Terrorists and murderers living among us. Soft on crime. Skyrocketing taxes. Liar. Senile. For weeks, there hasn’t been a 30-second pause in anything I have watched, from the Lions game to Jeopardy, without violent and seemingly wildly untrue accusations being hurled at candidates on both sides of the political spectrum.
The advertisements are intentionally inflammatory and address issues known to be controversial for potential voters. They run one after another, and ad breaks without a political advertisement accusing a candidate of atrocities and containing half-truths are extremely uncommon. Although the constant ads can likely be attributed to the split Democrat-Republican voter distribution in Michigan, one of the major swing states in the election, the incessant amount of advertising is bewildering.
The ads flash words in red script across the scene, photos of candidates shot at unflattering angles with eerie music lingering in the background. Unsettling proclamations are made that can create fabricated perceptions of reality without vital context. Our political advertisements have transformed from promoting a candidate’s ideals into scaring voters from keeping the “worse” option out of office.
However, the animosity surrounding the election doesn’t end at just the national level. Even locally, tensions always seem to heighten around October and November every four years. Some yard signs are violently ripped out, and street corners are crowded with numerous signs, each vying to overshadow its neighbor. I’ve even seen a stretch of land in front of a single house boasting seven political yard signs, all the same. Each sign was separated by four feet of grass before another yard sign was proudly placed, accompanied by a massive flag atop a shed roof. There is a clear line where support for a candidate transforms into an excess of advertisement, to the point of buying seven yard signs and placing each one in a uniform row.
Everyone is entitled to their own opinion, and it is each citizen’s prerogative to vote for whomever they choose. But respect is critical for all aspects of life, regardless of which name your neighbor circled on the ballot or whose name is written across their yard sign. Everyone is deserving of respect, and we should demonstrate that in all aspects of our life.
With practically every other house in my neighborhood hosting a Harris/Walz or Trump/Vance yard sign, the air of obsessed politics seems to suffocate and dominate each conversation, news channel, ad break, and simple drive down the street.
We don’t need to hate both of our candidates, and we don’t need to hate our neighbors. The negativity surrounding political advertising does not have to be intrinsic to election years. Political advertising will frequently be inherently negative, yet the current distribution of positive and uplifting ads to those that vilify the other candidate is wildly unbalanced towards the latter.
There needs to be a dramatic change in the way political advertisements work; the spiral of hate, accusations, and animosity will only create a worsening political atmosphere for our nation. One where yard signs are ripped out of the ground, and our people choose a president out of fear instead of pride.
