Posted this on my Facebook wall this morning. Thought I’d share it here, too:

I’ve made an effort to keep politics off of my wall the last year or so. I haven’t always been successful with this, but I’ve tried. And why? Because I guess I’ve wanted to move past the divisions in our country – try to focus on the things that unite us all: family, pets, loss, grief, birth, rejoicing, humor, the beauty in sunsets and sunrises and humanity.

But this morning – when I’m reminded again that there are so many places in the world where people are, literally, dying for the right to speak and write freely – I’ve decided to use my “wall” and my freedom as an American citizen to express my thoughts about the state of our democracy.

January 6th, 2021, is still with me. What happened that day in our capitol was terrifying to me. It was a BIG DEAL. And I have a hard time wrapping my head around the words and thoughts of anyone who tries to make that day sound like it was just another day in America – or worse, like the attempted insurrection that day was somehow noble and patriotic. WE ALMOST LOST OUR DEMOCRACY THAT DAY. I saw it happen in real time in front of my television – this wasn’t some slanted propaganda being fed to me by the “left-wing” media – the violence and insanity of that day was not some made-up “fake news” – it was there for all of us to see.

And I guess I hoped that everyone would recognize what they were seeing that day was over-the-top insanity. Afterwards, I was bewildered when I found there were people who thought the attempted insurrection was great. A year later and I am bewildered to discover there are STILL people who thought what happened that day was great. Capitol police officers were violently attacked that day, defending our democracy. The lives of our vice president and our legislators were seriously threatened. Thugs and bullies stormed their way into our capitol building and tried to force their will on our democratic process. This is not noble or “great.”

Joe Biden won the election – he got 7 million more votes than the other candidate. SEVEN MILLION! This tally was certified (over and over and over again) by judges and state officials of BOTH parties. If you think it’s alright to disenfranchise the 81,282,903 American citizens who voted for Biden by storming the capitol building to overthrow a legitimate election, you are not a patriot. If you think YOUR vote somehow matters more than my vote and the 81,282,902 other people who voted for Biden, you might want to consider moving to a country where elections just don’t take place at all.

Our system is flawed – there’s no doubt about that. How we ended up with the candidates we ended up with in 2020 is beyond me. But those were the candidates we were given. We all voted for the one we thought would do the best job (or cause the least harm), and Biden won. Why – after all that happened on January 6th and since then – there are still people proudly flying Trump flags in their yards is mind-boggling to me.
-Karen Molenaar Terrell