Democracy Works, But Only If You Do

I printed out flyers and business cards last week and went up and down the street, knocking on doors. The flyers tell people on my street, in my precinct, when and how and where they can vote. The business cards introduce me: 

Hi, Neighbor!

I am Mary Turck. If you want to talk about voting or elections (or even just talk!), you can call me.

I thought about whether it was wise to put my name and phone number on the card. And decided: if I want neighbors to trust me, and I do, I must at least show that much trust in them. So I did. 

Maybe they will think I am a crazy lady. 

Maybe I am.

I want people to vote. I want them to vote even if I disagree with them. I want them to vote and to believe that voting makes a difference, because if it does not, then we will not have a country much longer. If voting means nothing, then we are headed right down the drain, right into the dictatorship/fascism/authoritarianism that is the alternative to democracy.

The biggest threat to democracy is not the wanna-be dictator in the White House or his white nationalist buddies. The biggest threat to democracy is giving up on democracy. 

Some people tell me that none of it matters. That all politicians are crooked. That the news is full of lies and there is no truth. Such beliefs threaten democracy more than crooked politicians or bot-spread lies. 

I work at sorting information every day, and have for decades. My “spidey sense” for phony news is well-developed. If I have the slightest suspicion, I double and triple check even stories I want to believe. 

• Did 104-year-old Mabel Rose Thompson denounce Trump as the worst president in her lifetime? Nope – the 100 percent fake, AI-generated video went viral because credulous people reposted it. 
• Did a photographer get a picture of Trump reading something that was headlined “Kennedy Center DEMOLISH”? Yes. That is a real photo from September 15. Trump, and the Kennedy Center board members he appointed, also say that the Center will not be renovated or repaired unless Trump’s name goes on it. And a legal observer saw a forklift repeatedly striking the columns of the Kennedy Center on September 16. On September 17, a federal court ordered the Trump administration to give the court at least 30 days notice before beginning any destruction or construction of the Center. 

I know, probably better than most people, the depth of the sewers of misinformation, but I also know that it is possible to find accurate reporting and reliable information. 

Democracy depends on people caring and working to keep it. That includes the work of sorting through the flood of information to figure out what is true and what is false, what is known and what is not known, which sources can be trusted and which are unworthy of trust. 

The work of keeping democracy also includes the work of sorting out the corrupt politicians from the honest politicians, the competent from the stupid and incompetent, the caring from the selfish and self-serving. 

That’s your work before each and every election day. Time to go to work.