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Wednesday, August 30, 2017

The Damage Done: Violence

Part 2: In an on-going series, The Omnivore discusses how Trump is damaging America daily. It has been requested by a specific reader, as such The Omnivore is instituting a specific rule.

Key Rule: In order to disagree with the content of this post you must show evidence that The Omnivore is wrong. If The Omnivore cites an anonymous source in an article, you don't get to say "it's an anonymous source! I disbelieve it!" You need to show actual counter-evidence for the specific claim.

This is going to be important shortly.

Today: Violence

"So if you see somebody getting ready to throw a tomato, knock the crap out of 'em, would you? Seriously. Okay? Just knock the hell — I promise you, I will pay for the legal fees. I promise. I promise." --Trump on hypothetical protesters at his March rally. 
“The guards are very gentle with him. He’s walking out, like, big high-fives, smiling, laughing,” Trump continued, before saying to loud cheers: “I’d like to punch him in the face, I tell ya.” -- Trump on a protester being led away.
Maybe he should have been roughed up, because it was absolutely disgusting what he was doing,” he said on Fox News at the time. -- Trump on a Black Lives Matter protester.
I will say that people who are following me are very passionate. They love this country and they want this country to be great again. They are passionate. I will say that, and everybody here has reported it.” -- Trump on reports that two men had attacked, beaten, and urinated on a homeless man, citing Trump as the reason.

 Intermission

There probably has not been a more racially divisive, economic divisive president in the White House [Obama] since we had presidents who supported slavery."
He’s clearly the most racially divisive president we’ve had since I’ve been alive. But, again, we did have presidents in the first 80 to 100 years of our country that supported slavery, and you cannot say that Barack Obama was worse than them.”
-- Mo Brooks (R-AL)



"We have not seen such a divisive figure in modern American history" as Barack Obama -- Marco Rubio
"He lectures us on civility yet has been one of the most divisive presidents in American history." -- Ted Cruz

Donald Trump: Hold My Beer.


End Intermission

Trump supporters believe that the left is attacking them--that as Trump rose on the scene the antifa goons and the liberals and the rabble-rousers came out and struck. Certainly things have happened. We have video of Trump supporters being attacked. We have watched antifa fighters go after peaceful right-wing protesters.

In the narrative of right-wing media Trump supporters are the victims, not the attackers.

You think that's true? Of course you do. You have to: it's what your media tells you. If there were another story . . . that would be  . . .  unthinkable.


Thinking The Unthinkable: Trump Has Brought Violence With Him

Obama's divisiveness was always a subtle knife: he called police stupid, for example. He said if he had a son, he'd look like Trayvon. When you looked at the entire sentences there was always nuance and context--but that was because he was an artist of division.

Obama knew what to say--deftly--to cleave white people from black people and men from women--the rich from the poor--while still maintaining a veneer of reasonableness that liberals could use to defend him. He was a master at saying--without saying. That was one of the worst things about him.

Sure, sometimes the mask dropped and he said what he thought about the people clinging to Guns and Religion or the 47% who will never take responsibility for themselves. But mostly, in public? He acted like you saw in the speeches above: speaking in a calculated manner so as to appear respectful--while inciting his followers to blame the rest of America for their predicament.

Trump, on the other hand? He's just a counter-puncher. Throw a tomato at him? He'll tell his boys to rough you up a little. Give him problems at a rally? The police oughta rough you up some. You deserve it.

So let's get two things clear:

Antifa Does Bad Things

Antifa isn't storming the beach at Normandy. They fight Nazis sometimes--but they also fight cops--and anyone else. They may not just be attacking random people (a common charge that is hard to substantiate) but they are certainly attacking Trump supporters who are not engaged in any kind of violence.

This is bad--it is bad and stupid. It is disqualifying from being part of the political conversation. Antifa's position that they are pre-emptive violence against a fascist state is absurd. They are preemptive violence against a state they don't like--but their philosophy, such that they espouse one, is somewhere between infantile anarchism and idiot communism.

Putting violence on top of that scaffolding is atrocious--their stated plans, should they achieve them--would kill more people than if the Alt Right created its ethnostate (The Omnivore can show his work if someone is going to seriously defend antifa's espoused philosophies).

Also: Trump Supporters Have Been Attacked

The Omnivore already said this--but it needs to be said again--no, not because the attacks were so bad--and not just because you, Constant Reader and Trump Supporter will not believe The Omnivore is sincere about this.

No. The reason it needs to be said again is because of something you missed, Constant Reader. Something that hasn't already been said. Did you catch it? No--and The Omnivore knows you didn't. Go back--read what was written again--see if you can find it.

No?

Okay--here it is: non-violent, non-provocative Trump supporters have been attacked by people who are not antifa. The magic trick you, Constant Reader, do in your head--to yourself--is to turn everyone on "the left" (meaning left of Mitt Romney) into antifa. You might not even realize you're doing it.

So let's be clear: people who might just be assholes--but are not anarchist-flag-flying mask-wearing, black-hoodie antifa people have also attacked Trump supporters. For that matter people who were not antifa stood up to the marching Nazis--maybe even fought against them. Remember the magic trick: not everyone who punched a nazi in Charlottesville was antifa. Some of them just came out to stand up to nazis.

You, Constant Reader, can say firmly that violence is never okay in the political sphere--just, you know, don't get all offended when someone tells you that you sound like you're defending nazis--you do the opposite for antifa.

So we good?

Let's Go To The Unspeakable Place

Trump Supporter  At A Rally

Trump is a leader. He is the leader of the free world (or was before Merkel took that place by his abdication of it . . . America First, right?). He is the chief executive and the Commander In Chief. He is our leader--for all Americans. That's people who support him--and people who don't.

Trump Supporters At A Rally

When he advocates violence--any kind of violence--even if you think it's justified--he raises the heat level in America. He sows division--and hell, he means to. He knows people don't like him. He knows that his voting demographic has a bone to pick with some other Americans. He understands this just fine.
Trump Supporter At A Rally

He wants his supporters mad. For one thing anger correlates to political action--he might not know the studies--but The Omnivore assures you he understands the mechanism. For another thing, well, if he gets them riled up--angry--mad--that it creates a kind of cohesion: Us vs. Them. Trump knows that if he's re-elected in 2020 it'll be because the Us is greater than the Them.

Trump Supporter At A Rally

Can you hear The Omnivore now?

Of course you can't--you believe that these pictures could have been taken from anyone's rallies. Hillary? Jeb!'s Heck--Ted Cruz probably did have some pictures like this. Certainly Kasich had a few?

No? Okay--you don't quite believe that, Constant Reader--good for you. But there's no real effect is there? It's the violent leftists who are keying cars. Torching limos. Breaking windows. Right? The Trump-voters just have a good old-fashioned yell.

Right? That's what your TV tells you.

Isn't it?

Your TV, Constant Reader, is lying to you. You read other sources--but you do so with a specific intent to disbelieve them thanks to their bias. Your preferred media is biased too--but you believe it. You don't see the contradiction because if you did, well, that would be unthinkable.

Now we're going to go to the hard part: Slate has a running total of hate-crimes since the election. They call out faked ones. 

Read through some of them.

BUT SLATE IS FULL OF LIBERAL LIES

This is the part that The Omnivore told you would hurt, Constant Reader. You have to show that the crimes touted as real are actually fake. You can't just say "They're liberal--I won't believe it" and use some smiley faced icons. You asked for this, so you're getting it.

But let's do some ones that no one is disputing:

Jeremy Christian - Nazi White Supremacists, Stabbed Two People To Death On An Oregon Train
"If Donald Trump is the Next Hitler then I am joining his SS to put an end to Monotheist Question. All Zionist Jews, All Christians who do not follow Christ's teaching of Love, Charity, and Forgiveness And All Jihadi Muslims are going to Madagascar or the Ovens/FEMA Camps!!! Does this make me a fascist!!!"
 James Jackson - Hunted And Killed A Black Man
Jackson also subscribed to a series of racist channels including that of the National Policy Institute, a white-supremacist group founded by Richard Spencer. Another subscribed channel uploaded videos denying the Holocaust and claiming there are IQ differences between races. Videos in several other subscribed channels included “I Want a Fascist Ethnostate for Christmas” and uploaded broadcasts from Nazi website Stormfront.org and ex-Klansman David Duke. He also subscribed to the White House YouTube channel.
The Omnivore can hear you: You Can't Blame Trump For That (also, maybe, a picture of the Bernie Sanders Baseball Shooter).

Well, it turns out? You kinda can.

Flag At A Trump Rally

Tweeted By Trump (White Supremacists Lies)

The KKK Is Awfully Fond Of Trump

The Nazis Like Him Too

Enough To Wear His Swag

You see, The Omnivore holds that:

  1. Trump Has Raised The Violence-Temperature With His Condoning It By His Supporters
  2. Trump Has NEVER Called Out The Hate Group Right For Chanting His Name Or Bearing His Symbols
  3. He Has Never Told Those Who Endorsed Him In Strong Language That He Does Not Accept or Want Their Endorsements--Or Even Their Votes -- he has denounced--but not in the way that would make them actually think he does not support them. In fact, they read his denouncements as support--and so did a lot of other people (like the Joint Chiefs of Staff and all the Rabbis).
Trump isn't causing antifa violence--these guys are home-grown lefties who are now in a symbiotic relationship with the activist right. Right-wing provocateurs are able to make an appearance or even schedule one--and the antifa guys come out--and if they get a fight? They get footage--and it's what a small (but successful) portion of the right (the provocateurs) want.

They want the left to strike them--so they can either film it--or hit back. Sometimes this happens: At a Milo Y. speech a person was shot--the person was an anti-Milo protester. The shooter was a woman (the police at the night arrested her husband believing it was him).


Antifa is a part of this vicious circle--but the circle--the cycle--is being inflamed by Trump. It was inflamed at the start of his campaign. It was stoked throughout his campaign. He continues to inflame it by his rhetoric, by his refusal to condemn the groups like the Nazis and the KKK in a way that would back them off--by taking steps they approve of (Gorka, Miller, and Bannon are seen as fellow travelers by them). Trump is not the only one feeding it--there are others (voices in academia, for example)--but Trump is the president of the United States of America. The moment he won the election he became the president of All of Us. There is no more Them--not to him.

Even if he wants to hit back--and he does--oh boy does he--that is beneath his office. When he hits back he winds up hitting everyone. All of America. Every Time.

As such, as our country is driven further and further apart, we have a president who, instead of responding to hecklers as Obama did . . . wants them beaten up and thrown out. 

You know who likes this? Who profits from it? The people who want a fight.

That's damage Trump does daily to America.

2 comments:

  1. You will lose them at SPLC data. My personal experience has been that it's popular to characterize SPLC as a domestic terrorist organization in alt-right channels. Hell, I've been told Snopes was too lefty, never mind Vox...

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. The Slate Report uses multiple sources--not JUST SPLC--and I didn't cite SPLC explicitly. I know this. That's why one of the conditions is that you actually have to do the work to show they're lying in This. Specific. Case. They're not.

      Delete