Parsing Out Dystopia: Trump is our Slavery

Trumpism is a desperate, regressive revolt against modernity.  Trump supporters are psychologically pre-modern and lack the will to develop the skills necessary to become relevant in this age of accelerating change.

I am devoting a lot of time this year to developing my own "theory of everything" type thing.  It is intended to be an amalgamation of ideas and writings I have contemplated upon throughout my life.  A summary of my own system of belief.  Like Nietzsche, I am fundamentally discontented with the world's philosophies and religions.  As he attempted to find his own way and create his own values, so too is my endeavor.

In the process of building that set of validity claims recent events have motivated me to articulate this statement that I hold to be a fact...

Most people inhabiting the Earth today do so at a stage of psychological development almost identical with people who lived during the Roman Empire.  Psychologically speaking, the mass of humanity is behaving with mental and emotional skill sets that are at least 2,000 years old.

I spoke about this in general terms during previous posts regarding the work of Ken Wilbur, who, in turn, simply put his own spin on the psychology of Spiral Dynamics.  In a nutshell, human consciousness unfolds with a few people at the "leading edge" of consciousness and everyone else further back, psychologically speaking.

I want to apply this general idea to the riot incited by Trump upon the Capitol while Congress was in session on January 6.  My claim is this: those citizens who believed Trump's lies of election "fraud" and who rioted displayed a psychological make-up that has been around for centuries.

This has nothing to do with intelligence.  Many Roman citizens possessed a high degree of intelligence.  Some were brilliant. But in their daily lives they manifested behavior that is out of place with the current world.  These Trumpists almost universally manifest racism, sexism, xenophobia, zealous religiosity, bigotry, paranoia, and hate. For them, the benefits of modern science are limited to consumer technology, convenience capitalism, or medical surgery and medication.  Most other science (evolution, stem cell research, space exploration, global warming) is reprehensible, as it would have been in ancient Rome.

A recent study concluded that "people who lack consideration for others' wellbeing are more prone to political radicalization."  Psychological skills like empathy, curiosity, open-mindedness, the ability to shift perspectives, and basic respect for human diversity are precisely what radicalized elements of both the Right and the Left do not possess to the same degree as the concerns mentioned in the previous paragraph.  Non-clinical psychopathic behavior appears to be the "norm" for pre-modern personalities, certainly as exhibited by Trump himself.

Pre-modern citizenry rages against scientific and secular facts.  Anything to do with voting rights, abortion, gay marriage, cosmology, gun control, government healthcare, birth control, gender and secular philosophy is an abomination to them.  Collectively, all these things (and much more) has generated an amount of fear and anger within these people that far too long was simply dismissed by the psychological leading-edge.  Trumpists have obviously had enough and they are at war culturally with the modern world. 

That is what Trumpism is all about.  It is regressive in that it is revolt against modernity.  This does not mean these people do not relate to technology.  Quite the contrary.  Technology works independently of these mechanisms of frustration and enframes all of humanity, regardless of our individual psychological maturity.  But, that is a topic for another post.  

For our purposes it is enough to simply understand you can psychologically be a citizen of the Roman Empire and still drive a car, watch television, and use a smart phone.  In fact, it is because of this capability (the problem of social media, for example) that Trump was able to galvanize the collective frustrations of these pre-modern people into a cohesive cultural and political force.  Trump is the glue that holds these diverse people together and gives them the "messiah" they so desperately need psychologically - just as people did 2,000 years ago.

Witness the mob of January 6.  It is no accident that many of them, those not dressed in tribal militia attire, were clothed and carried banners as if they were from the middle ages.  It is no accident that Senator Josh Hawley, one of the mob's greatest champions, advances an ideology that can be described as "neo-medieval."  We are dealing with millions of people here that simply do not fit in with the driving forces of the modern world and are doing everything in their power to regress against it back to some past "greatness."

Let's take a closer look at the mob.  They undeniably adopted symbols from the Crusades.  On the surface this seems like an obvious fit for their Islamophobia, which is accurate enough.  But it also reflects the deeper need for these people to live in a world where might makes right, God is always (and only) on their side, and, more importantly, the past should be brought back into the present.  As Crusaders, they frame Trump as "the messianic savior of America."  This is all about the power of righteousness.  There is no way to have "dialog" with such arrogant self-serving power.  It is religious narcissism in its most blatant form.  It is a form of self-expression that is fearful, passionate, exclusive, and violent.

This all worked perfectly well 1,000 years ago when the crusades happened.  And Trump would have been a highly respected "caesar" 2,000 years ago.  His insistence of loyalty directly to him, his empire mentality, his breaking old alliances while forging new ones for his personal gain, his constant demonization of his opponents are all characteristics of numerous Roman leaders.  Everything about Trump and his following is "old school," desiring regression back to the virtues of that day and time.  He is an expert at exploiting the fissures in our society by playing into decades of conservative frustration with the unavoidable future.

Now let's see how Senator Hawley personifies this mold as well.  He exhibits rabid nationalistic-religious views that are directly attributable to a manner of thought from that same Roman time.  According to a recent article in The New York Times (also see here):  "In multiple speeches, an interview and a widely shared article for Christianity Today, Mr. Hawley has explained that the blame for society’s ills traces all the way back to Pelagius — a British-born monk who lived 17 centuries ago. In a 2019 commencement address at the King’s College, a small conservative Christian college devoted to 'a biblical worldview,' Mr. Hawley denounced Pelagius for teaching that human beings have the freedom to choose how they live their lives and that grace comes to those who do good things, as opposed to those who believe the right doctrines.

"The most eloquent summary of the Pelagian vision, Mr. Hawley went on to say, can be found in the Supreme Court’s 1992 opinion in Planned Parenthood v. Casey. Mr. Hawley cited Justice Anthony Kennedy’s words reprovingly. 'At the heart of liberty,' Justice Kennedy wrote, 'is the right to define one’s own concept of existence, of meaning, of the universe, and of the mystery of human life.' The fifth-century church fathers were right to condemn this terrifying variety of heresy, Mr. Hawley argued: 'Replacing it and repairing the harm it has caused is one of the challenges of our day.'

"In other words, Mr. Hawley’s idea of freedom is the freedom to conform to what he and his preferred religious authorities know to be right. Mr. Hawley is not shy about making the point explicit. In a 2017 speech to the American Renewal Project, he declared — paraphrasing the Dutch Reformed theologian and onetime prime minister Abraham Kuyper — 'There is not one square inch of all creation over which Jesus Christ is not Lord.' Mr. Kuyper is perhaps best known for his claim that Christianity has sole legitimate authority over all aspects of human life.

"'We are called to take that message into every sphere of life that we touch, including the political realm,' Mr. Hawley said. 'That is our charge. To take the lordship of Christ, that message, into the public realm, and to seek the obedience of the nations. Of our nation!' [...] That this neo-medieval vision is incompatible with constitutional democracy is clear."

Can you get any more psychologically medieval and regressive than that?   

The Republican Party is helpless against the likes of Trump and Hawley (not to mention the gun-totin' QAnon babe Margorie Taylor Greene).  Few within the party possess the courage to stand up to the Trumpists and that should scare the shit out every one of us.  Karl Rove recently said that there is a "civil war" within the Republican Party right now.  Karl is a pretty bright guy but he is wrong about the war.

There is a rout taking place within the Republican Party right now.  It is fast becoming the Regressive Party because so few so-called Republicans are willing to stand up against Trump.  This goes back to 2018-19 when hordes of reasonable Republicans like Jeff Flake, Bob Corker, and Paul Ryan refused to continue serving.  They caved and are now replaced by Trump-loving regressives who want to impose autocratic rule and Christian nationalism on our nation.  This is not an inter-party war for conservative values.  It is a surrender to Trump's need for absolute loyalty.

We are witnessing the demise of the party of Lincoln and Eisenhower and Reagan.  Now comes the rise of Trump and Hawley and Greene and god knows who else.  Now comes the dystopian reality that most people in America and the world psychologically live so far in the past that they will fight against the future.

The reason is simple.  Trump is wildly popular among the traditional Republican (regressive) base.  Trump managed to get 10 million more votes in 2020 than in 2016.  He is uncompromising in advancing the conservative agenda as a counter-culture force to "the radical left."  He is the only true force the party has and, being Trump, he has promised to find candidates to run against any Republican who opposes him, who votes to impeach him, who even hints that he has ever done anything wrong.

Clearly, he incited a riot on the Capitol while Congress was in session.  Five people died that day, two others died later.  Who is responsible?  Who will be held accountable?  Apparently, only the mob itself, some 400 suspects and 135 already arrested.  But the man who organized the rally from whence the 400 (and thousands more) marched, the man who told the crowd to go over to the Capitol building, the man who said that the election was "rigged," to never concede and to keep fighting, that man had nothing at all to do with it.

I keep hearing Republicans say we should not impeach the former president.  Okay.  Then what?  What should happen when the most powerful man in the world gets away with inciting a riot against the Capitol of the United States knowingly while Congress is in session?  Slap on the hand?  Bad boy. Not even.

This is the most ludicrous 1984-like moment of my life.

Nothing will be done about Trump because Trump now owns the Republican Party.  House minority leader Kevin McCarthy, who originally stated Trump bore some responsibility for the riot, flew down to Florida to kiss Trump's ass and make up.  It was not just McCarthy, almost the entire GOP Senate flip-flopped from rightly blaming the riot on Trump's actions to bowing down before him as the Great Deliverer of conservative votes.

Welcome to dystopia.  Where our two-party system has been dismantled by a narcissistic mobster boss and his vast psychologically ill-prepared following.  The threat to democracy is not in the future.  It is right here, right now.  Dystopia is not some future horror, it is right now.  We are living in it.  2020 was only the beginning.  The Republicans know they likely cannot win any political race without Trump's endorsement.  It has come to this...and Trump knows it, he knew it all along.  

That's why when he came to Georgia to (unsuccessfully) campaign for Loeffler and Purdue in early January he told the crowd at the rally: "I don't do rallies for other people.  I do them for me."

History repeats itself whether anyone remembers it or not.  Conservatives once again can't kick their addiction to a wretched power, only this time the parties have switched.  Thomas Jefferson once compared the issue of slavery to be like having "the wolf by the ear, we can neither hold him nor safely let him go."  Back then it was the conservative Democrats who defended slavery and brought this nation to war over it (though the actual fighting was about other things entirely).  Trump is our slavery.  He is just as divisive, just as obvious, just as uncontrollable.  Yet it is the Republicans who will defend Trump because he is a rallying cry for the Regressive Right just as powerful as slavery once was for Southerners and Abolitionists.  The Republican Party has Trump by the ears, it cannot let him go.

Who knows what war awaits us this time.  It has already begun.