Wide Awake

The past four years have seen the birth of a modern progressive movement so vast and energetic it just might be equal to the right-wing forces that threaten its extinction.

- Rebecca Traister

JANUARY 21, 2017

THE WOMEN’S MARCH

Washington, D.C.

THE STORY of an awakening must begin with how many had been permitted to sleep in the first place.

I often think back to a Saturday Night Live episode from October 2016, which aired after the release of the Access Hollywood tape. Lin-Manuel Miranda was the guest host, and in the cold open, he directed a line from his fanatically beloved musical Hamilton at a photo of Donald Trump, declaring with ferocity, “You’re never gonna be president now.”

You could feel viewers, Hamilton fans, Democrats, those who for whatever reasons could still afford to believe in norms or justice, laugh with the giddy conviction that a man who grabbed women against their will could never be president, perhaps forgetting that grabbing women against their will had been a habit of presidents all the way back to the characters depicted in … Hamilton. It would be less than four weeks before those who had felt the confidence that misogyny and racism were disqualifying in the United States had that layer of assurance stripped from them.

But even after the election, the fantasies of salvation and order persisted: Someone powerful—Nancy Pelosi, Hillary Clinton, George W. Bush (suddenly looking good by comparison, which should have been a big warning sign), Hamilton itself (remember when the theater audience booed Mike Pence?), Jill Stein (she took all the money, folks!), patriotic Republicans, the Senate, the military, capable advisers who would keep him in check—someone was going to fix this, right?