I've been reading around Medium with a growing sense of despair, because despite this excellent advice from Ibram X Kendi, that's not what's happening. People are doubling down and not introspecting on what went wrong. I've just read a piece where a woman has gone on a rant because 'men did not show up to protect women' - it's flying off the metaphorical shelves and people are chiming in to register their agreement and disgust at men in general.

You need only stop and think for more than 30 seconds. There are generally more women than men in a demos, normally 51/49%. If all women were voting in one way, you wouldn't need men - or, at best, you might need a handful of men. This article fundamentally misses the point that 33% of men showed up and voted for women and it was STILL not enough, which means there were a boatload of women who weren't on board with the Democrat message and who voted Trump. This wasn't a man problem, it was a messaging problem - but it's much easier to hoover up the applause from the echo chamber than to take some responsibility. Everything is always someone else's fault or problem. I don't know how progressive women thought straight men were going to vote after 4 years of making them villains, but I wasn't surprised when they didn't show up.

To answer your question, how do we reconstruct democracy. We have to listen. That means going off to find people that disagree with us, and eschewing the lure of those who agree - and kicking back at the monetisation of agreement and the monetisation of attention for unfettered agreement. In order to reconstruct Democracy, you're going to need to step away from the Blue side and go chat to to some Reds. You need to listen to why they're saying the things they do - and you're going to need to try and see the world the way they see the world.

I'm purple. I like arguing. I argue for the sake of it sometimes because I think people need to do it more - and everyone should be made to defend what they think. If you're not doing that, then you haven't really thought about it. As is the case with the woman arguing men are entirely responsible for Trump because they didn't show up to protect people. It's an indefensible argument and one the author won't have to defend because she's writing in an echo chamber. Should anyone dissent (and I might), they will be ignored, blocked, or hidden. These are the methods by which Democracy falls :o/

Also, I hope your sixth grader is okay and tell her not to worry. The world is a better place than she thinks - and it's great that she's thinking. :o)