This Thanksgiving, overcome divisions

The greatest enemy to this country is not President-elect Donald Trump or those who disagree with him. The greatest enemy that a nation-state has is irreversible strife within itself. Today, we see that kind of great civil division among us.

With people from both sides of the aisle blinded by planks in their own eyes, each have come to believe that they are the ones seeing things most objectively, and the others are suffering from bouts of naïve realism. The reciprocation of disrespect between disagreeing citizens has turned into meaningless lashing out among certain people. Our nation has become embroiled in a divisive culture of politics. We’re forgetting the whole point of our nation’s values: the freedom to speak, assemble and express without persecution. We’re forgetting what it means to be American. We’re forgetting that the only way to get through all this if we stand together. We’re failing to love one another. But worst of all, we’re failing to remember who we are, what we stand for and what really matters.

As Thanksgiving approaches, it’s time for all of us on campus to better appreciate the fellow Americans we study with. Remember at the end of the day, we’re all Trojans. We’re all Americans.

The people who support Trump shame the supporters of former Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton, while those who support her shame those who support him. Each side accuses the other and so on, so forth. The stream of endless articles on the election is fatiguing. But there’s little point in continuing to describe “ifs” and “should haves,” because whether we voted for him or not, what’s done is done. The right thing to do would be to take responsibility for our nation and hold our leader accountable. Especially as we enter into a time of giving thanks, it’s time to do away with the insults, mocking and rioting that accomplishes nothing. Again, it comes down to this: remembering. When we finally cool down, hopefully, some of us will remember that the one Democratic neighbor living down the street is an American. That one Republican neighbor is an American. Both Clinton and Trump are Americans.

But people who know much may still forget often.  Poet T.S. Eliot, in his poem “The Information Age” discusses just how prone we are to forgetting our values: “Where is the wisdom we have lost in knowledge? Where is the knowledge we have lost in information?” Some of us know so much about politics, American history, the President-elect, the economy, foreign relations and what leadership is. But sometimes that knowledge can blind us from seeing what’s right in front of us: each other. For everyone disappointed in the recent elections, just remember that Trump’s mandate to lead rests upon your approval. To clarify, he is the next president — no argument to be made there. However, it is we the people who can support our leader or bitterly oppose him for the next four years. We must be prudent with the knowledge that we carry. We, as Americans, as the single greatest asset or threat to a government, have to know how to translate information into useful knowledge that can be applied wisely. We have the choice to either let the better or worse parts of our nature show.

As Thanksgiving approaches in a couple days, we must remember what really matters. Remember we are a family. Remember we are Americans. Whoever is leading us, whoever is president, our nation is one family. For all the prejudiced against, you are Americans first and foremost. In his second inaugural address, former President Abraham Lincoln hoped that the people of this nation would act right “as God gives us to see the right.” This is still important today, because we have the capacity to decide with firmness in the right to act right. Whatever our personal preferences may have been or continue to be, anyone who is an American should strive “to bind up the nation’s wounds” and act “with malice toward none, with charity for all.”