpacks shown up yet? How has the second wave of trickle-down economics worked out? Are newspapers hanging in there? Has the pendulum of progress on civil and equal rights swung back in the direction of justice?

I very much hope so. Because, here on this side of these 12 years, it is just days after our president-elect named the former chief of a website that peddles white supremacy as his top strategist – and just days after some jackhole painted a racial slur on the side of a children’s center named for Martin Luther King Jr. here in Spokane.

So take anything I say on behalf of the voters who came before you with a grain of salt. As an electorate, we’ve had our better days. I hope you will consider, as you prepare to cast your vote, adopting an empathetic attitude toward the grownups of today and the election results we have handed down to you this year. We are human beings, flawed and weak and frequently wrong, and though it has already probably become obvious to you, a lot of us have thought much more about ourselves and our angers and our yesterdays than we did about the world we have bequeathed you.

Sorry about that. But now – starting today – you’ll have a chance to see for yourself that it’s not always easy to know what to do in this participatory republic of ours, and even when you think you know what to do, the rest of the country will often not cooperate with your thoughts.

Participate anyway.

As I write this, you are 9 years old. What you know about politics is pretty simple and pretty simplistic. Not long ago, I described to you the basic differences between conservatives and liberals, and you said: “So we should go for conservatives. For lower taxes. Right?”

I love you anyway, son.

But that conversation, and the subsequent presidential election and what I fear it means for the country – creating a safe space for racist attitudes, threatening the safety net that protects vulnerable people, governing with a petty, impulsive recklessness – has made me wonder if I’ve done enough to talk to you about civic values and citizenship, the corny old stuff that underlies all of the things you will, by now, probably have become cynical about.

With that in mind, I had a few thoughts.

Recognize the responsibility inherent in your good fortune. As white men in America, you and I live on the front edge of a wave of history that has benefited us in ways that are sometimes very hard to see clearly from inside the experience. Try your best to see it. Try your best to ignore the voice inside of you that constantly tells you your life is difficult, you deserve more, you are a victim. Work against racism, against even the whispers of bigotry threaded through the atmosphere. Try to see beyond your own self-interest. This is very difficult. Try to be better at this than I am. Try, occasionally, to shut up and listen. Try to be better at this than I am.

Recognize that your own great good fortune exists in the context of others who are less fortunate, and that you have a duty to try and help them. There are a lot of havens in the political world that will offer you the chance to ignore this fact – places where you can go to feel comforted and proud of your selfishness. Think, if you can, beyond your own tax rate.

Be careful about what you believe. We’re in a best-of-times, worst-of-times situation regarding information and knowledge. You have access to more good sources of information and journalism than any generation in history, and you have access to more bad sources of information and journalism than any generation in history. A recent analysis of viral news stories showed that fake news – actually made-up news – was shared more frequently on social media than real news.

Learn to tell the difference. Honor facts. Understand that the media you consume is supported by your consumption. Resist BS in all its guises – the constant assertions in American life, from politics to advertising, that are made without regard for truthfulness, to serve ulterior motive. Ignore sources that tell you only what you want to hear, and support good journalism.

Do more than just believe what you believe. Act on your beliefs, whether it’s speaking out in public, knocking on doors, volunteering time and resources. At the very, very least, vote. At the very, very, very least. I imagine that you are swamped – as we are swamped, back here 12 years ago – under a tsunami of lazy, ignorant, simplistic voices that tell you to be cynical and only cynical about the electoral process.

I wish I could say this cynicism is hard to understand, but it isn’t. I am writing to you from a moment in which it seems that representative democracy broke down. Half the country didn’t vote, the loser received the most actual votes, and our president-elect ended up winning about a quarter of registered voters. There was a lot of screwing up, son, from the electoral system to the media to the political parties. But, while there’s enough blame to go around, a big dose of it goes to the people who stayed home this time.

Don’t stay home, kiddo. Whatever the world looks like now, whatever you think about the system or the candidates or the choices, know that there is a choice.

Don’t stay home. Don’t sit out.

Choose.

Shawn Vestal can be reached at (509) 459-5431 or shawnv@spokesman.com. Follow him on Twitter at @vestal13.