The World that I am Leaving My Daughter
The Consequences of a Dysfunctional Society
This is my daughter’s kindergarten picture. She is sweet and innocent, like most elementary-aged children. She has no idea the future that my generation is leaving her.
She, her children, and her grandchildren will have to live in a polluted, depleted environment. My daughter will have to fight to get back rights concerning her own body that we have taken away from her.
She and her generation will have to reverse mean-spirited legislation aimed against individuals with sexual orientations or gender identities that depart from the supposed normal.
She will tell her children how she lived in a time when many people fought efforts to stop a million deaths because they wanted to eat in a restaurant or shop without wearing a mask.
She is also growing up in a time when two very basic passages to adulthood are out of the reach of many individuals: higher education and home ownership.
And, she will go through school participating in active shooter drills, hoping beyond hope that it will never happen to her because my generation cut spending on mental health care while refusing to adopt any commonsense cuts on the ability for a madman to shoot up a school full of children.
The blame falls on bloated politicians, selfish individuals, and an apathetic populace. I take responsibility. Merely wishing things were different or offering condolences, thoughts and prayers is never going to change anything.
We have to speak our minds when we see that something is not right. We need to stick up for those who may not have the numbers or the voice to advocate for themselves. We need to vote as loudly and as often as we can.
Things have to change. I never want to see the picture of my daughter on the front page of a newspaper or on the nightly news.
Change will not occur overnight and there is no single solution. But we owe it to the children who have senselessly died, we owe it to future generations, and I owe it to my daughter. We have to change.
