written 17 November, 2024
published 24 November, 2024
With Trump as president elect, some are grieving and others are ecstatic, but a few who voted for him are already becoming nervous as he chooses his cabinet.
Much is written about why so many people picked him. Some have Fox News on all day long, although Fox admitted they lie for profit to keep viewers. Talk radio has pushed disinformation for decades, stoking fear for profit. Social media algorithms are designed to addict viewers, increasing profit, while amplifying the worst aspects of humanity.
Our education system has produced generations with little to no critical thinking skills, or whole system awareness. Some people weren't even paying attention, perhaps burned out by 24 months of Trump every day. Google searches just before election day spiked on "when did Biden drop out?"
Democrats have been cast as too elitist, ignoring the working class and those with little higher education. The middle class has been slowly hollowed out for 50 years, while concentration of wealth now exceeds the roaring 20's before the Great Depression. Inflation keeps increasing, driven by corporate greed, resource depletion, and the growing destruction caused by the climate crisis. The empowerment of women, based on the audacious belief that women are actual people, threatens generations of masculine privilege. Men are afraid women will laugh at them and women are afraid men will kill them.
All of this has contributed, but doesn't fully explain why anyone except a billionaire thinks Trump will help them. However, I live in a west coast bubble, and am often reminded at election time how out of touch I am.
My wife Lynn walks every day. She encountered two men with signs on School Street. One was shouting for people to "repent". Being good hearted, she smiled at him, and was handed a small cartoon book about the Beast and End Times, according to the Bible.
I was struck by a passage from 2 Timothy 3:2-5. "For men shall be lovers of their own selves, covetous, boasters, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, unthankful, unholy, without natural affection, trucebreakers, false accusers, incontinent, fierce, despisers of those that are good, traitors, heady, high minded, lovers of pleasures more than lovers of God." This describes Trump in detail, but "Christians" revere him as their salvation.
We do seem to be living in end times. The seas are dying, pandemics assault the planet, fire, floods and drought hit everywhere. Trump sells the idea that all is bleak, and that he is the savior, appealing to all those who yearn for the rapture, when sinners burn in hell for eternity and the saved rise to heaven in the final judgement. A war in the middle east is one of the signal events. Even though everyone there will die, some evangelical "Christians" wait expectantly.
I am inspired by the teachings of Christ, who said the two most important things were to love God and love other people. But I can't identify with the religious organizations that men have created in Christ's name. How did the teaching "love God" change to defining a good Christian as "God fearing?" Love and fear are polar opposites, one opens up and the other closes down. To believe they are the same is crazy making. However, fear is a powerful tool for domination and judgement, excellent for controlling the faithful.
Rather than loving other people, they are hated and killed. Not only are "heathens" (non-Christians) the victims, but Christians kill Christians as well. Today, some "Christians" rally at churches with guns, shouting "death to Democrats". This makes sense for a domination/judgement organization, but can't seriously be considered following Christ.
I do believe most Christians strive to live Christ's teaching, loving all life and all people. But most religious organizations on Earth, no matter which faith, tend toward domination and judgement. The religious denigration of women is widespread. The Taliban in Afghanistan keep their women in bags when in public, and now prohibit speech if any but family can hear. In the US, with generations of empowered women, the radical fundamentalists can only insist they bleed to death in a parking lot if they miscarry, but they expect to make more "progress" under Trump 2.0.
Democracy is subverted to profit and power, and organized religion has lost its way. Trump is a consequence of this perversion, and has nothing to offer as a real solution. We do live in interesting times.
