Swallow the Red Pill, Democrats!
Hard truths about our delusions of America
The red pill and blue pill are metaphorical terms representing a choice between learning an unsettling or life-changing truth by taking the “red pill” or remaining in the contented experience of ordinary reality with the “blue pill”. The pills were used as props in the 1999 film The Matrix.
I’m swallowing the Red Pill this week. It’s going down hard. I volunteered for the Harris campaign in Pennsylvania. I donated. I canvassed. I worked phone banks. I took shifts as an election poll observer, including 14 hours on election day. I helped cure ballots. Based in Philadelphia, I saw Harris/Walz signs everywhere. I breathed hope in the air. I thought the City of Brotherly Love reflected the reality of the nation.
Two nights before the election, I saw Hamilton on stage, and felt so inspired by the vision of that musical: the multicultural story of the mixed-race immigrant who helped to forge our nation. As George Washingtion’s right-hand man, Alexander Hamilton was the man “in the room where it happened” as our nation took shape. I believed the premise of the show, and the promise of the Declaration of Independence: that in America “All men are created equal” — and that this included not only all men, but all women, and anyone on the…
