Part XXXIII: Tell Me Why

Please - I really want to know.

11 July 2025

My parents called me their why child for a reason.

I wasn’t necessarily defiant (although sometimes it felt necessary to be defiant), but I was curious. I wanted to understand cause and effect. I wanted to understand antecedents and outcomes. I wanted to understand motives and methods. I was always, always, always asking why about everything.

My parents quickly learned how disinclined I was to accept “because I said so” or “because that’s just how things are” or even “I don’t know” as the final answer to anything.

I’m still this way.

Honestly, I have some difficulty understanding why everyone else is not this way. Why wouldn’t you want to know why?

Eventually I landed on an answer that explains a lot, but leaves me unsatisfied: a lot of people simply do not want to know.

Occasionally (more frequently lately), I have been asked a why question myself: Why don’t we talk anymore? Or Why did we grow apart? Or – my favorite – Why can’t we still be friends?

These questions come most often from friends, neighbors, family, well-meaning people who wear red hats and claim they want to make America great again.

It’s tempting to respond with a detailed explanation about differences in values, or perception, or understanding. On its face, the question seems sincere: why can’t we be friends?

While they wait for my answer, I have to remind myself that they really do not want to know. What they want is for me to acknowledge the rightness of their choices. They want me to validate their views.

I get it. I’ve been there. I’ve been them. As a former adherent and now recovering survivor of deep theocratic indoctrination, I understand the source of their questions, and I understand why they make the choices they make. I understand that they are not seeking to understand me. They seek conformity. When I do not conform, it makes them uncomfortable.

So when someone asks me why I said this thing or that thing (because I tend to say what I think, which can make some people uncomfortable), or they ask why I keep my distance from them, my first response these days is, “Are you sure you really want to know?”

Most of the time, that ends the conversation because they really do not want to know.

For those who persist, those who declare that they do want to know, those who are determined to let me know that they care about me and what I think, or they care about how I feel, or some variation on that theme, my response now is this:

Before I tell you my why,

I need you to tell me

Because I really want to know

Why

Why you thought it was ok

To vote

For me

To die.

That’s what you did you know.

YOU know.

You KNOW.

YOU KNOW.

If you did not know it before,

You must – most assuredly – know it by now.

So please look me in the eye

And tell me why.

Surely you know

If you know me at all

That I am one of the

Marginalized “they”.

Even if you can’t see it

(Because not all of my challenges are immediately visible)

I am pushed to the edge

In more than one way

(in so many ways I’ve lost count, really).

You tell me you believed the loud ones

When they promised greatness,

And in the next breath you say

You didn’t think they were serious

About the threats they made against

The “monsters” they wanted you to be afraid of.

Remember: I am one of those monsters.

Perhaps your child is also one.

Perhaps your boss is a monster, too.

Perhaps you will soon be added to the list of monsters.

Perhaps that is why it is so important to you

To conform,

To look “normal.”

Never mind that, though.

The loud ones told you they would make things better

And you believed them.

You were worried about the price of eggs,

Or the “invasion at the border,”

Or people who enjoy sex in different ways than you do,

Or people who simply don’t look or dress or

live their lives the same way you do.

So you voted for a “greatness” that looks a whole lot like

Your unchallenged comfort level.

Tell me,

Is the cost of a dozen eggs so important to you

That you’re willing to sacrifice my life

And many more lives of living, breathing, fellow beings

To save a couple of bucks?

I look like you (except for my wheelchair and my oxygen tank).

I live in your neighborhood (even though you never see me).

I do essential work that I am uniquely skilled to do.

I am on your lists of people you “should” care about

(church rosters, neighborhood directories, local social groups).

You say all are welcome

But you make me feel unsafe

Because your life choices

Empower those who consider my existence irrelevant, inconvenient,

Those who would happily deprive me of my life if it would profit them.

That is what they are doing now, at every turn.

They are kidnapping people and sending them to concentration torture camps.

They are destroying the social safety net

That net helps to keep me and millions of marginalized others

Alive

And maybe, even possibly,

Somewhat more healthy than we would be otherwise.

The net would help you, too,

At whatever moment you become marginalized

(it will happen, you know, eventually, if you’re lucky enough to survive).

They are intentionally destroying the infrastructure and

The delicate ecosystem

Every living entity on this planet relies on for continued existence.

They are doing all of this

Because you, and millions more like you,

Voted to let them do that.

If you now regret that vote,

And truly I hope you do,

Why do you still wear that red hat and

wave those signs and

spread those memes?

Why have you not impaled your faux superhero posters

And your golden sneakers

And your battle flags

And your horned cosplay helmets

On a roasting fork,

Held them over searing flames of absolution,

And painted yourself with the ashes?

Why have you not foresworn your allegiance to

any and all aspects of authoritarianism?

If your question to me means you’re trying

to reconnect, to learn, to change,

To comprehend,

You must be honest enough to look at yourself

To understand what you helped to create,

To understand why you made the choice you made.

To come clean,

You must be born again

And commit to a new way of being.

You must see me

– really see me –

And see yourself in me

And see me in yourself.

If we are to still be friends

(or even friends for the first time),

You must understand this

Before you can truly understand

The role you’ve played

And the changes you need to make now,

The work you must do now

To try to stop the horror,

Arrest the harm,

Heal the rift.

This you must do

Because

Whether it’s what you intended or not

The law of unintended consequences never doesn’t apply.

If you’re serious,

do not look away.

Look me in the eye

And tell me why.

When you can do that,

You will understand:

Your answer is my why.

If you can’t do that

There is nothing for us to talk about.

~

I say this with all the love I can muster:

Let your conscience be your guide. When you’re ready to turn away from the festering toxicity that has led us to this impasse, when you’re ready to actively advocate for a community where there can truly be liberty and justice for all of us, I’ll be ready to listen and learn and talk with you.

I’ll be here to help…

I hope.

~

I’m so glad to have you join me here. Knowing I have readers waiting for updates energizes me and inspires me to keep writing. Your presence makes all the difference; it means I’m not alone and neither are you.

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~

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