After the Capitol siege: Coexistence Is the Only Option

[TomVilmer]

Last edited Mon Jan 25, 2021, 04:45 PM - Edit history (1)

Millions of Americans sympathize with the Capitol insurrection. Everyone else must figure out how to live alongside them.
By Anne Applebaum - The Atlantic

Not all Republicans are seditionists, nor is everyone who voted for Trump, nor is every conservative: Nothing about rejecting your country’s political system is conservative. ... As of this week, 32 percent were still telling pollsters that Biden was not the legitimate winner. ... That’s a very large number of people. For although Trump will eventually exit political life, the seditionists will not. ... We have no choice except to coexist. ...

But how? Drop the argument and change the subject. That’s the counterintuitive advice you will hear from people who have studied Northern Ireland before the 1998 peace deal, or Liberia, or South Africa, or Timor-Leste—countries where political opponents have seen each other as not just wrong, but evil. ...

In the years before and after the peace settlement in Northern Ireland, for example, many “peacebuilding” projects did not try to make Catholics and Protestants hold civilized debates about politics, or talk about politics at all. Instead, they built community centers, put up Christmas lights, and organized job training for young people. ...

I recognize that this is not what everyone wants to hear. ... Some might even prefer an American version of de-Baathification: track down every last Capitol-riot sympathizer and shame them on social media, preferably with enough rigor that they lose their jobs. I know how they feel, because I often feel that way too. But then I remember: It won’t work. We’ll wake up the next morning, and they’ll still be there.

[This is just some blocks from her thoughts. There is much more here:]
https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2021/01/seditionists-need-path-back-society/617746/

(I was asked to remove some more of her article for copyright reason, which I now has done)

[TheRealNorth]

1. Turn our backs....

And they might be successful in shiving us next time. Does anyone honestly think that Republicans wouldn't unleash the police state if this was a Democratic Party-inspired coup?

01/06/2021 -NEVER FORGET how close this country was to having its Democracy destroyed by these MAGA traitors.

[Walleye]

2. I say we ignore them for the time being. Don't respond to their provocation.

They are very good at pushing our buttons to throw us off our game. I fear a certain percentage of humanity is just hardwired for authoritarianism. The best thing we can do right now is pass our agenda as quickly as possible and get services into everybody’s hands.We should least have unity in the Democratic Party. That’s a worthy achievable goal.

[Mike 03]

3. Kicking. Applebaum discussed this piece on Morning Joe today.

I truly love her work and her new book Twilight of Democracy is IMO one of the most insightful books of the last few years.

I wonder if she has studied the genocides in Rwanda and former Yugoslavia as deeply as she has studied Stalinism (her specialty), though, or the reign of Pol Pot for that matter. The phenomenon of people living for decades side-by-side in authentic peace or uneasy friendship, suddenly erupting into a frenzy of homicidal violence is, well, troublesome. Maybe tensions can be patched over with some of the methods she highlights. We do need to try something.

It is also fair to say that, essentially and historically, denazification was a well-intentioned failure.

[Ford_Prefect]

4. Where I live they are still trying to kill us and overturn the election.

Playing nice is NOT an option. They will not wear masks, harass those who do, and talk up insurrection methods in line at the grocery store the way they used to compare high school basketball scores.

I have NO reason to play nice with rattlesnakes. I don't need to set them off or eliminate them from the wood pile. However I am considering a new walking stick from the Louisville Slugger custom wood line. It helped keep trouble a few feet further away in a former lifetime and neighborhood. I never had to do more than walk along with it, The message was clear enough. I am not looking for an argument and I won't have one either.

They have appropriated the flag, they do not believe science and scorn any symbol of peace or reconciliation.

Until Trump concedes or the GOP does we are screwed on getting along.

[Solly Mack]

5. Tell that to the republicans in Congress. See what they say.

It absolutely has to start with them. Because if they keep promoting Trumpism, and they are, then a willingness on our part won't make a dent.

As long as they continue the lies about the election, as long as they continue to promote division through their appeals to racism, classism - all their appeals to prejudice, as long as they would rather give tax breaks to the wealthy instead of helping everyone else - then nothing changes.

Because they'll continue to lie about their motives to their voters and those voters, with all their lie-based grievances, will believe whatever other lies they are told. And they will behave accordingly.

Republicans have to stop with the lying and they have to admit that they have been lying for years.

The truth is an appealing alternative because it is the only real alternative to where we find ourselves. Truth and accountability.

Otherwise, we'll still be combating the lies they tell that incite people to storm the Capitol. To be anti-government. To claim anything that helps people is socialism. To deny themselves healthcare because, somehow, that's un-american. To fear their guns being taken away by Democrats when that never happens. NEVER, ever, happens. Yet they still believe it because of all the lies. And that list of lies is long.

We can pretend it was all just Trump - but that's a lie.

Trump gained a foothold because of all the years of lying from republicans, conservative - whatever you want to call the right-wing.

Another Trump-like person will come along unless republicans have a come to honesty-truth-fact moment.

And they won't. The price to their hold on power is too high.

Tax-payers footed the bill for education that a lot of out-of-work miners wouldn't take advantage of because they firmly believed the mines would come back. Along came Trump who told them the lie that they already believed was true.

OOPS?

I'll happily help foot the bill for mental health care. Will they even go? They think we are the crazy ones. They think we are the ones living in a world of lies.

They think we're the enemy - and they have shown a willingness to kill us.

So? I extend a hand only to see my hand chopped off?

I gain a moral victory for the attempt?

No, thanks.

[TheRealNorth]

7. Exactly

If we entertain their lies and their treason, they will think that they are correct BECAUSE WE REWARDED THEM by "RESPECTING" them.

I got news for people who think we can take the "easy" way out of this - there is no easy way out. We must crush their ideology - or we will be crushed by them.

[stopdiggin]

6. sounds like a voice of reason

Well stated. And, you're right, not what some want to hear right now.

Note: The OP doesn't say anything about "compromise" or "understanding" or "power sharing" -- it just advocates finding projects and areas where people can cooperate and work together. That seems reasonable, and positive (and proven). And as the piece also points out -- the people on the other side are not going to go away. Today, or tomorrow -- or the day after that.

[TomVilmer]

8. Nice that somebody can read :)

That way of living together can also be called "freezing" the conflict. Kind of "agreeing to disagree". Moving on on all other fronts, both knowing there are unresolved things between them. It is still a dysfunctional relationship, but can make it possible to survive without violence breaking out all the time.
See it as the clear opposite of how the world of Trump was .

But Applebaum is also very clear on how she sees the problem. That America’s seditionists arguably pose a long-term social problem, they might no longer be able to cope with an ordinary life, and are in need of exit counseling like people who have left religious cults. A good clear analysis, though not words that would invite anybody to participate. This is no easy process!