#CalExit: America, We’re Just Not That Into You
As a native of Southern California, I am so into the idea of #CalExit. Ditching Trump and gaining an established national sovereignty in the process, why haven’t Californians thought of this sooner?
Despite my personal support of secession, the map of CA voters shows that the vote for Hillary was not consistant throughout the state, making California just as affected by this surge of right wing thinking as the rest of the nation is. Our state differs from our country, however, when the progressive thinking that is associated with voting for Hillary isn’t limited to just the young as California voters of all ages showed a mild investment in her campaign.
Before this election, it was easy to travel up the West Coast and admire the beauty and diversity that has cultivated here, but now it has been made clear that this is a perspective is very much limited to one who lives that particular coastal lifestyle. Thinking about San Francisco and Los Angeles as cultural hotspots and overpopulated urban cities, it makes sense that the majority of Californians would find comfort in the idea of designating this body of land as being different than the rest of the country, but where does this idea come from?
Both cities provide spaces for minority communities to create and in that effectively allowed those community’s cultures to be cemented into the history of the city itself. Asian and Mexican cultures have both been interwoven into the fabric that makes up the standard Californian, which inherently creates citizens with a perspective that differs from other Americans. Chinatown, Koreatown, Little Armenia, Mission District, Fillmore District; each of these cultural neighborhoods are what give character to the land that is California and provide the real roots for understanding how this ‘young progressive’ persona has been universally applied to all Californians.
The America we know as Californians is a privilege. We have heritage in cultures that teach alternative morals and ideals that differ from those offered by American media, and this is what I believe explains the inconsistency of voters within California and in the nation as a whole. My personal cultural identity plays a large role in my understanding of this complex socialization we experience while living in California, as I was born here in America, but truly identify as Xicana. I was raised in a Mexican-American household that taught me to have a fundamental respect for my culture and every individual in my family, because regardless of the circumstance, ellos son familia.
This isn’t to say that Mexican-American families don’t discriminate because racism and sexism are both deeply rooted into the culture, but I am suggesting that it is this type of familial sentiment that has allowed for Californians to see an advantage in setting up a new border to consolidate our way of life. Boiling #CalExit down to these key elements even illuminates that this response of Californians to ‘leave’ the U.S. literally mirrors Trumps advocacy to “Build a Wall” to keep Americans in and (Mexican) immigrants out.
It’s disturbing to make this connection, but using the thinking of theorist Wendy Brown, clarifies that a wall around California aims to stage a the same false image Trump has incited of “sovereign protection” for those inside and “sovereign aggression” for those outside. As this becomes the role of the border, the wall, the physical illusion of sovereign power, hides the irony that these walls give life to threats by portraying an “image of power and control in the face of the opposite.”
So it’s up to us, fellow Californians, do we show our fear by following through with the secession, or do we make our voices heard and use the privilege we do have access to demonstrate to the rest of America what real acceptance looks like?
