What V.C. Andrews Can Teach Us About Politics
Heaven on my mind
Last week, Democratic social media influencer Chris Evans posted the following insult wrapped inside a rhetorical question:
Why do so many white liberals seem to live in this fantasy world where there’s gonna be some big aha moment and one particular thing is gonna suddenly make their racist MeeMaw and PawPaw stop being MAGA? It’s been 10 years now and 3 elections. The man told them to inject bleach.
Another user on his thread wondered, “I’d love to know why white liberals also keep seeing MeeMaw and PopPop on holidays and rushing to tell Black and brown people about their racist relatives and friends at work, school, etc?”
This sort of smug fatalism might play well on social media but it ignores basic human nature. It’s not hypocritical to express frustration over a relative’s politics while still caring about them or hoping they’ll finally reject right-wing propaganda and conspiracy theories. Also, it’s quite possible that when they aren’t watching Fox News, “MeeMaw” and “PopPop” are more pleasant to be around than some pious liberal online. It’s a variation of the W.C. Fields line from It’s A Gift: When told he’s drunk, Fields replies, “Yeah, and you’re crazy. But I’ll be sober tomorrow.”
I’m not so arrogant as to think that anyone is going to choose me over their loved ones, no matter how high on Fox News they are. I can’t compete with the memory of that Happy Meal your MAGA aunt bought you. Yes, many liberals will claim they’ve cut Trump-supporting relatives out of their lives, but those relatives were almost always uniformly terrible. Refusing to wear a mask during the pandemic was often just the final push needed to end a toxic relationship. This is simply not true of everyone who voted for Trump, and anyone who insists otherwise exists in their own bubble.
This is what I call the “deplorables” conundrum. You might agree that your MAGA loved ones are annoying, ignorant bigots but you’re probably not going to appreciate Democrats suggesting they are inherently awful people.
The Julia Roberts spot for Kamala Harris had a similar problem. It basically said, “Hey, your husband is an abusive bigot but you can vote for Harris without the sleazebag knowing!” There is never any political gain from insulting the people closest to your voters.
I understand the impulse of liberals who haven’t given up on their MAGA loved ones, even those who voted for Trump three times. They remain hopeful for redemption. (Hell. Chuck Schumer has admitted that his imaginary friends the Baileys probably backed Trump in 2024. He’s a loser in his own fantasies).
Barack Obama understood this. A vote for him in 2008 was seen as a vote for an optimistic future not a personal rejection of your worst family members. He certainly never had any ads where people were secretly voting for him like they were junkies in a 1980s anti-drug PSA. Of course, Republicans like Megyn Kelly and Newt Gingrich have the gall to blame Obama for the nation’s racial divisions. The first Black president didn’t start the fire. It was always burning. Kelly and Gingrich spent years roasting marshmallows over it.
Don’t ask me why, but this all reminds me of a scene from the classic American novel Heaven by V.C. Andrews. The titular character is frequently shocked by her sister Fanny’s overt promiscuity. There’s a moment where she confronts her stepmother about it. The family is dirt poor and her stepmother is busy chopping up a squirrel or something for their broke-ass dinner. She’s miserable and doesn’t have time for this. Heaven is mid-way through her meltdown, when her stepmom stops her and says, “Yer sister Fanny is gonna be a whore.” That’s it. That’s the reality. Heaven might want to believe otherwise, but her stepmom has to go put the squirrel in the oven.
Anyway, I often feel like Heaven’s stepmother whenever I see someone tagging one of their Trump-supporting friends or relatives and asking, “Did you see what he just did? Kids in cages. Attempted coups. Needless cruelty. That must be the last straw for you!”
Sorry, but Heaven’s sister Fanny’s gonna be a whore and your Trump-voting friend or relative believes Robert F. Kennedy Jr makes some good points and Portland is a literal war zone. That’s it. That’s the reality. Now I have to go put this squirrel in the oven before the Proud Boys track me down.
(*I mean no disrespect to sex workers who are all more honorable than members of the Trump administration.)
Heaven’s stepmother tells her, “Ya kin’t do nothing about Fanny, Heaven. Ya just look out for yerself.” I confess this cynicism is tempting, as we endure the world Trump voters willingly inflicted upon us, but successful politicians need to be more like Heaven. Democrats still need to hold out hope that your MAGA loved ones can do better or at least keep trying to understand them. (This doesn’t mean you have to surrender your values to them in the name of false peace.) It’s frustrating but that’s the better path. It’s how we win elections and avoid a metaphorical Cold War from becoming very real and very hot.
Yes, Fanny ultimately betrays Heaven but she later feels guilty about it and makes amends. Like I said, she was more honorable and capable of redemption than anyone in Trump’s White House.
My sisters and I are all of different political ideologies with the oldest being GOP, the youngest Libertarian and me, the middle, DEM. We’ve settled into an accord of sorts where we do not talk about these things. This isn’t hard when you’re raised in the south where you regularly ignore the elephant in the room and fiddle dee dee i’ll think about it tomorrow.
We just all agree that we need each other and that is that.
I know that no one is going to have me extreme liberal views and neither am I going to have theirs. But perhaps some time in the future there may be a change and we come together. You can never stop having hope.
I’m fortunate in that the only friends and relatives I interact at with all hate Trump but imagine it couldn’t be easy having say a father who is otherwise a terrific person but has this blind spot for MAGA. One thing liberals do have to get through their head is that while Trump supporters include a lot of assorted pieces of shit, he has also managed to appeal to otherwise normal people in a way we can’t understand. It’s not just “white supremacy”—these people in their hearts don’t believe Trump is promoting that, only that he’s “politically incorrect”—but he does play on natural fears of losing what little they have. It’s jarring to us because he seems so obviously a scumbag but if you’re consuming different media or just seeing the same items through a different lens, you can have a different take on what to us just seems a given.
Anyway, if we don’t figure out how to reach more people (nonvoters but also some former Trump voters) we are screwed. Assuming they’re lost causes is a recipe for disaster.