Someone passing the Mountain Indivisible demonstration April 19th in Spruce Pine on Rt 226 asked from his car: “Don’t you have anything better to do?”
Well, that depends on what you consider “better” or more important.
We work, volunteer, shop, cook, clean house, tend our yards and gardens, worship, and care for our children and the elderly. Some are still doing repairs after Helene damage. Some, that day, had to leave early to go to a memorial service.
So, it actually comes as somewhat of an annoyance that we have to take time to constantly look over our shoulder for the next threat to our rights, freedoms, privacy, safety, the next immoral, illegal, unconstitutional act, the next threat to innocent lives.
We would like to trust that those who took an oath to uphold the constitution could be trusted to actually do so and not bow to greed, favoritism and fear.
But, right now, we can’t.
A month, a year, or a century from now, many of us cannot bear for someone to look back and see that our houses were clean, our gardens well tended, we were up on the latest TV episode of ..whatever, while our rights and freedoms were taken away from us, our democracy turned to a dictatorship, our lands were ravaged in the name of profit, our air and water became unsafe, good people serving their country lost their jobs, life saving research came to a halt, people went without essential health care and children went hungry.
So, we will take some time to do what we can: demonstrate non-violently, hold a sign, chant, write a letter, volunteer, donate, stay informed, make calls to our representatives, bring lawsuits if necessary, but cannot stand by while honesty, compassion, decency and respect for life and liberty are forever lost.
And there are many other opportunities to gather, exchange ideas and speak up: download the “5 calls” app, look at websites for meetings and activities with Mountain Indivisible, League of Women Voters, Yancey Progressives, Carolina Forward and many more.
Democrat, Republican, liberal, conservative. These labels should not matter anymore as we are all Americans facing dire threats. So, if you’ve got nothing better to do….SPEAK UP!
– Liz Peverall
