A chill went down my spine in 2020 when I realized what I’d been participating in for the four years Trump was in power. I didn’t go along with all of it. I defended Melania Trump when Twitter slut-shamed her. I defended Sarah Huckabee Sanders when the Good People of the Left mocked her makeup. But I went along with enough that, at some point, I overdosed on hate.

I always thought we were the good guys and that we didn’t engage in bullying, harassment, abuse, and dehumanizing. Don’t the lawn signs count for anything? Hate has no harbor here? No human being is illegal? Practice kindness?

I was the kind of person who woke up with NPR and spent the afternoon with Terry Gross and Fresh Air, then All Things Considered in the afternoon. I read the New York Times at least once a day. It made me feel smart and well-informed.

I hadn’t been involved in politics much before the 2016 election. That was when I started watching MSNBC. Rachel Maddow was the North Star for the Democratic base, older unmarried women like me, the Oprah generation, who had been living our best lives for decades. All that was missing was our first female president, which we were supposed to get in 2016.

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