![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
'68 all over again?
Jun. 4th, 2020 01:09 pmIt has been well weird seeing the reactions to the protests and looting in the news.
Especially the "conservative" news. Tucker Carlson leads the charge here, by proclaiming that the protestors and the "liberal media" are directly responsible for - and encouraging of - vandalism and looting, because they hate white people and they hate America. And that "statistics prove" that twice as many white people are shot by police than black people (strangely failing to mention that black people make up %13 of the population) In other words, all those angry brown people protesting are just a bunch of hoodlums who hate the police and want free reign to commit crime.
Which is really obviously paranoid and ignorant, and yet it’s apparently what a lot of people in this wack country believe.
This all happened 50 years ago. And just like then, it's leverage to get a Republican elected.
Here's how it works:
First, assume that there is absolutely no middle ground between encouraging crime, and severely punishing crime. Second, declare that the other side (Democrats) are encouraging crime, because they are on the criminals' side, because the criminals are a threat to Republicans who are all "decent people", and Democrats are happy when Republicans get killed. Third, promise to crack down on these criminals in exactly the way the Democrats won't.
And ... pull up the curtain to reveal your Republican candidate du-jour. Ta daa!
We are going to be hearing about these protests for the next 100 days straight, as loud as possible, from people like Tucker Carlson. The perfect fear-stoking smoke screen over the last four years of crass, divisive rhetoric from the commander-in-chief, and his complete lack of progress on anything but the standard court appointments and graft.
Especially the "conservative" news. Tucker Carlson leads the charge here, by proclaiming that the protestors and the "liberal media" are directly responsible for - and encouraging of - vandalism and looting, because they hate white people and they hate America. And that "statistics prove" that twice as many white people are shot by police than black people (strangely failing to mention that black people make up %13 of the population) In other words, all those angry brown people protesting are just a bunch of hoodlums who hate the police and want free reign to commit crime.
Which is really obviously paranoid and ignorant, and yet it’s apparently what a lot of people in this wack country believe.
This all happened 50 years ago. And just like then, it's leverage to get a Republican elected.
Here's how it works:
First, assume that there is absolutely no middle ground between encouraging crime, and severely punishing crime. Second, declare that the other side (Democrats) are encouraging crime, because they are on the criminals' side, because the criminals are a threat to Republicans who are all "decent people", and Democrats are happy when Republicans get killed. Third, promise to crack down on these criminals in exactly the way the Democrats won't.
And ... pull up the curtain to reveal your Republican candidate du-jour. Ta daa!
We are going to be hearing about these protests for the next 100 days straight, as loud as possible, from people like Tucker Carlson. The perfect fear-stoking smoke screen over the last four years of crass, divisive rhetoric from the commander-in-chief, and his complete lack of progress on anything but the standard court appointments and graft.
