This excellent essay was posted the day before the election
and remains deeply relevant today.
Peace ~ Molly
Their stupidity is amusing.”
“Stopping Trump is essential. Anyone who says otherwise is either
foolish or blinded by privilege.”
“People should get hated for voting for Johnson because he is a
moron.”
“Are Trump supporters too dumb to know they’re dumb?”
“Hillbots have complete inability to do anything except parrot
their hero Shillary’s endless lies”
“Anyone who votes for Killary has already been drugged and taken
the stupid pill.”
“They will never change.”
“Disgusting, twisted human beings.”
Anyone who reads Facebook or pretty much any political website
is sure to see comments like these that dehumanize not only the opposing
candidate, but the candidate’s supporters too. This polarization and vitriol,
unprecedented in my lifetime, has me more concerned than the prospect of an
evil candidate winning. It is as if what is really going on here is a
preparation for civil war.
Dehumanization is a predecessor of war. When you see your
opponents as subhuman in their morals, conscience, or intelligence, then you will
have to defeat them by force. Moral or rational persuasion won’t do it. That is
what the above-quoted comments imply.
The dehumanization runs top to bottom, from the headlines in
major news outlets to the comments on Facebook and Twitter. Photos of political
candidates chosen to provoke contempt, statements taken deliberately out of
context… the no-holds-barred tactics of war. Both sides feature the most
outrageous comments made by partisans of the other side, seeking to indict all
of them through guilt by association. Similar to the atrocity stories used to
whip up war hysteria among a pacifist public before World War One, these
reports polarize the electorate and sow paranoia and distrust.
If you read only one side, you don’t know that the other side expresses
the same outraged grievances as yours does. Most of my readers are probably
familiar with articles about gun-toting “poll watchers” sent by Trump
operatives to intimidate voters. But unless you read right-wing media, you
won’t be aware of its earnest, indignant articles about agents provocateur from
the Clinton camp seeking to sow violence at Trump rallies. Each side claims the
other exaggerates and misconstrues. Each side is constructing a reality in
which the other is hideous.
Reading right-wing and left-wing news sites side by side, one
gets the impression that reality has diverged into two. I read both, in order
to understand the sickness that has infected my country. Headline news in one
camp is totally absent from the other. It isn’t just the interpretation of the
news that is different – the two sides don’t even agree on fundamental facts.
Here’s how one Facebook commentator, Amelia Bagwell, describes the experience
of reading a conservative friend’s news feed: “News agencies I have never heard
of with bold headlines of’Breaking News’ announcing HRC’s pending arrest. Trump
is second to none in morality, decency and honor…loves Jesus…and is a perfect
example of a godly family man. If the same stories are reported, they are akin
to reading two different languages. We are divided not just ideologically, but
at a core level of raw information.”
Such a gulf of perception inflamed by hatred presents a very
dangerous situation.
Please continue this essay here: http://charleseisenstein.net/this-is-how-war-begins/
No comments:
Post a Comment