Gerrymandering

In recent years, our nation has seen an unfortunate rise in Gerrymandering, a practice where lawmakers redraw congressional maps to benefit their political party. As congressional districts across the country begin to resemble abstract art, America must take a long look in the mirror and decide what we want our future to look like.

In Tennessee, a republican legislature is attempting to do this to the city of Memphis. As can be seen, districts have been drawn across the state in order to disperse the democratic vote that Memphis would have had. This is projected to aid republicans greatly in the upcoming elections by giving them an extra seat in the house. 

In Illinois, Democrats have done something similar. As you can see in this congressional map, democrats of gerrymandered a winding strip of Illinois together across the state in order to bring more democratic voters together and give themself another seat.

This practice is problematic because it undermines our country’s very soul: democracy. America is based on the ideal that our people get to choose our government, and when congressional maps are redrawn to maximize one party’s votes, it undermines the very principles that our country is built on. Elections are supposed to embody the will of the people, and electoral maps ought to be structured in such a way to support this. Both parties need to decide whether they will stand up for our democracy or continue to follow partisan interests in a desperate race to the bottom.

My Visit to Atlanta

This week, I had the great pleasure of visiting a mentor of mine, Tim’m West, in Atlanta. Although I was only there for less than 24 hours, we had quite the trip together.

First, we started off at the PEACE academy in Atlanta, where he joined me in giving one of my presentations about the importance of democracy. It was a unique experience for me as I had never presented to lower school students and I found it quite enjoyable. I found it especially exciting to explore a new style of presentation in order to adapt to the younger audience. By the end of the day, I had given 4 and a half (our last one got cut short) presentations on the importance of democracy. The enthusiasm that the students had was absolutely phenomenal and it was fascinating to see these problems from a Kindergartener’s perspective.

Additionally, I had the experience of visiting the national center for Civil and Human Rights during our lunch break. The exhibits were fascinating and told the story of segregation and the brave individuals who worked tirelessly to overcome it. One particularly moving experience was being able to sit at a mock lunch counter, and experience through sound and vibration a lesser degree of what many of the sit-in protesters had suffered for freedom.