The demonization of Trump to the left exacerbates the danger to democracy – The Voice of New York

One step away from the momentary conclusion of this traumatic political event, it will be necessary to deal with the errors that we see on the left or in opposition to Trump. It would be very easy to analyze the mistakes of this aspiring little dictator, but it didn’t seem helpful or necessary.

In today’s political journalism, even the prominent journalist, low moral instincts often prevail; Whereas in a democracy, politics must be subject to morality more than reliance on one and abstract moral component. Religious nucleus From purity and correctness (also linguistically) he invested the democratic forces of this century, hardening civic life in a frantic search for a supposed common interest. Traditions and words must be updated immediately, under constant pressure from a society that wants itself to be fair, and thus must sweep its recent and past history, in the name of a future free from any stigma. The weight of brutal and militarized capitalism, of stubborn imperialism that roams the world and dispenses life and death, remains like a rock of a bad conscience; Just like the drones promoted by the Obama administration.

The reaction to the Trump nomination, on the left, was immediate and unanimous. He was thought to be a bad candidate, not just for his ideas, but from anthropological and human considerations, Social and linguistic. The American left (but the European Left is no different) does not like people like Trump to be involved in politics. Just as the question of the legitimacy of brutal capitalism is being systematically pushed aside, people like Trump are embarrassing the educated and liberal middle class. They should be allowed to do their dirty work, deal with business and Wall Street, without directly exposing themselves, and thus risk distorting the ideals of American politics. If they put their faces on them, all progressive capitalism loses its value, the masks fall off, and what remains is a peasant making the cameo in a hit movie or being a regular guest on a talk show.

The high idealistic values ​​of progressive capitalism that Obama sung cannot be conveyed flawlessly through Trump’s repeated and vulgar rhetoric. But on closer examination, these are not different values. Both were staunch supporters of the American theory of exception, and both wagered on the moral superiority of the United States to justify the policy of imperialist domination, political and economic, over their countries.

Looking back a few years, I wonder (as a matter of provocation) what would have happened had the Republican leader’s opponents not consistently delegitimized. My theory is that the criticism of the left-wing media is continuous and is incapable of dialogue, It has turned the democratic process into a crazy game. As chalkboard teachers, they separate the good from the bad, and put Trump in that last group. They completely ignore the basic teachings that Plato provides through the words of Protagoras: Every human being has the inherent right to practice politics and the democratic process requires hypocrisy, that is, the ability to find common ground beyond our opinions. Personal. I wonder what would have happened if left-wing media and intellectuals had criticized Trump without demonizing him. Could the orange monster create such a large fanbase? Take the example of the wall on the border with Mexico. Regardless of the symbolic aspect of the question, it can be said with confidence that the wall that Trump wanted certainly caused fewer deaths than Obama’s drones or Bush’s wars, and there is no doubt that it received more criticism. One could go further to say that since there are borders between two states and these borders are constantly being ignored, strengthening a pre-existing barrier is a technical matter of solving a problem.

I am not saying there is no ethical problem with the way Trump has suffered from Mexican immigration problems. I am not ignoring the fact that anthropologically and linguistically speaking, Trump is light years away. Nevertheless, I wonder if a direct attack on the symbolic value of the question, which is required by all left-wing media, is the right strategy. Promoting the moral and symbolic question has done nothing but give Trump’s supporters fertile ground to oppose the so-called corrupt Democrats. Without losing moral thoughts on the subject, perhaps the wall issue could be declassified as a strategic solution, to reinforce the borders that already exist. Democratic progressives seem to have forgotten that borders were in place before Trump’s wall. They forgot that the differences between those in the south and from the north of that wall are enormous and that those borders guarantee us happiness based on the exploitation of their resources. There was probably more to this scandal than the sordid language Trump uses. It is here that the left becomes arrogant, academic, and an end in itself. The Mexicans themselves have been much tougher, and instead of feeling hurt and sad from Trump’s words, they understood something very important: Borders, with their asymmetries, existed before Trump and will continue to exist thereafter. The difference between him and the Democrats is that Trump openly defends a privilege that the Democrats do not care much about.

A protest in Berlin, in September 2016, against Trump’s election promise to build a wall on the border with Mexico (Image via Flickr)

It certainly is not the Democrats ’fault if there is a wall between the north and the south of the world. At the same time it would have taken more decency; It would be appropriate to look at the moon, not at the finger pointing at it. Democrats could and should have responded not to Trump, or to reinforcing existing borders, but to the political question of social inequality. Being franchisees, they have no right to make it an ethical issue. The same can be said for many other topics. Banning Muslims was a very odious measure, but … America, not Trump, has always restricted access to the country for people from all over the world. Paranoia and bureaucratic border controls in the immigration or tourist visa process have always been in place. Getting to America from Europe or Africa often means following very different procedures and screening for presumption of offense. Trump restricted entry to some Islamic countries but did not invent anything; If anything, it has exacerbated an existing practice that clearly states discrimination starting with the country of origin.

In order to build itself, an authoritarian regime needs to create two states within the same state: one is good and real, and the other is fake and bad. Trump succeeded in his intention to abandon the idea of ​​national unity in favor of the opposition between two different politically separate states. On the left, we have forgotten that democracy is based on an ethic of hypocrisy and not on an absolute moral truth. Trump certainly had some traits of a fascist dictator, this was always evident; However, out of political expediency, the basic anthropological feature would have been better overlooked. To be sure, the job of the press is not to warn voters of the danger of a potential fascist drift but to present the facts. It is up to the readers to take the path of political awareness and draw conclusions.

Although the idea of ​​being a savior of the homeland greatly tickles the moral appetite of the media, one should warn them that telling the truth (assuming they possess it as if it were something) does not have the necessary result to convince readers and listeners. Therefore, the goal was never to judge Trump’s credentials or behavior, but to avoid him building such a broad and deep consensus. So deep, that we live today in the impression that there are two countries, two cultures, and two parts coexisting in riots in the same region. We, who are very open to understanding diversity, fail to understand the culture of Trump supporters, and we refuse to accept that he, like Obama, is a successful anthropological model for them. His potential reassignment in 2024 looms like a nightmare on the horizon.