Given the recent events surrounding the presidential election, I find it hard to scribble about the topic I originally had intended to delve into: love.
I mean, in such a packed city, how do I find so many single people who just can’t find the one to swipe right?
I planned to make some profound statement about our hopeless yearning for romance through a screen, and just the general lack of intrigue happening on campus — but in light of what has happened, I think the real question is where is the love?
I’d go on quoting the entire lyrics to the song “Where is the Love?” by The Black Eyed Peas, but I’ll let you walk down that memory lane yourself.
One lyric that I do want to talk about though is “I think the world is addicted to the drama.”
It’s true. Despite the political journalism that's become so ubiquitous, there is such an intense focus on celebrity gossip that our generation is more familiar with the country’s actresses and singers than the people running it.
The situation reminds me of that scene in SuperSize Me where children were shown pictures of various presidents and historically significant people but the only face they recognized was Ronald McDonald.
I will venture to say that it was the controversial celebrity status of Donald Trump that attracted such fervent interest in this year’s elections.
The overwritten and overhyped rhetoric of what a maniac Trump is created an intense following in this nation’s Real-Life Drama.
From the increasingly shocking tone of each new debate, to interviews with angry supporters split ideologically and literally on your split screen TV, to unnerving supporter threats over Twitter, the election became The Greatest Show on Earth.
With the pilot episode over and the four seasons yet to start, we are left only with fear over how the story will unfold.
Up-to-the-minute Facebook updates feed that fear with looming plans for mass deportations and rising accounts of hate crimes — it's all reminiscent of an ugly history that we once thought was behind us.
Spray painted messages shouting “GET OUT” have appeared, reminding me of stories from people placed in Japanese Internment Camps. Accounts of blatant abuse based on mere appearance remind me of documentaries set in the days of Martin Luther King Jr. Each day, I am becoming more aware of reality’s nightmare.
But as I write this, I also understand that in fact, for plenty of people living not in the distant past, but this very day, this is not a new feeling. So many of us have been blind to a truth that was never gone to begin with.
I am not here to perpetuate despondency over what a horrible life we are living in. There is a silver lining — people are waking up. I now realize that this is my fight, story and drama as much as anybody else’s.
I want to apologize for my past inability to empathize because my myopic and selfish view blinded me to the pain of others around me. But if you could accept people like me as fresh recruits into this unfolding battle, let us be the numbers and voices that you need.
And we are not connected by some common enemy, but by the love we have for each other. We are here to sympathize, empathize and to love.
This is the love that we were looking for.
