Would you rather be labeled a boor or civilized? A boor is a rude or insensitive person. Civilized means characterized by taste, refinement or restraint. So, civilized, right? If only because a boor is rather, well, boorish. Yet today I fear that a good share of Americans would proudly claim the boor moniker, going so far as putting “Make Boors Great Again!” on their bright red caps.
Why are so many hardworking, God-fearing, country-loving Americans willing to toss aside their civility and embrace the misanthropic world of Breitbart News and Stephen Miller? Perhaps because so many smarty-pants “liberals” don’t approve of this president’s leanings and these good folks relate. They’ve been ignored, mocked and marginalized, and they’re tired of biting their tongues.
By abandoning all sense of propriety, the president has freed their hearts to bellow out what has surreptitiously lurked within. In a world where civility is dead, they are free to embrace the ugly with pride because in a free-for-all there is no righteousness, only victory by attrition.
Have you noticed that anyone who earns Trump’s ire is “a traitor?” Ask Sen. John McCain, the FBI, and those pesky White House leakers. Don’t forget the “enemies of the state”: special counsel Robert S. Mueller III, the press and Democrats in general. He acts just like his despotic heroes — Putin, Kim Jong Un, Duterte. And like them, he knows best, and what is best is what is best for him.
The left isn’t blameless here. Take comedian Samantha Bee’s apology for her vulgar comment about Ivanka Trump: “I never intended it to hurt anyone.” So, she thought that calling the President’s daughter the “c” word wouldn’t hurt anyone? Well, aside from Ivanka and her family, it hurt women everywhere and everyone left of center. Her incivility only emboldened the president’s supporters and his sycophants in Congress.
What would be fascinating, if it weren’t tragic, is how the president gets away with shucking old-time race-baiting, goose-stepping nationalism. What happened to “the only thing we have to fear is fear itself,” or, “Ask not what your country can do for you — ask what you can do for your country”? Instead we get his catcalls to violence: “I’ll beat the crap out of you” and “I’d like to punch him in the face.” He says things only third-grade bullies say.
Nationalism is defined as loyalty and devotion to a nation; especially a sense of national consciousness. OK, but what about the more sinister implication? Nationalism can also mean exalting one nation above all others and placing primary emphasis on promotion of its culture and interests as opposed to those of other nations. After the Charlottesville alt-right debacle, our president couldn’t quite decide which side he fell on. His initial tepid, wishy-washy position spoke, bigly. You knew whose side he was on — it wasn’t the American majority’s.
He wants to restore America to greatness, all right, by tramping on the ideals that make us great, such as equality, free speech, freedom of the press and due process.
Nationalism, like a flag, unifies those who live under it and empowers those who fight for it. But so often it is really a one-dimensional sheet that gets wrapped around the one-dimensional idea that “we” are better than “them.” In this regard I think Albert Einstein said it best, “Nationalism is an infantile disease. It is the measles of mankind.”
That would be funnier if it weren’t true. The president should recall our motto: e pluribus unum, out of many one. If we’re not careful, Trump’s nationalism will be the shroud over the casket of our democracy.
