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Unread 07-21-2019, 05:06 AM
Mark McDonnell Mark McDonnell is offline
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Location: Staffordshire, England
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voting for that man is beyond my understanding.
Fair enough, James, it's very difficult. But I think it's part of our job as poets and human beings to try. As soon as you start seeing millions of people as an irredeemable mass to be demonised rather than as flawed individuals, you've kind of lost the argument imo * People love a good redemption story, when they can empathise with the individual: rehabilitated murderers, jihadis and white supremacists give TED talks. And yet it sometimes seems the same possibility for change is afforded less to people who put a tick in a box three years ago. This struck me reading Ashley's poem just on met. Moving that poem clumsily into the real world, I imagine we might be in the world of Trump voters there, victims and abusers alike (many apologies to Ashley if that's incorrect). There's absolutely nothing in this line of thinking that is mutually exclusive with greater sympathy for the more obvious victims of Trump's administration. And nothing in it means you shouldn't fervently oppose what they believe and the government they voted for.

*Edit: I'm not saying you're doing this — speaking more generally here.
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