Election fervor is in full swing. The Democrats are railing against the Bush administration. The Bush administration is taking potshots at the Kerry camp. But this year I have seen something new. Something disturbing. Something more befitting a banana republic than the beacon of democracy the US purports to be.
Campaigns have always been nasty, at least from the viewpoint of an outsider. Candidates have, during my memory, taken the low road when speaking to one another. But this election season, these “slash and burn” tactics of demagoguery have spread to the populace.
This is not a trend I’m alone in seeing. In a great article in The Oregonian reporter Erin Barnett talks about campaign signs being burned, shot at and stolen. By citizens. Against citizens.
Blogs are seeing the same trend. People whom I trust and respect have adopted an “us and them” stance. They harp on the “Bush sucks!” or “Kerry flip-flops” theme over and over and over again. To the same audience.
Does anyone think that if you burn the Bush sign in front of someone’s house that person will suddenly think, “My God! They’re right! Kerry’s the best choice!” Do you think if you shoot holes in a Kerry sign that the owner will have a similar epiphany about Bush? Do you think that people reading the umpteenth “Why George Bush sucks,” post on your blog are suddenly going to change their minds? You’re preaching to the choir at this point.
The article cited above describes this election as “the most polarized race for president in memory.” I agree. And at this point, no one is going to change their mind based on your blog or your pyromania or your marksmanship. People are polarized. And that’s bad.
Politicians behave in ways they think will get them elected. If a candidate thinks embracing the “no gay marriage” position will garner them enough votes to get them a win, they’ll do it. If a candidate thinks that by bashing Bush for “lying about Iraq” (which the record clearly shows he did not do, he had piss-poor intelligence he chose to believe) they’ll do it.
And they don’t care about the carnage left behind.
That’s right. When we’re all still divided and at each other’s throats in the middle of November, the winners won’t give a damn. They aren’t concerned about protecting the social fabric any further than what concern is necessary to get them elected. They’ll leave a bunch of people whipped into a frenzy over same-sex marriage and not give it another thought. Meanwhile, these people foster a deeper distrust and hatred of their fellow homosexual Americans. If Bush wins, do you think Media Channel will feel the slightest bit of responsibility if someone makes an assassination attempt? They won’t, even though they spent a tremendous amount of effort scaring Americans silly about George Bush.
The Bush campaign wants to keep you in fear about terrorists. Anne Coulter will say whatever is necessary about Kerry to sell as many books as possible. The Kerry camp wants to keep you in fear about the police state Bush will supposedly create. Al Franken will call people “big, fat idiots” if it gets him another book deal. Both sides want you to be scared. Distrustful. Off-balance. When you’re scared of something, you see it as alien to yourself. It creates an “us and them” dynamic. It divides so they can conquer.
And at the end of the day, they’ll wash their hands and go back to business as usual, and forget about the debris field they leave in their wake.
Let’s not let it happen here. It’s happened in plenty of other places. At the risk of invoking Godwin’s Law, remember that in 1933 when the Reichstag burned, the Nazis had Germans so afraid of Communists the German people were ready to blame a Communist plot whether it existed or not. And we all know what happened after that.
I’m not comparing anyone to Nazis. I’m merely pointing out that a climate of fear, distrust and divisiveness is not a climate in which freedom and liberty flourish. Before you burn a sign, steal a bumper sticker or post the bajillionth story on your blog about how bad Bush is or what a rat Kerry might be, think. Are you going to change someone’s mind, or are you just fanning the flames?
I was born into one of the greatest nations on Earth. I don’t want to die in some industrialized banana republic where we’re “us” and “them.” We’re all Americans. We solve our problems with polite, measured speech that tackles the issues. Not speech that focusses on fear, distrust, divisiveness, name-calling, flame-fanning or minutiae. Or by tackling each other.
Don’t we?