I'm 19 and I have never voted before in a presidential election, and I don't plan on voting in this presidential election.
Now I didn't make this decision because I'm a millennial. I made this choice because I truly felt like I couldn't vote, as I don't support either candidate and really couldn't bring myself to pick the lesser. Throughout this entire election, however, I have been feeling only one emotion, and it isn't anger-- it's fear.
I am honestly terrified by this election and by how outrageous some supporters have been in each party. Just the extremes of the supporters and the extremes of the candidates have made me truly scared. When I think of what the future could hold, I don't want to imagine either of the two candidates' futures that they imagine for the United States. When I imagine the future, I imagine something good and positive, but when I think of their futures, I only see destruction and the fall of the United States.
Now this is not a fear that only I have. There are probably many others out there that feel honestly terrified by what could come of this election. Some people are even saying that this will be our last president, and there is a part of me that agrees with them. I am completely terrified and, after everything that happened on the Potsdam campus in the past week, I am even more terrified. If those are the kinds of people voting, then I really am scared. I am scared of people on both sides that are so closed-minded.
I don't want this to seem like an anti-America article where I beg people not to vote. I simply want to show the fact that I really am scared for when I wake up on November 9th and I'm told who is president. I don't want to have to wake up and know that everything I once knew is going to be completely different or that everything I believe in is going to change.
I'm afraid of a lot of things like clowns and big waves and jellyfish, but this election tops them all. Knowing there are people out there that can cause a presidential election to become more like an SNL skit is honestly terrifying. To know that if I watch the debate, it will be more humorous then serious. To know that when I wake up on November 9th, my life as I knew it will be completely changed forever. That's not what I want and that's what is truly scary. Knowing that even if I did vote for someone I don't support, that my life is going to completely change.
I really don't know if I'm ready for that.
