The stage is set, the actors take their places on the stage, opposite to each other. One is a billionaire reality TV star who has bankrupted several companies in his life, relying on the government to foot the bill, a person who has spewed vile discrimination and hate speech just like his KKK member father to generate attention, and a person who says he is for American workers but uses foreign workers to make his products.
The other is a woman who has a lot of ties to Wall Street, who supported NAFTA, a treaty that has done more economic harm to America than anything else in recent history, who has lied about her role in pivotal mistakes made by her department in the government, and who has leaked top secret information by being careless, information that could hurt innocent American lives.
The play is a self-aware one: the fourth wall is as necessary a part of the play as it is separate. The actors plead their case, saying that they are the best candidate for the job, but the audience doesn't buy that. Then, when the audience becomes bored and begins to leave, the actors turn on each other. They attack each other's flaws and call them unfit for the job. The audience becomes divided on which flaws are worse. Eventually, the audience begins to accept the vices of their favorite actor to the point where they don't even consider them bad. They become so blinded in their fear of the opposite, they run to the dangerous bosom of their "favorite".
What the audience doesn't know is that both of the actors aren't just randomly attacking each other. They are reading a script, masterfully crafted by an adept playwright to play on their emotions. At the end of the play, the audience feels what the playwright wants them to feel: divided and fearful. The debate rages outside of the theater, which one is better, and which is worse. The divisions take a deeper root in the hearts of the public at large.
What the public doesn't realize is that the story is not as narrow as it may come across as. The two actors are but a small part of the larger cast. The cast contains many others who act out small parts of their own plays, written with their own message. The playwright, however, blots out these other story lines with his overarching conflict. The fear of one of the actors outweighs the people's sense of freedom, and, instead of identifying with an actor who is more in line with what they believe in, they stand besides their extremely imperfect actor, because they were coerced into it.
I am here to tell you that if you vote out of fear, you are forfeiting your freedom as an individual and submitting yourself to the will of those who would control you.
I feel a strong desire to tell you – and I expect you feel a strong desire to tell me – which of these two errors is the worse. That is the devil getting at us. He always sends errors into the world in pairs – pairs of opposites. And he always encourages us to spend a lot of time thinking which is the worse. You see why, of course? He relies on your extra dislike of the one error to draw you gradually into the opposite one. But do not let us be fooled. We have to keep our eyes on the goal and go straight through between both errors. We have no other concern that that with either of them. ~ C. S. Lewis
While this refers to Christian mythology, this is something that applies to many things beyond morality, voting included. When faced with two evils, condemnation of both is the correct manner by which we can move forward. If we give into our fears, we make mistakes, and allow bad things to be perpetrated by the evil we have accepted.
So when you are voting this year, do not be afraid. Choose whatever candidate makes sense to vote for, not for the one you feel you have to to beat the one you are afraid of.
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