Note the word is “ethic,” not “ethics.” Untruth has become the Republican party’s ethic; its principle, its culture. The alternative seen as just lame, for naive namby-pambies. Real men don’t fuss over truthfulness.
It didn’t quite start with the “alternative facts” trope, but that signaled giving falsity somehow a pastiche of legitimacy. Now their ethic comes straight out of Orwell’s 1984: truth is simply what serves their purposes.
Thus the pet-eating Haitians, insisted upon despite exposure as a lie. J. D. Vance baldly explained that, yes, it was untrue, but nevertheless pushing the story served a useful purpose. So it’s all good.
In fact it’s one lie in service to a bigger one, the lie that immigrants are somehow destroying America. And this is no joke; no pets have been harmed, but people have been, havoc wreaked upon the Ohio town in question. Where Haitians, living legally, have been great contributors to the local economy. Until Trump and Vance tossed this grenade into their midst.
The aim, central to their campaign, is to dehumanize immigrants, to incite fear and hatred. Thus too the ridiculous rubbish about countries (Congo no less!) “sending” us their prison and insane asylum inmates. No shred of truth there. Except in the 1984 sense of serving Republican purposes.
Not caring who is harmed, like those Ohioans. Thusly weaponizing lies to provoke hate and division is beyond despicable. History bloodily shows where it can lead.
And they constantly call Democrats liars! Itself yet another lie; it’s “projection,” accusing others of your own transgressions. Trump the epitome. Like shamelessly charging Kamala Harris lied about a youthful McDonald’s job. What nonsense. The word “lie” itself just another Republican weapon — wielded with wild dishonesty.
Of course the biggest lie is the 2020 “stolen election.” It’s starkly telling that such a demonstrably absurd falsehood has become a core dogma of the Republican party. Undaunted by their huge efforts to prove it all backfiring and actually disproving it. The lie extends to whitewashing January 6, whose reality was Trump trying to steal that election, with violence, and fake electors even. Now they’re gearing up for a 2024 repeat, screeching lies about legions of non-citizens voting.
All this tears apart America’s civic culture.
I’ve been a lifelong close student of politics. People say all politicians lie. It actually wasn’t so in the past, far from it. Though personal ambition always loomed large, most politicians also saw themselves as engaged in something noble, serving the public, and larger causes. They might lie about personal matters, like sex, but regarding public issues the idea of just making stuff up was not a thing. That’s really a Trumpist innovation.
Moreover, there used to be a big disincentive for lying: exposure was fatal to a political career. That’s no longer so. Trump has normalized lying. It simply no longer matters (to his cult, anyway).
There’s been much lamentation about our political polarization. Disagreement over issues by itself is actually the stuff of democracy in a diverse society, we can have such debates, it can even be healthy. If based on facts and reality. Though not when truth is its 1984 version. Republicans scream about freedom of opinion, but as Hannah Arendt said, freedom of opinion is a farce without facts.
Combine disregard for factuality with the deliberate incitement of tribalistic hatreds, and it’s societally deadly. We can’t go on like this.
(Image courtesy of Trump campaign)
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I cannot fathom the irresponsibility, the sheer insanity, of rewarding this monstrous wickedness with votes. Is this the kind of America they really want? Trump keeps saying we’re a dark declining country. He’s making it so.