UNC student opposes anti-Trump ‘walk out’

‘Just because the candidate that you support was not elected, does not mean that you can openly protest against the democratic process’

UNC sophomore Terren Williams sat down with The Tab after a heated post on the Campus Walk Out’s Facebook event. The event was created in response to Donald Trump becoming our president-elect. The event description urges students to “refuse to be a part of this racist, sexist, homophobic bullshit that has swept the country.”

The walk out is part of a wave of protests that have swept across the nation in the days following the presidential election.

Terren claims to be a socialist. He didn’t support Hillary or Trump in the primaries, but instead voted for Bernie Sanders. He became a Hillary voter in the general election. Even though Clinton did not win the presidency, the pre-nursing student said his disdain for the outcome of the election is completely independent of the respect he has for democracy.

Williams’ facebook post on the ‘NO Trump: campus walk out’ event page. The post is now deleted from the page. Photo: Elizabeth Chen / Facebook.

We followed up with Terren to get his reaction to the current state of the political world.

What do you think about the outcome of the election?

I’m not happy. I think it’s more a testament to Trump’s campaign managers…that really paid off. And just sort of like, Clinton overlooking the fact that rallies in those places are so effective.

Democracy is about everyone’s voice being heard, do you think protests are a part of a healthy democracy?

Um, no. I think that the fact that they call it a “walk out” really does implicate that it is a protest and they’re protesting the results of a democratic election, which is deplorable, in my opinion. It’s the voice of the people — the people have spoken — and just because the candidate that you support was not elected, does not mean that you can openly protest against the democratic process. If anything, it should serve as inspiration for you to become politically active in the future. But it’s over for now, and protesting it only reflects negatively on our community and UNC as a whole.

I’ll be interested to see what is actually said during the walk out and if this garners any attention outside of UNC.

Will you be attending?

No. Absolutely not. But hopefully this sort of stays within the walls of our university.

Williams opposes the UNC Trump protest. Photo: Evan Kyndall / Facebook.

What’s your political affiliation?

I’m a socialist.

Why would you say that you’re a socialist? 

I’m just really liberal. I enjoy the idea of high taxes, universal health care, stuff like that — basic socialist concepts. I hope anyone who reads this does not equate socialism to totalitarianism, because that just makes me so upset. But my family doesn’t like socialism.

What influenced you to be a socialist if your family is not?

Education, I guess. The more I read about politics, the more it made sense for me to be a socialist. My mother is just about as moderate as it gets and the rest of my family lives in rural North Carolina, so they are staunch Trump supporters, Obama haters, the works.

Do you think that Trump getting elected has anything to do with Obama being the president for the past 8 years?

No.

Have you read any of those theories?

Yeah, I’ve read the theories, but if you look at it, Obama, now, has higher approval ratings than Reagan at the same time in his tenure as president. It’s really really really high and I think that any backlash from Obama — it’s a big stretch to say the backlash from Obama lead to Donald Trump. I think if anything it was backlash against Clinton.

I know that Trump shit-talked Obama a lot in the earlier parts of his campaign, but he sort of strayed away from that.

Williams updated his Facebook status to voice his opinion. Photo: Elizabeth Chen / Facebook.

With the plurality of people who voted third party, their votes could have easily swayed the election. What do you think about third party votes?

I don’t think they’re completely wasted, but it’s really hard because I am very very for third parties existing, but our political processes inherently divide which makes third parties even less relevant. Take the primary system for example. It automatically makes candidates have to reach further to the left ad further to the right to gain votes for their own party. Then they spend the rest of the

So you’ve got the primary system that inherently pushes people to the brink so for their political party you’ve got people like Bernie Sanders gaining a lot of votes, even from me, because he’s super far left. The parties during the primaries are more willing to reflect their actual beliefs, so those fringe voters on the far left are even more important. So everybody has to cater to them. And on the far right as well, everybody has to cater to them. And they spend the rest of the election trying to seem more moderate. Which is why third party candidates cannot exist — it just a bipartisan thing. You either go far left or far right, you don’t switch it up into social politics and fiscal politics during the primary season.

I’m not a poli-sci major. It’s hard for me to say that third party votes are wasted, because it just goes against everything I believe, but in elections like this, you just threw your vote away.

More
UNC