Someone I follow on Twitter re-tweeted -- with a reply -- a nasty anti-semitic comment from a conservative. Against my better judgment I checked out the offending tweeter’s account. The first tweet I saw was a screenshot of a partial New York Times headline: "What if only white men voted?" it asked. There followed a number of tweets from right wing neanderthals (are there any other kind?) about how much better the country would be. (I pause here while readers variously fall on the floor laughing or head to the toilet to commence vomiting.)
I decided to go into enemy territory and tweet a reply. It was as follows: “Everyone would be dead from Covid in a few years.” I braced myself for a barrage of misspelled, grammatically hilarious responses from white nationalists but none came. Indeed, my tweet has thus far gotten twenty likes.
Of course it got me thinking about what else one could safely say about what the U.S. would be like if, as in days of yore, only white males had the franchise. Here’s what I came up with:
The rich would pay no taxes.
Police forces would be armed to the teeth and officers would be encouraged to carry out extrajudicial punishments, including those of a capital nature.
Climate change would accelerate even faster and our coasts would soon be under water.
Abortions would be illegal.
Gay marriage would be illegal as would be gay sex and there would be no civil rights or protections for anyone falling under the LGBTQ umbrella.
Women would lose protection from sexual harassment and the right to recourse when such harassment occurs.
Guns would be even more plentiful with even less restrictions with a consequent increase in gun deaths by accident, suicide or murder.
The environment would be ravaged
Government funding for scientific research would be cut to the bone, if not entirely.
The wildest of conspiracy theories being accepted as fact, would influence public policy.
Student debt would skyrocket.
Predatory lending would be encouraged.
The crumbling infrastructure would totally collapse.
Immigration of non-whites would be halted.
More children separated from parents and put in cages.
A costly and ineffective wall would be built.
Poverty would increase at the same time the social safety net was being dismantled.
The U.S. would be regarded by much of the rest of the world as a rogue nation that is totally unreliable and only interested in self-preservation.
Severe restrictions on freedom of the press would be imposed.
Political dissenters would be jailed.
Peaceful rallies and marches would be quashed.
Public schools would be even more severely under-funded, especially those serving primarily students of color and/or in low income areas.
Christianity would be made the official state religion.
The military budget would be greatly increased.
The national debt would skyrocket.
The Food and Drug Administration’s power would be limited.
Pharmaceutical companies would profit enormously and most citizens would have difficulty affording basic medications.
Regulations on businesses and corporations would be no more.
Small business would become a thing of the past.
Marijuana would be made illegal.
There would be stiffer prison sentences for all crimes.
The crime rate would go up.
Prisons would be privatized.
Mail delivery would be privatized.
The suicide rate would go up by 500% or more.
So let us all take comfort in the fact that we live in a country in which women and people of color can vote (well, theoretically, as we’ve seen, white males often do their utmost to restrict voting).
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