How far can you separate personal life from the politician? How far you can you distant the person’s morals with what they say they stand for on TV?
As the list of presidential candidates gets thinner every day, a lot of people are scrambling to find the perfect person to vote for. In today’s world, everything about every candidate is public. What they like, what they don’t like, what they put in their campaign promises and what they left out.
The presidential race is aggressive and both parties are currently scraping together as much support as they can. But before long, the line between their political beliefs and their personal beliefs gets blurry.
President Donald Trump’s campaign is heavily focused on more religious conservative Americans, and they have pushed him to success since the beginning of his presidential career. But despite the religious support, Trump doesn’t necessarily follow anything that they stand for. He’s cheated on his wives, paid off porn stars, said and done numerous racist and sexist things, and been a generally not-so-great guy.
Yet he still gets the votes and results he needs because his constituents love his economic plans and his plans for immigration problems.
I don’t think the two should be separated. Anyone can vote for him all they want but should admit they are voting for who he is – Donald Trump and all of the sexism, racism and homophobia that comes with him. Cherry-picking the best qualities of his campaigns and ignoring all of the unsavory things that come with him isn’t the best way to go about doing things. If thinking about those unsavory things makes you not want to vote for him, then maybe you just shouldn’t vote for him. Not thinking about aspects of your president isn’t the best option.
And some people vote for him because of the things that many of his supports might want to ignore. Not all republicans are white supremacists, but all white supremacists are republican. They are not the majority and are only an extra unsavory part of Trump’s campaign. But they are there, and you’re supporting the same things they are, albeit likely for different reasons.
Conservative-leaning immigration policies are a good example of that split. While some republicans appreciate stricter immigration laws because they just feel that the current laws are lacking, the more conservative of the conservatives simply do not want refugees in America. It’s a very thin line that separates those two interpretations of immigration and Trump has been wildly successful at playing both sides in his favor.
Trump has publicly called women terrible thingsthat I don’t want to type, and at the same time, boasted about kindness and all of his redeemable characteristics. He has said he stands for peace and the American dream, but at the same time has encouraged internet cult leaders like Alex Jones, whose ideals are infamous for the chaos that comes with them.
Does voting for Trump automatically mean that you are all of the things that he is? Does voting conservative turn you into the white supremacist people associate with that party? No, of course not. But hiding behind Trump’s policies doesn’t erase who he is as a person and that’s the same person that you are voting to keep in office.
Nobody is perfect. No candidate this election season is 100 percent free from controversy or unflattering things in their past or present, but if the unflattering aspects outweigh any potential good campaign promises, people don’t vote for them. That’s why, for the most part, they don’t become president.
Politicians shouldn’t be allowed to hide behind good intentions and campaign promises and let people forget the things they’ve done. Hold them accountable this election season.