A Letter to my Father, The Man Who Chose Donald Trump Over Every Woman in His Life

[AmericanMan1958]

Dearest Dad, I am not writing you this letter to change your mind about your vote in 2016. I am not writing this to sway you, to convince you that Hillary Clinton is the better choice. That is not my goal, because I know that is impossible, just as impossible as an attempt from your end to get me to vote for Donald Trump. I am writing you this letter to tell you how heart broken I am that you have made this choice. Not because I am a broke student pursuing a PhD in a field that is not exactly lucrative. Not because I rent an overpriced apartment in the Upper East Side that I struggle to afford. Not because I fear I will never be the one percenter that you have “pulled yourself up by your boot straps” to become, an immigrant Latino with no college education who built a multi-million dollar corporation from the ground up with his bare hands. Before I continue this letter to you, I must tell you that I am so proud of you. I am so proud of you for hiring the sort of men that deserve a second chance, that no one else would ever employ. My heart swells when I think of the blood you shed to put food on our table, to put a roof over our heads.
But all of that seems to lose its spark in the shadow of your support for Donald Trump.

https://medium.com/athena-talks/a-letter-to-my-father-the-man-who-chose-donald-trump-over-every-woman-in-his-life-85125feeee57#.106rhysbm

This is a long read but believe it is worth the time spent, doing so.

[niyad]

1. k and r for this heartbreaking, excellent read.

[Jerry442]

2. A very intense essay.

My parents are no longer living. I can't envision either of them supporting Trump, but then again I can't envision anyone in my circle of friends supporting Trump, yet some of them do.

I never wanted the be that guy, the one who broke off friendships because of political disagreements, but in the Age of Trump, how can you not? it's not much different from seeing someone you're close to go off the deep end and saying "You know what? When you read history, you can see the world would be a lot better off if Hitler had won."

[PJMcK]

3. That was a powerful and heartbreaking letter

Ms. Riis has written an amazingly candid and heartfelt letter to her father. I hope her message reaches him. Clearly, she loves her family.

But she's absolutely right.

Thanks for posting the link, AmericanMan1958. (By the way, your screen name could be mine; when we were born, there were only 48 stars on the American flag. Think about it.)

[mothra1orbit]

4. Yes but does it say whose blood this father shed?

This is a serious question.

[bettyellen]

7. THAT is your takeaway?

[narnian60]

15. What the hell?

[mothra1orbit]

29. Your surprise and outrage astound me

"blood was spilled" means someone was killed. You don't talk about "spilled blood" if you mean "blood, sweat and tears"--which is the kindest interpretation I can make of whatever this woman was trying to say. If her father achieved success through murder, I say what the hell is she proud of him for? If you're going to make public statements like this, you must be prepared to clarify jarring statements like this.

My question was serious. I am not sentimental, and I have zero tolerance for the maudlin. I wanted--still want--to know if someone who read the entire letter learned whose blood was shed, and why and by whom.

[alittlelark]

5. That was an amazing letter.....

[bettyellen]

6. Wow. What an amazing woman.

[ffr]

8. His father's shame is what I see in most republican supporters

The go blindly into the voting booth. And for that, I shame them.

[Maru Kitteh]

9. Monsters are elected by good people who do not vote, and good people who

reject reason and humanity in favor of party.

I found this part very moving;

But if Donald Trump wins the election in November of 2016, it is not him who takes away everything I have fought so hard to attain. It is you. You are the cold blooded killer of the rights women have fought for for as long as we can remember. It is you who will rob millions of young women of the respect they deserve, the future they deserve, and the feeling of safety we are barely clinging to now. It is you and only you who will give your daughters the gift of an impossible uphill climb, a bleak future stuck to the bottom of some man’s shoe. And you will cut the chord that has connected us for so very long. I must pose this question to you Dad, because it is really and truly the only thing I want an answer to: Do you really care about someone who is nakedly contemptuous of you and what you have accomplished more than you care about your own daughters?

[elmac]

11. Some people are blinded by the light

and that light can come from 2 sources when voting for a republican, greed, religion or both.

[Bernardo de La Paz]

10. Tough case. Will he be the last one to leave the tRump campaign?

[SunSeeker]

12. K & R

[Missn-Hitch]

13. Thank you for sharing. I needed this. I am going through some family issues too.

[susanna]

19. I needed this, too.

I have been dealing with this for many years, but this year is far worse than all the others. I hope we all survive it.

Hang in there.

[Missn-Hitch]

20. Thank you susanna. WE will.

Is there any going back? I have to let these people go, I guess.

Just awful. I hope it's a crushing defeat.

[susanna]

21. You raise such good questions.

I wish I had the answers. But yes, WE will.

[etherealtruth]

14. K&R ... hoping everyone takes the time to read this

[dbackjon]

16. This needs to be posted/shared everywhere

Incredibly powerful.

[Johnny2X2X]

17. My wonderful mother is a Trump fanatic

I had a great childhood and my mother taught me everything I needed to know, to be honest, to treat others the way I want to be treated, and to always respect those around me. My mom was always cooking, and no kid in the neighborhood wasn't welcome if they had not had a good meal that day. She was a generous spirit and a great role model.

What happened? When her 4 children were old enough she went back to work at a small neighborhood pharmacy. The owner of the pharmacy was a Right Winger who played Rush Limbaugh every single day. She was forced to listen to that garbage for over 20 years until she retired. That changed her for sure, but it wasn't until Facebook that she truly became lost. My mom is now in her 70s, she simply wasn't ready to handle all of the information the internet offers. She'll read a DRUDGE headline and to her that is just as valid as a CNN headline. And she followed the rabbit down the hole from there. She believes everything she reads on Breitbart and she follows links from there to even darker websites. Her and her same aged cousin send fear stories back and forth about Muslims plowing their cars into crowds in the US, about Obama pledging allegiance to ISIS, and everything you can imagine about Hillary.

In her world, danger is around every corner, minorities are savages intent on stealing her country, Muslims have all but taken over the whole country and Sharia Law is now being enforced. It's terribly sad and it makes her miserable.

I still love my mom and she's still a great grandmother, but this stuff has changed her. There is no reaching her, countless hours have been spent trying. Trump is some type of super hero to her, only he can make things right in the world, none of his flaws matter because he's a super man and will make her and everyone she cares about safe.

It's absolutely disgusting the fear mongering coming from Trump and the Right in general, their aim is to do exactly what they did to my mother, terrify her in her golden years so they can gain power. It's decades worth of brain washing and it's basically permanent. Trump is the end product of all of this.

[uponit7771]

22. +1, most people I find who support tRump are single sourced political info people. I even tune into

... FAUX news for opo mostly but to see why they see what they see and most of the time they're making up their own realities relative to facts and being bold faced lied to.

What I find irritating is the repeating of the alt-right ish memes on the other news channels as if their alternative reality is to be taken seriously and not called out for being bold faced stupid

The M$M has normalized tRumps overt "ism's"

[Johnny2X2X]

24. The scary thing

The scary thing is how incredibly coordinated it all is. Limbaugh laid the ground work and FOX normalizes everything. Now FOX won't go as far as Breitbart, but they will reference Breitbart stories vaguely to give them credibility. There 100% has to be collusion between Alt Right sites like Breitbart and FOX as well as the Con Newspapers. It all works together.

[uponit7771]

28. +1, yes... they don't even try to hide it !!!

[susanna]

23. You have told the story of my father.

I don't know the answer; I wish I did.

[DonCoquixote]

18. Sadly

a lot of the older latinos think that just because they made it in business means that they have been accepted by Anglo society. Senor, this Puerto Rican can tell you that people like Trump eat Millionaires for breakfast, and one of the ways they do it is by encouraging people you swore were your friends to dogpile on and backstab you. That Rush Limbaugh listener who is your friend, chances are he resents the fact you have your business and will gladly ally with someone else to take it from you. That Cop that waves to you, he probably think is you are just another sp*c who will get what he deserves someday. Many of these people you think are friends are often people who have had to play nice, but when the moments comes, to them, you are just another bit of brown wood to shovel into their furnace. I have seen it happen, it is NOT pretty, and when it happens, you will wish you did not isolate yourself from tu nena that cared about you.

And it is one thing to simply disagree on politics, but honestly, a man who changes wives like clothes, utters insults like "Miss Housekeeping." Says he will force Mexico to build a wall, even if you have no objection to any of that MORALLY, it shows the man is STUPID. Senor, you did not get to make your business by employing stupid people, but then again, you did not have daddy's money to save you like Trump did. Use the brain that made you money, because Trump's brain does NOT.

[Akamai]

25. Wow! Extremely moving letter bringing up so many important issues. Wonderful insights! Sure worthy

of sending to every father who is thinking of voting for Trump.

Thanks for sharing this!

[handmade34]

26. I hope she

actually gives it to her father

[Kashkakat v.2.0]

27. If it's cult thinking - closing oneself off to all input except what the cult is telling them is

true - then what do we do with that??? With my sibs/ mom, I will keep channels of communication open but disengage. Oh - I am contemplating sending a short note to my mom that just says "please consider that the Clintons may not be as evil as your information/propaganda sources are telling you" My elderly mom is terrified and I want to reassure her that Obama wont declare martial law and put anyone in camps.... or any of that nonsense.