Saturday, November 19, 2016

Women for Trump




   A lot of email from yesterday's column about a woman who says she's fleeing to Canada out of fear of  a new holocaust. Perhaps surprisingly, the most passionate came from women. My guess is, since Trump is so blatant and grotesque in his disregard for women, they have to be especially fervent in their love for him to avoid any risks of recognizing the dissonance between their actual interests and what they're supporting. A number of sneering emails from women Friday; this will stand in for them all.
Your article comparing the Trump presidency to the actions of the third reich is hateful garbage. To base an entire article about some bigoted nitwit leaving for Canada is insulting. Hatred is consuming you, please leave.
     The charge that one is acting out of a hate is an example of the fallacy of assuming everyone is motivated by the same thing driving you. Particularly when you can't understand the argument they're trying to make. She's also aping Trump's habit of merely echoing back whatever charge is being made against him. "I'm a racist and misogynist? Noooo. Hillary Clinton, SHE'S the racist and misogynist." This week I stopped answering negative emails, generally — it took 30 years, but it finally happened. But this one the temptation was too great. I replied:
What's the hateful part? I just see a rightly frightened woman -- millions of them actually -- terrified by the real actions, this week, of the utterly unfit president-elect you've chosen. You're just doing the I'm-rubber-you're-glue parroting that your leader does so well. Proud of yourself? Really? The sad thing is, I bet you are. Thanks for writing. I'm staying right here. To thwart people like him. And you.
    Though I immediately regretted sending it — a big drawback of email. That last sentence, I would insert "try" — "To try to thwart people like him." Because who can be confident of stopping this juggernaut of hate that's assembling in New York City? I'm not. The time to stop them was Nov. 8, and we blew it. Now, all we can do is try, and grieve over the consequences of our failure.

10 comments:

  1. In The Bertrams, Anthony Trollope suggests waiting 24 hours before sending an angry letter. And then burning it. Today, I suppose 24 minutes would be considered an excessive amount of time to decide whether to hit the Send or the Delete button. Most of us, myself included, can hardly wait 24 seconds. And we so admire our brilliant harangue that we don't even read it over, thus perpetuating silly mistakes.

    john

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  2. Trump is following the time-honored Republican playbook of squeaking into office with fewer votes than his opponent and governing as if he had an absolute mandate.

    He has nominated someone named Jefferson Beauregard as attorney general, in charge of protecting the civil rights of America's minorities.

    It's going to be a long four years.

    And Neil, argue with nitwits or don't, as the spirit moves you, and don't give it a second thought.

    Bitter Scribe

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  3. Neil, I thought it was a great column. Granted it seems ridiculous to flee the country, but just the fact that some are prepared to act on such fear is unsettling. And now the backlash from the Trump supporters over the Hamilton tweet, "we won, you lost, get over it," and the idea that its rude and even deranged to protest or speak out in public. Trump is making clear that he intends to continue to lash out out any critics and his followers may well be prepared to take that reaction too far.

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  4. A nice thought for those who think of fleeing, but not usually practical or realistic.

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  5. grieve over the consequences of our failure.

    That's a really pessimistic way to phrase it. Grieve over the results of the election, yes. I didn't fail at anything, though, and neither did you. It is not my fault, or yours, that there are more anti-semites and other assorted bigots among us than we thought! To put it in those terms - one side wins all and one side loses completely, is echoing the simple-minded view of the woman you quote. Just a stupid bigot who doesn't understand democracy.

    There is nothing wrong with us. It is not the fault of the good guys that the bad guys were slimier and more sinister than expected, or that a lot of people are stupider than we thought. It has to be addressed, but let's start from that point.

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    1. Let's not polish a turd here. There is no prize for trying hard. The United States faced a monumental threat, we saw the threat and didn't respond sufficiently. I'm not saying it's my fault, or yours, and if you want to be proud of trying your best, well, fine. I don't know and can't judge. But I can tell you, the way people were parsing Hillary Clinton's minor flaws, the stakes, which were so clear to us, were not clear to them. And now they're holding protests -- heck, maybe in their secret hearts they wanted Trump to win so they could keep protesting from the outside, and they certainly have a boogeyman to push back against. But it's too soon to bend over backward making ourselves feel good. This was a monumental fuck-up. Not just in the US -- the world has gone stupid, and the non-stupid people let them do it.

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  6. Too bad some of the ones protesting never bothered to vote.

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    1. Sadly, if you're talking about that Portland protest where half of the arrested protestors hadn't have voted, it wouldn't have made any difference if they had because another 50 or so votes on top of HRC's is-it-over-2-million-now? lead in the popular vote isn't worth a bucket of warm spit compared to the maybe quarter of a million suppressed votes (legally, just like the Fugitive Slave Act) in GOP-controlled states where the fascists unexpectedly won.

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  7. No, it isn't just in Portland. Maybe it wouldn't have made a difference but that's beside the point & the non voting protestors sure didn't help matters, did they? Oh the irony...

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  8. Maybe? Unless those protests were in Pennsylvania or WI|MI|NC|FL (and, honestly, it sure looks like the results in the latter 4 states were determined by voter suppression) and the non-voting protesters were not kept from the polls, it just would have been in the bucket anyway.

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