You’ll feel shame but won’t address it or speak about it or sometimes even know that it’s affecting you but it will be there. The most conscious thoughts will be justifications you’ll know are weak. You were part of a history that will be repressed. A country that really won’t deal with what it did to itself and how distorted it became. It’ll take months or years or decades (or sooner) to address it, and when you finally get there you’ll feel queasy from the shame. You know it now. This is not what you wanted, at least, not all of it. You have hatreds and prejudices and but a morality that nags. “Something is not right.” And the shame will creep in. And you’ll justify your initial intentions while still knowing there was wrong that was there and not just wrong but one of those very basic wrongs. The shame may temper what you teach your children and save the next generation. Maybe. If the damage isn’t already done.
A lady completely bat-shit connected to the news outlets and pundits and participants in some of the most extreme racism and anti-semitism of the recent political climate. Katie McHugh acts regretful, makes excuses, blames “the climate.” Relationships with and those associated with: Daily Caller. WorldNetDaily. Breitbart. Her essays and tweets contain extremely extremely vile statements about other POC and Jews and one of her current excuses is that there were much worse racists.
The basic idea is that if someone possesses any moral failing then they have no ground to criticize others’ flaws. It’s considered a high skill of propaganda perfected, of a sort, by the Soviet Union when any government or NGO outside of their walled society would denounce their corruptions or human rights abuses. After all, don’t other countries have bought-off politicians? Governments that have committed just-this-side-of war crimes? Lynchings? The basic flaw with this defense is that if something is wrong it is wrong no matter who is doing it. Being accused of murder by another who has murdered does not make you a non-murderer. If only the flawless were permitted to criticize then we all would devolve, without valid dispute, into the worst that has occurred.
There is a pot and blackness of kettle type of support to whataboutism. There is a mocking of hypocrites. Yet it certainly doesn’t absolve murder or equate degrees of murder. Reporters in the United States have been put in free speech zones. Reporters and opposition leaders in Russia have been assassinated. There is no equivalence.
National Monument in Vitkov
Trump said, during his Helsinki debacle an interview, that “There are a lot of killers. We’ve got a lot of killers. What, you think our country is so innocent?” This is the sweet sweet temptation of whataboutism. Its siren call etc. is compelling. If the US spies and subverts, its acts ameliorate the corruption of Putin (and no not that of the Iranian leader, and no not that of the Syrian president (or maybe so), but yes that of the North Korean leader, and yes that of the assassination-frenzied Philippine president, and yes that of other authoritarians whom the president-small-p, re their power, covets-captital-C) and bars any societal self-reflection and self-correction when we commit moral crimes or even offenses. Can we fail and hate ourselves and still be nobler than ruthless autocracies? As per Trump: no, we can’t.
While researching the history and rhetorical qualifications of whataboutism, I found a Stack Exchange discussion on How can I respond to Whataboutism? which had answers nuanced and in great detail. I cannot add anything valuable to it. Read those questions, answers, and the in-betweens.
Enumerated, or at least bullet pointed, points from notes for my previously intended essay:
Arguments made in support of the Trump/Putin summit. Can there be any? Is there any world that can defend Trump’s actions?
False equivalence – US spying, a corrupt murderous Putin and oligarchs, and now Trump may be equally corrupt. Is this satisfactory to us for our leaders? Have we become that because whataboutism says we were already that?
(In war, do we look the other way when someone tries to shoot us even if they missed? (I really feels this has nothing to do with whataboutism. What did I have in mind?))
Keep your enemies close.
George W. Bush and Bill Clinton met Russian representatives in private like Trump did with Putin. What is the difference?
The difference is one of quality. Neither previous presidents praised Putin with fawning earnestness or held his veracity above American intelligence or had any history of compromat. A private meeting should be met with greater concern. Roger Ebert–in interviews I cannot find or am remembering incorrectly–repurposed the law of the excluded middle to be a flawed premise. In logic, the law states that a statement is true or not. However, we tend to try to apply that speciously to intent. Trump has suggested (again, cannot find the quote) that not talking to Putin or Kim Jong-un will result in nuclear war. Talk or not-talk is not-war or war and supposedly there is no in between. I often think of conservatives as having black and white and not gray thought. This is a perfect example.
Rashomon (and uncertain equivalence)
[ed. written after Helsinki and cleaned up now, after the midterms]
No matter what happens with Kavanaugh, despair is not an option. Channel your angry energy into action. Call. Demonstrate. Register. Vote. There will be devastating losses along the way, and from them we recover and learn. We’re taking this fucking country back. Keep going.
No matter what happens with Kavanaugh, despair is not an option. Channel your angry energy into action. Call. Demonstrate. Register. Vote. There will be devastating losses along the way, and from them we recover and learn. We’re taking this fucking country back. Keep going.
6 Oct 2018, 10:59 AM
Older woman crying in photo: “How are we going to find the strength to keep fighting? Are we going to be out here for another 30 years? I don’t have 30 years left.”
Younger woman taking her photo: “I’ll be here. I’ll keep fighting.”
Older woman crying in photo: “How are we going to find the strength to keep fighting? Are we going to be out here for another 30 years? I don’t have 30 years left.”
Younger woman taking her photo: “I’ll be here. I’ll keep fighting.”
6 Oct 2018, 11:03 AM
NEW: Ramirez statement: 'The other students … chose to laugh and look the other way as sexual violence was perpetrated on me by (BK). As I watch many of the Senators speak & vote … I feel like I'm right back at Yale where half the room is laughing and looking the other way.' https://t.co/9ucSRJrtz7
NEW: Ramirez statement: ‘The other students … chose to laugh and look the other way as sexual violence was perpetrated on me by (BK). As I watch many of the Senators speak & vote … I feel like I’m right back at Yale where half the room is laughing and looking the other way.’
6 Oct 2018, 12:56 PM
Protesters have climbed the stairs of the Capitol chanting “November is coming!”. Hundred present here and across the street in front of SCOTUS. pic.twitter.com/0vqW45BMXJ
“What we are witnessing is not a step backwards for America so much as a headlong plunge into a punitive past. Adults must fight this future for the sake of the youngest Americans, who have already lost more than they ever got the chance to know.”
6 Oct 2018, 6:23 PM
What I hope people grasp is that the fight is not only about the win. You fight because it's the right thing to do. You fight because if it alleviates suffering for just one person, it's worth it. You fight because if you don't, if you let them define you, you will lose yourself.
What I hope people grasp is that the fight is not only about the win. You fight because it’s the right thing to do. You fight because if it alleviates suffering for just one person, it’s worth it. You fight because if you don’t, if you let them define you, you will lose yourself.
Updated 5 May 2020
I was reminded recently of another tweet Sarah Kendzior posted at the time of the Kavenaugh hearing. In his Washington Post op-ed Trump must be removed. So must his congressional enablers, George Will referenced the T S Eliot poem The Hollow Men. Skewering the Republican Congressmen, Kendzior posted verses from that poem along with images of those pretending to engage in the Kavenaugh accusations at hand, but were obviously not. This was the first time I had heard the poem and it was a moving introduction.
"We are the hollow men We are the stuffed men Leaning together Headpiece filled with straw." pic.twitter.com/sLjGlfUm8N
He was corrupt for decades through the 80s and 90s and eventually grew into a dependency on money from Russian oligarchs. They laundered and he ameliorated debts he accrued from exceedingly poor business decisions and kiting loans and generally robbing Peter.
He joined the bloated collection of Republican contestants in the 2016 presidential election with gross absurdity: gliding down an escalator in a gauche-looking hotel lobby in front of a crowd paid for their attendance (to be repeated many times later). John Oliver notably and–regrettably–mocked him and his chances as did everyone. Craven and slightly un-craven presidential-hungry politicians were skewered by him with base taunts. The constituency groomed by Fox News and trash AM Limbaugh decades before in an attempt to destroy liberal policies arose to destroy the ugly conservatives that benefitted, until they didn’t. The golem ate its creators.
The results were no less gauche and maybe we deserved it but no we really didn’t I don’t think or at least hope we didn’t. He started his iconoclastic retribution towards Obama childishly enough with a boast (eventually doubled- and tripled-down with cringe-inducing ferocity by his first-of-many press secretaries) that his inauguration crowd was larger than Obama’s. More grave attacks on the previous president’s accomplishments followed. Obamacare, the Iran nuclear deal, the TPP, NAFTA, the Paris Climate Accord, and any number of greater or lesser thorns. For Trump, the bad became the enemy of the good.
Alliances with Europe and Canada were destroyed as new ones were formed with North Korea and Russia.
During the Obama administration, Republicans petulantly held up a Supreme Court nomination, along and with equal importance, many federal judgeship positions. Under Trump the SC position and federal positions have been quickly filled; many of those federal positions filled by the grossly inexperienced. To extend for decades.
The 1st anniversary of the murder of Heather Heyer in Charlottesville, VA was last weekend. Best take was by Wonkette reminding us that it was “[the] time when [Nazis] marched and then killed a young woman with a car.” No need to mince about.
There have been several retrospectives of white supremacist beliefs in the news (because we don’t already know or understand what they believe in?). The most egregious was NPR’s interview with the organizer of the Unite the Right’s racist remembrance–presented as a spurious “both sides” segment–followed by the Black Lives’ spokesman responding. The former’s statement that “Ashkenazi Jews rate the highest in intelligence, then Asians, then white people, then Hispanic people and black people” is not one that can be presented on equal footing to anything. As The Washington Post opinion piece points out, succinctly: “Black Lives Matter [is not] the ideological counterpart to white supremacists.” Flat Earthers take note: you are as respected as centuries of science. Fuck you NPR. You did the same thing prior to W’s Iraq invasion–uncritically parrot the party line–and you deserve the worst that can happen to you because of these.
A recent study by the Institute for Family Studies analyzed data from the 2016 American National Election Survey to determine, as best as possible, what drives white supremacists. This research summary deserves to be read a few times. The data was based on the respondents’ answers to three questions regarding white racial identity, racial solidarity, and feelings of discrimination. The short answer is that white supremacists are more likely to be low income, low education, unemployed, and either Independent or Republican. The longer answer includes interesting contradictions to several assumptions: the researchers found no-or-little connection to the individual’s feelings on changing gender and family norms, no connection to rising secularism in society, and no prevalence in any one age group. So even though there are, surprisingly, young supremacists to replace the older generation, their beliefs are still in the minority. Cold comfort.
Looking at this group’s influence, an editorial in The Atlantic cautions that no matter how fringe this group remains, the blessings on them by the president along with tacit support by most Republicans gives their minority beliefs a majority of power. Last weekend’s Unite the Right 2 rally had 30-at-the-most supporters and, hearteningly, thousands of counter-protesters. Another Atlantic article closed with the observation that “[after] the protesters were ushered away quietly by their police escort, the counterprotesters didn’t even notice they had left.” And at least we can laugh at the Unite the Right’s 34-year-old organizer living at home and being berated by his father during a live stream while he praises Nazis and denounces “orthodox Israelis”. How long before this shit passes?
