On January 20th at 12 pm, students at Florida State University that opposed president-elect Donald Trump’s inauguration walked on to Landis Green to riot, chant, and speak out. It seems that political/social tensions haven't been this high in quite a while. Meanwhile, during Obama’s inauguration, there were no riots or protests, just some unhappy people ranting a little on Facebook.
Both presidential elections were held at high tensions, yet why is the public response so exorbitant in Trump’s election vs. Obama’s?
First, it’s important to analyze the demographics of both parties: Obama’s supporters were more liberal, meaning his protesters were conservative. While Trump was the exact opposite of this. From this, it is inferred that the liberals that are more outspoken; but why?
Liberals are typically filled with minority, low-income, and young people. This is simply because of their democratic views in community government, equal rights, and open-mindedness. Therefore, this progressive thinking and past suppression is what pushes them to want to riot and protest.
The Conservatives on the other hand, are primarily filled with middle-upper class that are middle aged. From a psychological stance, they as a generation are less likely to speak out. Remember, they grew up in a generation where people were incarcerated or put in a mental asylum for being gay, or women for liking sex/masturbating. From their perspective, silence is greater than any words.
From my analysis of the rioting ordeal, the president truly has nothing to do with it (remember that people truly hated Obama when he came into office, only recently have they become nostalgic since he was leaving.) The key component on what the fuel of the riots are the people.
This is 2017 after all, people are more pro-activist/pro-free speech than ever.
Which is fine, if protesting allows people to feel important and heard, then do it.
Just remember that regardless of your protesting, Trump is still our president, our leader. For all who are wishing for him to fail, that would mean you want this country to fail.
Maybe Trump will grow on us and turn into a decent president just as Obama did. And if not… well it’s only four years; how much damage could he really do?
