A Coup and a Conscience: Why I Won’t Speak to My Trump-Obsessed Mother Anymore
Hate has no place in my heart — or family
January 6th is now a day that will live in infamy with the acts of domestic terrorism that descended upon our nation’s capital, spurred on by Donald Trump and his rabid supporters. But that day also happened to be my mother’s birthday. While we haven’t been close for a number of years, I felt her birthday at least warranted a gift and a phone call to catch up, even if it was done begrudgingly. But not this year. Maybe never again.
Because she’s chosen to believe in Trump over everything and everyone.
Including me.
My mother used to believe in science, teaching agricultural science for several elementary schools, and taping every episode of Bill Nye The Science Guy. Now she proudly proclaims that COVID is fake news and masks are liberal muzzles.
My mother used to believe in Black Lives Matter, going against her school board’s history curriculum to spend a term exclusively teaching her class about The Underground Railroad, and making sure we would visit any Black History museums nearby on our summer family vacations. Now she would see a Black Lives Matter bumper sticker while we were driving, turn to me, and viscerally spew “Brett, I hate Black Lives Matter.”
Whether it was through text, a short phone call, or a weekend visit, once any small talk was over with, she immediately pivoted to her Trumpian talking points. How we needed a wall on both borders, or how Antifa was destroying all our property, or that George Soros and Hilary Clinton were to blame for nearly everything else. I tried to have civilized, respectful conversations with her, where she would listen to my views, and I would ask her in-depth about why she feels the way she does about hot-button issues. But ultimately, it fell upon the deafest of ears. She picked up this ideology from her current husband of 15 years, who has quite the bigoted resume, including:
- Disowning his son for being gay
- Disowning his daughter for supporting his gay son
- Leaving horse manure in his ex-wife’s mailbox
- Memorizing and re-telling a plethora of racist jokes against BIPOC
- Having FoxNews on the TV at all times
After spending a few long weekends at their home over the years, and enduring this kind of behavior, I told her I wouldn’t be visiting her so as long as he was there ever again. Even though it cost me $400 to book hotel rooms for her each time she visited me when I was making $15 an hour at a temp job.
We haven’t spoken since just before the election, where she angrily texted me misconstrued Bible verses about respecting her and Trump after I had mentioned I had been doing phone banking for Democrats when asked. Amongst all the chaos on that day, I still felt a tinge of familial obligation to reach out, considering it was her birthday. But first I wanted to see if perhaps she had a change of heart or an epiphany based on the terrible events that had been unfolding that day. I hadn’t checked her Facebook newsfeed since she unfriended me moments after the election was called for Biden. My suspicions were confirmed, though — it was full of resharing posts of support of conspiracy theories, of Trump’s tweets, and support for the attempted coup.
I picked up my phone, blocked her number, and deleted her contact.
She literally pushed me out into life itself, but in a much different way, but it came time to push her out of mine. If she wasn’t my mother, I wouldn’t think twice about eradicating someone with such vile views from my world. I know I’ll feel forever conflicted, even if it is slight, on that. But there is no bond I will not sever, whether it be a bond by time, by name, or by blood if it with someone who espouses hatred against those who are of different skin color or sexual preference than her, who scorns those who do not use God to judge as she does, and who declares death to democracy in the name of demagogues.
I am so far from perfect in my actions and my views I’m sure, but I will never become a better person and make this world a better place by letting those who wish to watch it burn to stand beside me.