I’m afraid of the mass of self-identified nazis coming to my city tomorrow. I’m afraid of the white supremacists that are already here. I’m afraid that they want me to be afraid and it’s working.
I’m afraid because their win condition is chaos, and chaos is easy. Peace is harder than war. Love is harder than hate. And narratives where we are the hero, where we’re right and everyone else is wrong, are so easy to believe.
While I do care about our laws around weapons, I’m more concerned by how easily we were convinced of the need to carry them in the first place. And with the intentional chaos invading my home, I’m terrified of how easily we might be convinced of the need to use these weapons on each other.
I’m afraid of the worst of us coming out, but hopeful that we will do the harder work of seeing the humanity in each other. Take care, and I’ll see you on the other side of the war I hope we don’t have.
