If you've been on any social media site in the past few weeks, you've probably been inundated with dozens upon dozens upon millions of tweets, posts, and shares about the US Midterm elections. I've honestly never seen this much interest in an election that didn't include casting a ballot for the president.
It was wonderful.
Politics and the government, whether we want them to or not, influences our lives in ways we don't even think about. Certainly everyone is aware of the laws meant to keep us safe and the stress that comes with paying taxes, but so much of what happens in our lives is determined by government policy. Health codes and regulations: implemented by the government. Equal protection under the law: overseen by the government. The reason you can't use firearms to fish in Wyoming? It's likely that someone in the government was trying to stop someone else from getting killed because of their unique brand of stupid.
Knowing and understanding how the government affects our lives is a lot more important than some people think. I've spoken with some people and they've told me how they're uninterested or feel they are too uninformed for politics.
It saddens me that people don't always take the time to utilize their freedom to vote. Not everyone in the world has this right. There are so many people who lack the power to help decide the direction of their country's future.
Voting is a unique type of power that I am grateful to have.
During the 2008 election year, I was still in high school. It was a presidential election year, so the media was in a frenzy and talked of little else. I couldn't vote, but I was incredibly well informed on what was going on.
One day, right before election day, my math teacher started class a little differently. Like quite a few of my other high school teachers, he had served in the military before going into teaching. He looked at all of us and I remember him telling us (though my friends might have different memories) that the most important thing we could do as citizens of the United States was to use our right to vote.
That year the United States elected their first African American president.
Despite my teacher's lesson, I didn't start using my right to vote until 2012. My university tried to increase engagement in the politics. October through early November always had plenty of pamphlets on the dining hall tables detailing what was going to be on the ballot in our area. Our newspaper would put out a special edition on the candidate. Even one of the professors ran (and won) for mayor of our city.
It wasn't that I was disinterested in politics (I'm from DC - we're surrounded by it from the day we're born). I just had a lot of other things to do that got in my way of going out to the polls. I also didn't realize how important local elections were.
Since 2012, I have made it my mission to vote in as many elections as I can (this includes primaries). I make sure I know where my polling place is, what times it's open, and how easy it is for me to get to. I send out texts to my family to remind them that it's election day.
Still a number of people I would talk to would tell me that they hadn't even realized it was election day. Some would shrug their shoulders and tell me that it didn't really matter all that much.
It wasn't until this year that things felt different.
Usually midterm elections are treated as an interesting blip on people's radar that fades into the background of other, more pressing matters. Presidential elections are the ones everyone really cares about.
Not this year.
This year, everyone was talking about them.
Turn out was huge. People of my generation, who are notorious for not voting in midterm elections, turned out in droves. Absentee and early voting was at it's highest. Lines were long and people arranged to carpool to polls.
I sent out texts to my family as per usual and so many of the responses I got back were: have you voted yet? Even more wonderful, two of those texts came from younger cousins who had to send in absentee ballots because they go out of state schools.
I'm proud of the people in my country. I'm proud that people my age are aware of how important their right to vote is. I'm proud that we're paying attention to what the people lead us are doing.
But with the good, there comes the bad.
Despite the success in getting people out to vote, there were plenty of reports of horror stories. As I stated earlier lines were long. I hadn't had to wait at my polling station for anything since 2012 (I waited over an hour to vote in that election), but I did this year. There were issues with the polling machines malfunctioning. I heard reports of people being told to go to the wrong polling stations.
And the less said about the situation in Georgia the better.
Our system isn't prefect, but we can work together to keep improving. Having a voice in politics and being able to vote is such a wonderful opportunity. It puts the power of our future into our own two hands. We get to have a voice in how our country is run.
I am incredibly grateful for that.
Thank you America for getting out and voting last Tuesday.
If you enjoyed this post (or it really pissed you off) please like, share, and/or leave a comment. I love hearing from my readers and I hope you guys like hearing from me.
Until next week.
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