And it wasn’t only because the shooter seems to have intended to aim at, and kill a fellow human being, and a presidential candidate, but was thankfully thwarted by a Secret Service agent. That intention is despicable enough. But the whole context was shocking, the timing, the election. Just when a shift in people’s perception of DT was being reported, from the polls, and the debate⎼ just when so many more people had been coming to recognize the craziness he spreads to all of us, the threat, and then this happened.
And now, this newest example of intended gun violence is sharing the media news cycle with how DT would lie, say or do almost anything to get his way, no matter who he might hurt. How he used racist lies about Haitian immigrants to rile up his base, to shock and destabilize our nation and spread anger, hate, and the sense of continuous threat. And the result of his comments? Bomb threats and other violence are being aimed at those he maligned and hurt, and the city they live in. He and his VP were just beginning to be held accountable by many media sources when the Secret Service agent’s shot rang out.
But the mere attempt to kill a political leader in this country is shocking.
DT has continuously, from 2016 to today, viewed our nation through a dark lens, describing us as a crime-ridden, failed, “third world” country. He talks about not being able to go out for a loaf of bread without being raped, mugged, or shot at. Most of us go out every week without getting mugged or raped or shot at. Despite FBI statistics showing a historic 26.4 reduction in murders and similar reductions in rape, robberies, and crime overall in 2024, we might still fear violence due to the anger, hate, and sense of grievance DT stirs up. He helps create the division and violence he describes and attributes to others.
For example, his violent rhetoric has helped turn compromise into a dirty word and turned people who have different viewpoints into enemies. He undermines political cooperation by changing discussion from a way to share viewpoints and create a greater understanding, to a way to destroy opposition. He thus undermines democracy itself.
In a specious manner, he makes claims that the violence he incited was caused by those who have revealed his role in said violence. For example, he said President Biden was trying to overthrow the United States by saying DT was a threat to democracy. Meanwhile, on Jan. 6 it was DT who actually tried to overthrow the constitution and the will of the American people (and then continued to lie about it ever since). His statements misrepresent the facts and the blame is his own.
His constant lying undermines not only the specific facts he distorts, but a general sense of truth, or reality. Once we break any commitment to truth, all the dark, imagined, feared beasts lying dormant in our minds can be released. Back in 2007 Naomi Klein wrote The Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism. It was a groundbreaking, startling contribution to the understanding of the world then, and right now. Klein’s book argued that when people feel they are in an overwhelming crisis, they support doctrines, policies, laws that they never would have supported otherwise. They accept the unacceptable.
Crises can be of all kinds, not only political but economic, public health, national security, education. For example, after the shock of Katrina, public housing, schools, hospitals in New Orleans were taken over by private interests.
DT shocks us. He creates a crisis so many will think he, with the help of select large corporations and billionaire supporters, can step in and sell the solution, however disagreeable it once seemed.
Yesterday shocked me. I deplore such violence. I hope most of us deplore such violence. It undermines our sense that we live in a community, with other human beings who deplore violence, and who, when needed, will be there for us. Yet, maybe we shouldn’t be too surprised that some of the hate and violence he stirs up is directed back towards him?
In an earlier blog, I described the obvious, that we live in relationship with others and our world. This relationship, and our very lives, is more fragile than we like to recognize. If society falls apart, it’s not so easy to piece it back together. DT is not a populist working for the common good, but someone working to undermine the sense of relationship that creates a society. And he does this so that he can reconfigure our nation, reconfigure our lives to fit his interests.
Only by understanding even those we oppose can we talk with and, if needed, fight them. Only by working to create a society that prioritizes relationships that are mutual, inclusive, caring, and honest can we, as a species, live well, and possibly, live at all.
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This Post is republished on Medium.
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Photo credit: Flickr
