TheDeadFlagBlues
Junior Chimp
Posts: 5,990
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« on: January 29, 2016, 09:25:46 PM » |
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Note: this TL was inspired by Mencken's TL but, as will become apparent soon, will take a very different track.
From East LA to Miami, from Corpus Christi to Chicago, from Yakima to New York City, Latin America's diaspora was glued to its television screen. Some were watching Univision or Telemundo, others were watching CNN or ABC, a few were furiously refreshing web pages instead. They were to see what their fate would be. They paid no attention to Donald Trump's pivot towards the center nor were they re-assured by the words of Republican Senators and Congressmen who assured them that they would place a check on Trump's authority, they knew what his intentions were, they could see it in livid rage of his supporters, who were increasingly bold, harassing anyone with brown skin or a Hispanic surname. So, when the results poured in, the sense of despair was palpable: Donald Trump was the President-Elect. Families were quick to reach for liquor, tears flowed down the cheeks of many. However, a few took to social media to post vitriolic "tweets" and "posts", posts that spread like wildfire. A mass movement was soon in the making. While first generation immigrants, particularly the undocumented tried to numb the pain of defeat, their children were ready to fight. This was their country. English was their language. They bled "red, white and blue". They had siblings in the military. They were angry. So, one by one, they took to the streets, meeting up at set locations, early in the morning, starting at 1 but slowly cascading towards 4 and 5. At first, the marches were peaceful, near solemn affairs but they turned into riots rapidly; all it took was a few drunk high schoolers throwing a rock at a vehicle with a MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN bumper sticker or a trashcan into the storefront of a known Trump supporter. This was not a universal event; in farming communities, the entire population came together to grieve and to vent, there was no one to assault. The same was true in most of southern California, where any Trump supporter with an IQ above 30 knew to hide their political views. Elsewhere, particularly in Phoenix, Las Vegas and Dallas, many residential areas were engulfed in flames, many police officers were on virtual strike and the sense of doom was palpable. President Obama, his approval ratings mired in the mid-30s, took to the screen at 5 in an attempt to calm the rioters, his last "hail marry" to demonstrate that there was one America. He failed miserably.
As dawn broke on that grim Wednesday, Trump supporters were meeting up, locked and loaded to "do something". Police departments, at least the ones packed with Trump fans, were in a state of rage, assaulting kids left and right. Due to the media's palpable dislike of Trump, most national outlets were quick to cover the police brutality, so, when Officer Troy O'Donnell opened fire on a scattered line of fleeing Mexican youth in Mesa, the country knew within minutes. At that moment, a constellation of Latino interest groups, labor unions, student groups and "latte liberals" was spurred to act. As the riots died down rapidly, running out of fuel towards late morning, a trend brought to its conclusion by the news of multiple police shootings, leaders from the SEIU, Unite HERE, UFCW, LIUNA, Council of La Raza and more met. Although they had discussed contingency plans in the run-up to election day, they were not prepared for the violence nor were they prepared for the roving bands of angry white men patrolling the streets of suburbs. They were in a collective state of shock, unsatisfied with the initial plan to hold mere candle light vigils or silent marches but entirely unsure of any other desirable alternatives. When a staffer, venting that "this country can't function without immigrants", a lightbulb went off in the leaders' minds: in order to demonstrate the utter stupidity of Trump's "big beautiful wall" and his promised deportations, they would need to pull Latinos out of the labor market for weeks. Thus, the Month Without Immigrants was born. In an afternoon press conference, covered by every major news network, they announced the plan: starting on Monday of the next week, Latinos and any of their allies were encouraged to not show-up for work, and to continue to stay home for three weeks.
Was this a recipe for disaster? Of course it was, no one could think straight in those dark days, racial minorities, not just Latinos, were not emotionally prepared for a Trump victory, they could not fathom why their friends and their neighbors would vote for someone who appeared to despise their very existence. They weren't willing to sit through four years of Trump, they weren't willing to wait until the 2018 midterms to elect a favorable Congress. So, democracy died on November 1st, 2016: it lost its legitimacy in the eyes of millions of immigrants, students and latte liberals when Trump, who they were told was an unelectable fascist, triumphed over Hillary Clinton. It lost its legitimacy with everyone else when it became clear that they didn't care about democracy, demonstrating that every right-wing trope about the inherent authoritarianism of Democrats, immigrants and non-white people was true. They just wanted gifts, they wanted to be coddled, and if they weren't, they would shred the Constitution.
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