Thank you for having the stomach for Trump's antics. I have barely been able to listen to a Republican president since Reagan openly expressed his disdain for those dying of AIDS by blaming them for the situation in which they found themselves: often alone, abandoned by judgmental families and scared friends, with only medical staff acco…
Thank you for having the stomach for Trump's antics. I have barely been able to listen to a Republican president since Reagan openly expressed his disdain for those dying of AIDS by blaming them for the situation in which they found themselves: often alone, abandoned by judgmental families and scared friends, with only medical staff accompanying them on their death beds.
There is so much about our situation that reminds me of the beginning of the AIDS crisis, despite the fact that the virus that causes COVID is affecting even "decent men and women", to recall one of Reagan's favorite phrases for voicing a deeply exclusionary vision for this country. That this vision has become narrower and narrower, to the point where only those who can be pulled into the cruel alternative reality of a sadistic con man, does not surprise me nearly as much as it does many other white folks my age.
But in Trump I see and hear only a repetition and intensification of a dominant culture that has been brutal and self-aggrandizing from the time it set foot on this continent, assuming that divine providence had given it the power and authority to brush aside the claims of those who already lived here. The "empty wilderness", just waiting for the hand of European men to bring it under civilized order, is no less a fanciful narrative than any that Trump has cooked up: it was a cruel fiction into which many well-intentioned people enthusiastically threw themselves and took up their parts as tamers of wild lands and peoples. The ruthlessness of the ensuing drama is the other half of our original sin as a country, and the necessary counterpart of slavery in nation-building.
And now we who descend from colonialists and settlers are finally beginning to understand what it means to live under this kind of arrogance and arbitrary rejection of the complexity of life on earth. It occurred to me last week that Trump's aptitude for twisting reality to the point that many of us are left nearly paralyzed with anxiety about what might happen next is just another echo of the interpersonal abuse that is rampant in our culture, and that the only way to neutralize this kind of violence is to step out of the narrative and find a way not to be pulled into its immobilizing spell of extreme uncertainty.
Which is no easy feat for anyone who is living under domestic violence or familial abuse, but is at least somewhat easier if the person who would control our reality is on the opposite coast and has no access to us that we do not ourselves grant him. And so I decided to kick him out of my head and let the events tell me how I needed to respond as they unfolded.
Which is why one reason why I thank you for taking on the task of reassembling the narrative for your readers. I know I am not the only survivor of abuse watching in horror as this man attempts to pull an entire nation into his psychodrama; we have been rehearsing this moment all our lives. And I am certainly not alone in belonging to a number of groups that he and many other conservatives have repeatedly targeted as being deserving of quite nearly nothing that sustains life, but plenty that beats it out of us, sometimes quickly (as though merciful!), and sometimes as one tiny slice of flesh, over and over and over and over.
I have begun to think a bit more about the possible cultural links between a deniable--and usually denied--proclivity for private, familial abuse and a potential for publicly embraced fascism. I have often wondered what it would take for the US to begin to understand what Europe was forced to come to grips with after World War II: that white culture is not exceptional, that it is capable of and has already committed grotesque violence in a number of founding political and even philosophical gestures, and that it will destroy itself if it does not recognize the realities underwriting its current existence.
If this seems a rather dark vision and a sobering way of registering my gratitude, it is only because I see this moment as a moment in which we may have begun to turn around, but it seems glaringly clear to me that we must keep walking in some other direction than the one that brought us here. Otherwise we will be back much sooner than many might expect. That the vote has been closer than many of us were hoping seems to me a good thing, for even if we are able to get this one example of USian fascist domination out of the executive office, it seems clear that we have much more work to do to cure ourselves of ills that allowed him to gain that office to begin with.
Perhaps later on I can say more about what it seems to me we have to do. It is far from simple or even all that clear to me, but certain parts of Euro-American culture have long been placed into critical questioning by those of us who think about such things. One difficult part is disappointing the faith of so many who still think of the US as the shining city on the hill. And there are many and much deeper faiths that I doubt will be even as easy to address as that one.
But later for that. As a disabled academic, I am in fact deeply grateful to you for doing this work that I myself only wish I had the energy for. When this is over (will we know when it is over..? Maybe when there is a lull?), please do take a nice long refreshing rest. One thing we USians often forget is that caretaking is essential: for ourselves, yes, but also as a service to each other.
Whoever you are, this is really helpful. Not that I would have been able to write so brilliantly in a million years, but it’s what I’ve been edging toward. It’s a galvanizing moment when all sorts of national fictions have been blown away from my eyes. The hard work lies ahead, but real change may now be possible.
Love that you feel so comfortable with this group to express your heartfelt thoughts which, by the way, have helped all of us. And the fact that an adorable kittie is your avatar says everything to us cat lovers!
The picture is perfect - as was the entire comment. How "sad" is it that its such a gift to read these "Letters" AND the comments to them - intelligent, unbiased comments - not like some sites that start out with news & end up with shouting (in writing) at each other. I think there has to come a time - dont know how - that people on different "sides" can actually talk TO each other rather than AT each other - when? Or how? That part I dont know!
We have to see each other as "people," not enemies. Try to understand their points of view, their concerns. Former Ohio Governor John Kasich made that point yesterday morning on CNN.
I came here this morning, as always, for Heather (and, as long as she writes, I will always come back)...but Erik. You have managed to put on the ethereal glowing "paper" a cogent narrative of the jumbled thoughts in my head. Do, please - continue.
Thank you, Erik, for describing so well the ever more evident stain(s) from our colonial and post-colonial past. Now that the systemic wrongs have been made so much more visible to all of us — and not only those who have suffered from them from the beginning of this national enterprise — it’s clear that we must change. We can’t go backwards to right those wrongs, and going the way of the conservative-right/authoritarian crowd (beheading? Really?!?) is absolutely the wrong direction. Somehow we need to make a more perfect union, one that includes everyone, preserves the earth, air, and water that sustain us, and expands rather than contracts the possibilities for decency, humanity, generosity, and compassion in our society.
Thank you all for reading and responding. I am always working on speaking up more often and I do appreciate that there are many who would like to be able to express what I have learned to express over the course of recovering from trauma (sort of--it's not really a process that ever ends as it is a retraining of neurological circuits to be a little less reactive, a little less prone to panic, a little more disposed to compassion for oneself).
And language only gets one so far, but it can do remarkable things nonetheless. Still, I was planning on making music today, so that is what I am going to do now. I haven't found substack to be the most conducive to long conversations, but I will try to respond more a little later on.
Making music is a great place to go at this point - I'm not a music "maker" but listening certainly does take us all to a different place! Your "speaking up" adds much to these conversations.
Brilliant, Erik. Thank you. I think often about the resilience of the African American community, who have kept pushing and pushing and not given up, and also not lost love for our country. It looks to me like they have, once again, pulled us back from the brink. We MUST address inequity, and do it now, if only in gratitude.
Kathy, what a beautiful, gracious way of expressing what black and brown people have given us. Yes, in gratitude. Thank you- another window just opened in my mind.
Well said, sir. America is great; but until we learn that we are not exceptional, and that humility is often the truest sign of greatness, we will remain what we have always been, too often, a brutal and self-aggrandizing culture.
Thank you for writing this. Relatively few people have seen abuse before. The 2016 Republican opponents who turned into respectful worshippers are shining examples of what bullying does. The media — all media— were fascinated by the bad boy and never headlined the fact that voter turnout was abysmally low in the primaries. If Anderson Cooper and Martha Raddatz had stopped his creepy stalking in the second Clinton “debate,” would he have apologized? He has never said I am sorry to my knowledge. There is a community standard of behavior, call it the Golden Rule, he Ignores. But we cannot play coulda-shoulda-woulda right now. If🤞🏼🙏🏼 he loses, what then? He has militia and an unbelievable number of supporters. He is early Hitler.
Such sly self-deprecation. But remember, a little goes a long way.
You don’t want to become like those in Shia Islam, where self-flagellation is considered an important spiritual virtue. I think it demeans that beautiful Faith.
I say this because I sometimes fall victim to excessive put-downs of self. We are noble beings, if we would just recognize that and live life to its fullest.
I’ll work on it if you will.
P.S. I somehow missed most of this day’s letters and am just getting back to them. Stay well and stay joyous!
Erik, I read this post, and then read it again. It moved me, but I could not respond just then. Needed to physically move to free my mind to think, so I set your essay aside, went out and moved another little bit of my woodpile into the barn (this is how I do everything these days- a bit at a time until it's done). Now I am back. Read again, cherished the beauty of your writing, remarkable for it's rich succinctness. What I wish I could do is sit down with you face to face and just talk, find the links in our thinking. I looked you up to see what else you might have written and discovered some beautiful, delicate fragments. Through those fragments I learned a little about you, and how you came to be where you are. Not only is your writing remarkable, so are you.
I agree with you that the closeness of the vote is a good thing (wrote about it elsewhere). Otherwise, I'm afraid we will become either complacent and think we have dealt with the underlying problem. Or allow our exhaustion to overtake our ability to see it as it is. As you described it: "... we have much more work to do to cure ourselves of ills that allowed him to gain that office to begin with."
Many, many of us are refusing to allow ourselves to fall into that trap. We are taking a few days or weeks to recover, but we have already begun the process of reclaiming our democracy. I too am a disabled semi-academic and elderly to boot, but I've found a welcome in several organizations who welcome the skills I can bring, and I am at home. I expect to spend the rest of my life on this, and to pass it on to the young people with whom I am associated. I celebrate this. Nothing is altogether clear to me either, except that we have to make clear that we are all citizens, and it is we who make the decisions. Then we figure out which things are getting in the way and how to fix them. Together, inclusively. We just proved that our system WORKS! And that even in the midst of what seems like chaos, we see progress as more black and brown and indigenous and gender-non-conforming people have been elected by their peers, who are all of us. Even the votes against them is part of this amazing process, because the fact that those votes were cast means that those folks believe in the validity of our system too. We must honor them for that, I think, because someday we may be voting together with them as allies.
Thank you for taking the time to share your thoughts and observations. We are of like mind, and your words affirm me, and all of us who've refused to give up. Please post more as you can. You help open my mind to new ways of thinking.
Annie. You, too, are a gifted writer and your thoughts and probing questions are pearls that we all can admire and gain humanity from.
Your are a clear and independent thinker and your musings offer this not-so-little community valuable perspectives on life and living. Together we form a composite of the progressive thought of the day.
I apparently missed most of this day’s responses to HCR’s Letter, so I’m just catching up. I look forward to your contributions daily. Please don’t disappoint me.
I have begun reading the tome The Silk Roads by Peter Frankopan in hope of getting a different perspective on World History. His preface quotes Eric Wolf about the lazy history that starts with ancient Greece and moves west completely ignoring a large part of the world. I'm hoping for an interesting & educational read because we have such a slanted view. I believe we have to know ourselves before we can make meaningful change. It sounds like you are already on that path, Erik.
One of the best pieces of writing that I have ever read in this forum. Sir, your deft treatment of the tortured conscience and self immolations of USians (as you put it) living one part of our lives to fulfill the mission of The Manifest Destiny and yet reject with the other half its very existence at all, is worth a full book in my opinion.
Bravo, Erik. Thank you for putting your words out here. Many hands make light work. And many words make thoughts and vision more clear. Well done, sir.
Thank you for having the stomach for Trump's antics. I have barely been able to listen to a Republican president since Reagan openly expressed his disdain for those dying of AIDS by blaming them for the situation in which they found themselves: often alone, abandoned by judgmental families and scared friends, with only medical staff accompanying them on their death beds.
There is so much about our situation that reminds me of the beginning of the AIDS crisis, despite the fact that the virus that causes COVID is affecting even "decent men and women", to recall one of Reagan's favorite phrases for voicing a deeply exclusionary vision for this country. That this vision has become narrower and narrower, to the point where only those who can be pulled into the cruel alternative reality of a sadistic con man, does not surprise me nearly as much as it does many other white folks my age.
But in Trump I see and hear only a repetition and intensification of a dominant culture that has been brutal and self-aggrandizing from the time it set foot on this continent, assuming that divine providence had given it the power and authority to brush aside the claims of those who already lived here. The "empty wilderness", just waiting for the hand of European men to bring it under civilized order, is no less a fanciful narrative than any that Trump has cooked up: it was a cruel fiction into which many well-intentioned people enthusiastically threw themselves and took up their parts as tamers of wild lands and peoples. The ruthlessness of the ensuing drama is the other half of our original sin as a country, and the necessary counterpart of slavery in nation-building.
And now we who descend from colonialists and settlers are finally beginning to understand what it means to live under this kind of arrogance and arbitrary rejection of the complexity of life on earth. It occurred to me last week that Trump's aptitude for twisting reality to the point that many of us are left nearly paralyzed with anxiety about what might happen next is just another echo of the interpersonal abuse that is rampant in our culture, and that the only way to neutralize this kind of violence is to step out of the narrative and find a way not to be pulled into its immobilizing spell of extreme uncertainty.
Which is no easy feat for anyone who is living under domestic violence or familial abuse, but is at least somewhat easier if the person who would control our reality is on the opposite coast and has no access to us that we do not ourselves grant him. And so I decided to kick him out of my head and let the events tell me how I needed to respond as they unfolded.
Which is why one reason why I thank you for taking on the task of reassembling the narrative for your readers. I know I am not the only survivor of abuse watching in horror as this man attempts to pull an entire nation into his psychodrama; we have been rehearsing this moment all our lives. And I am certainly not alone in belonging to a number of groups that he and many other conservatives have repeatedly targeted as being deserving of quite nearly nothing that sustains life, but plenty that beats it out of us, sometimes quickly (as though merciful!), and sometimes as one tiny slice of flesh, over and over and over and over.
I have begun to think a bit more about the possible cultural links between a deniable--and usually denied--proclivity for private, familial abuse and a potential for publicly embraced fascism. I have often wondered what it would take for the US to begin to understand what Europe was forced to come to grips with after World War II: that white culture is not exceptional, that it is capable of and has already committed grotesque violence in a number of founding political and even philosophical gestures, and that it will destroy itself if it does not recognize the realities underwriting its current existence.
If this seems a rather dark vision and a sobering way of registering my gratitude, it is only because I see this moment as a moment in which we may have begun to turn around, but it seems glaringly clear to me that we must keep walking in some other direction than the one that brought us here. Otherwise we will be back much sooner than many might expect. That the vote has been closer than many of us were hoping seems to me a good thing, for even if we are able to get this one example of USian fascist domination out of the executive office, it seems clear that we have much more work to do to cure ourselves of ills that allowed him to gain that office to begin with.
Perhaps later on I can say more about what it seems to me we have to do. It is far from simple or even all that clear to me, but certain parts of Euro-American culture have long been placed into critical questioning by those of us who think about such things. One difficult part is disappointing the faith of so many who still think of the US as the shining city on the hill. And there are many and much deeper faiths that I doubt will be even as easy to address as that one.
But later for that. As a disabled academic, I am in fact deeply grateful to you for doing this work that I myself only wish I had the energy for. When this is over (will we know when it is over..? Maybe when there is a lull?), please do take a nice long refreshing rest. One thing we USians often forget is that caretaking is essential: for ourselves, yes, but also as a service to each other.
Whoever you are, this is really helpful. Not that I would have been able to write so brilliantly in a million years, but it’s what I’ve been edging toward. It’s a galvanizing moment when all sorts of national fictions have been blown away from my eyes. The hard work lies ahead, but real change may now be possible.
Glad to be of help. I wish I had the resolve to write more publicly more often. Thanks for the encouragement!
I maybe should put a picture in my little icon, yes? Not that it will make it any clearer who I am. I haven't much of a clue either, in any case. :)
A photo of your tuxedo cat is fine, Erik.
We'd love you to keep writing and sharing your insights.
Love that you feel so comfortable with this group to express your heartfelt thoughts which, by the way, have helped all of us. And the fact that an adorable kittie is your avatar says everything to us cat lovers!
The picture is perfect - as was the entire comment. How "sad" is it that its such a gift to read these "Letters" AND the comments to them - intelligent, unbiased comments - not like some sites that start out with news & end up with shouting (in writing) at each other. I think there has to come a time - dont know how - that people on different "sides" can actually talk TO each other rather than AT each other - when? Or how? That part I dont know!
We have to see each other as "people," not enemies. Try to understand their points of view, their concerns. Former Ohio Governor John Kasich made that point yesterday morning on CNN.
Love Kasich!!
brothers and sisters
We need to stop thinking of each other as idiots and start listening, truly listening.
I came here this morning, as always, for Heather (and, as long as she writes, I will always come back)...but Erik. You have managed to put on the ethereal glowing "paper" a cogent narrative of the jumbled thoughts in my head. Do, please - continue.
Thank you, Erik, for describing so well the ever more evident stain(s) from our colonial and post-colonial past. Now that the systemic wrongs have been made so much more visible to all of us — and not only those who have suffered from them from the beginning of this national enterprise — it’s clear that we must change. We can’t go backwards to right those wrongs, and going the way of the conservative-right/authoritarian crowd (beheading? Really?!?) is absolutely the wrong direction. Somehow we need to make a more perfect union, one that includes everyone, preserves the earth, air, and water that sustain us, and expands rather than contracts the possibilities for decency, humanity, generosity, and compassion in our society.
Thank you all for reading and responding. I am always working on speaking up more often and I do appreciate that there are many who would like to be able to express what I have learned to express over the course of recovering from trauma (sort of--it's not really a process that ever ends as it is a retraining of neurological circuits to be a little less reactive, a little less prone to panic, a little more disposed to compassion for oneself).
And language only gets one so far, but it can do remarkable things nonetheless. Still, I was planning on making music today, so that is what I am going to do now. I haven't found substack to be the most conducive to long conversations, but I will try to respond more a little later on.
Making music is a great place to go at this point - I'm not a music "maker" but listening certainly does take us all to a different place! Your "speaking up" adds much to these conversations.
Brilliant, Erik. Thank you. I think often about the resilience of the African American community, who have kept pushing and pushing and not given up, and also not lost love for our country. It looks to me like they have, once again, pulled us back from the brink. We MUST address inequity, and do it now, if only in gratitude.
Kathy, what a beautiful, gracious way of expressing what black and brown people have given us. Yes, in gratitude. Thank you- another window just opened in my mind.
Well said, sir. America is great; but until we learn that we are not exceptional, and that humility is often the truest sign of greatness, we will remain what we have always been, too often, a brutal and self-aggrandizing culture.
Keep writing, keep writing! Brilliant writers like you who capture emotion are in demand, always.
Thank you for writing this. Relatively few people have seen abuse before. The 2016 Republican opponents who turned into respectful worshippers are shining examples of what bullying does. The media — all media— were fascinated by the bad boy and never headlined the fact that voter turnout was abysmally low in the primaries. If Anderson Cooper and Martha Raddatz had stopped his creepy stalking in the second Clinton “debate,” would he have apologized? He has never said I am sorry to my knowledge. There is a community standard of behavior, call it the Golden Rule, he Ignores. But we cannot play coulda-shoulda-woulda right now. If🤞🏼🙏🏼 he loses, what then? He has militia and an unbelievable number of supporters. He is early Hitler.
And if you think I am exaggerating, remember what happened when he made COVID-19 political. We will be at the quarter million dead very soon.
You are brilliant and I thank you for putting into eloquent words what many of us have been grappling with for months. Keep writing, please.
Dang. An "edit" button would be nice. Oh well. *Most* of my sentences express a complete thought.
Heh. Whatever that is. :)
All of us bemoan that this platform doesn't allow self-edits.
Yeah, I just realized I have part of a sentence dangling at the end of my post above, and no idea what I had in mind. <sigh> Typical...
<Shared sigh and empathetic chuckle.>
Such sly self-deprecation. But remember, a little goes a long way.
You don’t want to become like those in Shia Islam, where self-flagellation is considered an important spiritual virtue. I think it demeans that beautiful Faith.
I say this because I sometimes fall victim to excessive put-downs of self. We are noble beings, if we would just recognize that and live life to its fullest.
I’ll work on it if you will.
P.S. I somehow missed most of this day’s letters and am just getting back to them. Stay well and stay joyous!
Thank you, Erik. And thank you, too, to all of you who have commented. You are becoming my much needed community.
Thank you for so eloquently putting into words the jumbled and terrified thoughts in my head.
Erik, I read this post, and then read it again. It moved me, but I could not respond just then. Needed to physically move to free my mind to think, so I set your essay aside, went out and moved another little bit of my woodpile into the barn (this is how I do everything these days- a bit at a time until it's done). Now I am back. Read again, cherished the beauty of your writing, remarkable for it's rich succinctness. What I wish I could do is sit down with you face to face and just talk, find the links in our thinking. I looked you up to see what else you might have written and discovered some beautiful, delicate fragments. Through those fragments I learned a little about you, and how you came to be where you are. Not only is your writing remarkable, so are you.
I agree with you that the closeness of the vote is a good thing (wrote about it elsewhere). Otherwise, I'm afraid we will become either complacent and think we have dealt with the underlying problem. Or allow our exhaustion to overtake our ability to see it as it is. As you described it: "... we have much more work to do to cure ourselves of ills that allowed him to gain that office to begin with."
Many, many of us are refusing to allow ourselves to fall into that trap. We are taking a few days or weeks to recover, but we have already begun the process of reclaiming our democracy. I too am a disabled semi-academic and elderly to boot, but I've found a welcome in several organizations who welcome the skills I can bring, and I am at home. I expect to spend the rest of my life on this, and to pass it on to the young people with whom I am associated. I celebrate this. Nothing is altogether clear to me either, except that we have to make clear that we are all citizens, and it is we who make the decisions. Then we figure out which things are getting in the way and how to fix them. Together, inclusively. We just proved that our system WORKS! And that even in the midst of what seems like chaos, we see progress as more black and brown and indigenous and gender-non-conforming people have been elected by their peers, who are all of us. Even the votes against them is part of this amazing process, because the fact that those votes were cast means that those folks believe in the validity of our system too. We must honor them for that, I think, because someday we may be voting together with them as allies.
Thank you for taking the time to share your thoughts and observations. We are of like mind, and your words affirm me, and all of us who've refused to give up. Please post more as you can. You help open my mind to new ways of thinking.
What you wrote is a
Annie. You, too, are a gifted writer and your thoughts and probing questions are pearls that we all can admire and gain humanity from.
Your are a clear and independent thinker and your musings offer this not-so-little community valuable perspectives on life and living. Together we form a composite of the progressive thought of the day.
I apparently missed most of this day’s responses to HCR’s Letter, so I’m just catching up. I look forward to your contributions daily. Please don’t disappoint me.
I have begun reading the tome The Silk Roads by Peter Frankopan in hope of getting a different perspective on World History. His preface quotes Eric Wolf about the lazy history that starts with ancient Greece and moves west completely ignoring a large part of the world. I'm hoping for an interesting & educational read because we have such a slanted view. I believe we have to know ourselves before we can make meaningful change. It sounds like you are already on that path, Erik.
One of the best pieces of writing that I have ever read in this forum. Sir, your deft treatment of the tortured conscience and self immolations of USians (as you put it) living one part of our lives to fulfill the mission of The Manifest Destiny and yet reject with the other half its very existence at all, is worth a full book in my opinion.
Bravo, Erik. Thank you for putting your words out here. Many hands make light work. And many words make thoughts and vision more clear. Well done, sir.