So you say Trump was "obviously a tryhard autocrat." Since I respect you, rather than disagreeing (and suggesting he was more like a petulant child, which I suppose are their own kind of "tryhard autocrats"), I'll ask exactly what you saw personally that convinced you of that fact. Because I hear that a lot, but I fail to see it (and I used CNN as my main news source for the first two years of his presidency). He seemed no more of a wannabe autocrat than any other president we've had since I've been paying personal attention to such things, including Obama.
Also, over a year and a half ago when the first "two weeks to bend the curve" were announced and the schools closed, my sister called me enraged, suggesting that this would never end. I told her to calm down. My niece would be back in school in two weeks and we would go on with our lives. It was a temporary sort of insanity and the people would never go along with everything she was suggesting (long-term business closures, long-term school closures, putting masks on all our faces although we're dealing with a virus that goes right through masks, etc.). Guess which one of us turned out to have a better bead on things?
So you can put me firmly in the "paranoid" camp because I got it wrong, and anymore I don't care how crazy I sound. In fact at this point I don't think we can exaggerate how much we're teetering on authoritarianism and fascism, whatever and whoever is driving it. I know I was made a believer. And I do agree that there are authoritarian tendencies on both sides, but it's the fact that the left seems to be not only getting away with theirs but aided by the very people that should have the strength to stand up to them that worries me. (Even your article is rather tepid in the face of the slope we seem to be sliding down, though I'm guessing your audience isn't people who were shocked by the situation but instead who see the left as well-meaning and would be put off by any stronger condemnation, and I can't fault you for reading your audience.) The right has never been given that much leeway (bottom up or top down), so we (the US population) remained for the most part safe from their authoritarian bent. But that to me would be the crucial distinction.
And despite this lengthy response, I as always enjoyed the article. Thank you.
It is true that both left and right have a tendency towards authoritarianism. But authoritarianism is only dangerous when the would-be autocrats have access to the machinery of power. And I assure you, the Proud Boys are as far from getting their hands on the levers of national power as are the Inland Northwest Council of the Boy Scouts of America.
I'm sorry, this may veer into bigotry, but I could never possibly respect anyone or a single word anyone writes or says, who has "preferred pronouns."
Gender narcissism and all of its supposed ideas (which are really reified feelings) does the same thing to your brain that joining any other cult does.
The digital & social information environment we're in seems to have an infantilising effect, regardless of political allegiances. I've now seen 3 major democratic exercises in which the result was denied by the losers (Brexit & the elections of Trump & Biden). One of the most curious aspects is the fury of each tribe with its own detractors. The only reliable way to parse what goes on is to imagine that everyone is 9 years old. I say this after hauling myself out of one of these tribes (anti-Brexit) and experiencing more vituperative attacks from people broadly on my own side than I ever received from actual opponents. Even when Breitbart did a hit job on me.
Interesting post, but I do find it a bit whataboutist. The fact that there are anti-democratic forces on the American left doesn't change the fact that some people really seem to be making plans to reinstall Trump as president in 2025, regardless of whether they win or not. Let's put it this way, if the Republicans (presumably Trump) win in 2024, I haven't seen any indication that the Democrats would try to overturn the election results in close states. (Maybe I should be worried; maybe they think a second Trump term would be so bad that anything would be justified to stop it, but it's not obvious, and no, the "Democratic attempts to overturn the results of the 2016 election" don't count as evidence.) But if the Democratic candidate wins in 2024, especially if it's the least bit close, which it would be, I wouldn't be surprised to see even high-ranking Republicans demand that Democratic wins in close states not be certified. We know it can happen, we've seen it last year (and it's a separate issue from what happened at the Capitol on January 6th, which worries me less than it worries the media). The point is, I feel that there isn't perfect symmetry between authoritarianism on the right and authoritarianism on the left, at least when it comes to the results of the next American presidential elections.
Also, I've seen a few writers use the pronoun "they" to refer to a specific person, and then put a note explaining that "they" and "them" are that person's preferred pronouns. I feel that the note is unnecessary and just serves to attract attention to the person's unusual pronoun usage. I have no issue with using a person's preferred pronouns, and I also think that "they" works perfectly well (even for people who don't use it as their preferred pronoun), so that there is no need to specifically point it out.
So you say Trump was "obviously a tryhard autocrat." Since I respect you, rather than disagreeing (and suggesting he was more like a petulant child, which I suppose are their own kind of "tryhard autocrats"), I'll ask exactly what you saw personally that convinced you of that fact. Because I hear that a lot, but I fail to see it (and I used CNN as my main news source for the first two years of his presidency). He seemed no more of a wannabe autocrat than any other president we've had since I've been paying personal attention to such things, including Obama.
Also, over a year and a half ago when the first "two weeks to bend the curve" were announced and the schools closed, my sister called me enraged, suggesting that this would never end. I told her to calm down. My niece would be back in school in two weeks and we would go on with our lives. It was a temporary sort of insanity and the people would never go along with everything she was suggesting (long-term business closures, long-term school closures, putting masks on all our faces although we're dealing with a virus that goes right through masks, etc.). Guess which one of us turned out to have a better bead on things?
So you can put me firmly in the "paranoid" camp because I got it wrong, and anymore I don't care how crazy I sound. In fact at this point I don't think we can exaggerate how much we're teetering on authoritarianism and fascism, whatever and whoever is driving it. I know I was made a believer. And I do agree that there are authoritarian tendencies on both sides, but it's the fact that the left seems to be not only getting away with theirs but aided by the very people that should have the strength to stand up to them that worries me. (Even your article is rather tepid in the face of the slope we seem to be sliding down, though I'm guessing your audience isn't people who were shocked by the situation but instead who see the left as well-meaning and would be put off by any stronger condemnation, and I can't fault you for reading your audience.) The right has never been given that much leeway (bottom up or top down), so we (the US population) remained for the most part safe from their authoritarian bent. But that to me would be the crucial distinction.
And despite this lengthy response, I as always enjoyed the article. Thank you.
Singling out the left is sensible.
It is true that both left and right have a tendency towards authoritarianism. But authoritarianism is only dangerous when the would-be autocrats have access to the machinery of power. And I assure you, the Proud Boys are as far from getting their hands on the levers of national power as are the Inland Northwest Council of the Boy Scouts of America.
I'm sorry, this may veer into bigotry, but I could never possibly respect anyone or a single word anyone writes or says, who has "preferred pronouns."
Gender narcissism and all of its supposed ideas (which are really reified feelings) does the same thing to your brain that joining any other cult does.
The digital & social information environment we're in seems to have an infantilising effect, regardless of political allegiances. I've now seen 3 major democratic exercises in which the result was denied by the losers (Brexit & the elections of Trump & Biden). One of the most curious aspects is the fury of each tribe with its own detractors. The only reliable way to parse what goes on is to imagine that everyone is 9 years old. I say this after hauling myself out of one of these tribes (anti-Brexit) and experiencing more vituperative attacks from people broadly on my own side than I ever received from actual opponents. Even when Breitbart did a hit job on me.
Interesting post, but I do find it a bit whataboutist. The fact that there are anti-democratic forces on the American left doesn't change the fact that some people really seem to be making plans to reinstall Trump as president in 2025, regardless of whether they win or not. Let's put it this way, if the Republicans (presumably Trump) win in 2024, I haven't seen any indication that the Democrats would try to overturn the election results in close states. (Maybe I should be worried; maybe they think a second Trump term would be so bad that anything would be justified to stop it, but it's not obvious, and no, the "Democratic attempts to overturn the results of the 2016 election" don't count as evidence.) But if the Democratic candidate wins in 2024, especially if it's the least bit close, which it would be, I wouldn't be surprised to see even high-ranking Republicans demand that Democratic wins in close states not be certified. We know it can happen, we've seen it last year (and it's a separate issue from what happened at the Capitol on January 6th, which worries me less than it worries the media). The point is, I feel that there isn't perfect symmetry between authoritarianism on the right and authoritarianism on the left, at least when it comes to the results of the next American presidential elections.
Also, I've seen a few writers use the pronoun "they" to refer to a specific person, and then put a note explaining that "they" and "them" are that person's preferred pronouns. I feel that the note is unnecessary and just serves to attract attention to the person's unusual pronoun usage. I have no issue with using a person's preferred pronouns, and I also think that "they" works perfectly well (even for people who don't use it as their preferred pronoun), so that there is no need to specifically point it out.