Despite having been written over seven centuries ago, Dante’s Inferno remains the most renowned and celebrated textual description of Hell ever conceived. It follows two wanderers on a journey through the Nine Rings of Hell. A deeply philosophic text, Inferno details the punishments which sinners cannot escape.
I have always been particularly disdainful of the ignorant, which remains the sole reason that I can never fully accept Inferno; it fails to address the vice of naïveté. Certainly, I am repelled by the gluttonous and disgusted by the treacherous, but I despise the ignorant beyond all others. Their own lack of knowledge is responsible for their suffering and nothing more. Ignorance is the root of all of humanity’s troubles.
Trouble is something that we have to deal with all too often. This election cycle has been turbulent and tempestuous. It’s certainly more of a burden on voters than it is a chance to make one’s voice heard.
This cycle is nothing short of a choice between the lesser of two perceived evils, both of whom seem disingenuous at best.
And it seems that damning evidence sheds light on the lies the President-elect Donald Trump has propounded over the course of his campaign.
He justifies taking advantage of women because of his celebrity status. He dismisses his abusive words as “locker room banter.” Can America trust the moral fortitude of a man like him? Do Trump’s supporters fail to comprehend the depths of his moral ambiguity? Do they fail to acknowledge his xenophobic, misogynistic, bigoted, narcissistic nature as a result of their lack of information?
No. Donald Trump’s voters grasp, perfectly, their beloved candidate’s myriad vices. They choose to support Donald Trump not because of what he is, but because of what he is not.
Regardless of his deplorable treatment of foreigners, minorities and women, he is no Washington insider, no politically correct powerbroker. And that is why his base favors him — even trusts him.
America’s electorate is exhausted by having to choose between two individuals who care little about their needs. America’s electorate is furious with the bureaucracy that remains the foundation of American government and politics. America’s electorate wants, and needs, a fresh perspective.
And America’s electorate seems to have chosen Donald Trump, a man who boasts about his affluence, and never misses an opportunity to display it; a man who flaunts his tax evasion as being characteristic of intelligence; a man who believes that his endorsement was something both Mitt Romney and John McCain “begged” for. Certainly, this man cannot be a powerbroker — it simply is not an aspect of his personality.
How are Trump’s voters unable to apprehend the magnitude of their decision? Do they really believe that a man in the highest tax bracket, who fails to pay taxes, chooses to be honest of his own volition? That he chooses to be honest for the good of the people?
If he cared about America, its people, and its infrastructure, he would not have avoided funding roads, funding the poor, funding the elderly and funding the military.
The national debt, which he so deplores, has been plunged deeper into entropy as a result of his alleged intelligence. Violence against women, which he so deplores, is an ideology exalted by the Donald himself.
And what about religion? Muslim Americans steadfastly maintain that radical jihadists are not real Muslims. Trump dismisses this as a facade — a lie born of political correctness.
Instead, Trump appeals to Christian morality. Christian morality? A man who attacks individuals on the basis of their physical appearance or their race is not a real Christian. Neither is a man who chooses to end a marriage only to pursue another.
And a man like Donald Trump is in no position to attack his political opponent’s marriage.
Donald Trump constitutes the very definition of greed, opportunism and evil — all of which are, incidentally, sins detailed extensively in Dante’s Inferno.
Ignorance is the basis of our flawed political system. The ignorance of the media can be dismissed as partisan bias. The ignorance of the candidates can be dismissed as party policy. But ignorance on the part of the voters is nothing short of a willing suspension of disbelief and that is inexcusable.
— Ketan Sengupta, a freshman at WW-P High School North.
