“There’s no Batman coming to clean things up.”
For the last couple of weeks, I had been thinking about why people so often don’t use their right to vote and I kept bumping up against perfectionism disguised mostly as cynicism. This fella that Theresa and I spoke with while we were doing get-out-the-vote canvassing this past weekend summed it all up when he – a veteran of the armed forces, an engineer becoming an RN for the VA hospital, the child of a former councilman – said the above.
There’s no superhero coming.
And he’s right.
Frankly, though, even if Batman did decide to run for office, even if he did win, he still wouldn’t be a perfect public servant or provide perfect solutions. Even Batman would be working within a system of checks-and-balances that is intended, in part at least, to keep any one person from being able to make all the changes.
Even Batman would inevitably anger not only the Riddler and the Joker and Two-Face and everyone else who stood in opposition to his election, but also, at some point and in some way, Robin and Alfred and Vicki Vale and everyone who voted for him because there are 325 million Americans and no two of us march in perfect lockstep. There’s no way to represent all of us perfectly…
…because, of course, there is very little Truth in this life and a whole lot of truths. I mean, a LOT of truths.
Voting, to me, is about making one effort in a broad and deep pool of efforts I could make. Voting, to me, is about trying to put people in office who share enough of my values that they’re more likely to listen when I and other activists assemble ourselves and say, “This matters to us!” Voting, to me, is about trying to keep out of office those who would disempower, disenfranchise, and otherwise harm those most in need of public support and the organizations whose missions are to serve those populations.
Voting, however, is not my full responsibility when it comes to reshaping this country and this world. That’s some heavy lifting and just like it took a couple dozen of us to heft the rafters onto the Habitat house I told you about a couple of weeks ago, this heavy lifting becomes more and more possible the more hands we have on deck.
There’s no superhero coming.
Except, of course, you.
p.s. Same goes for your efforts in your business and reducing your environmental impact and being a great partner/spouse/parent/child/sibling/friend – no efforts are perfect, no one effort is enough, and every bit of effort matters. Keep going. Your contribution matters.
I have a newish habit of going live on Instagram each Friday, usually around 8am Eastern, to talk for just a few minutes about the week’s blog post. I’d love to see you there!