The Conservative Fear Fetish
In a recent opinion column for the Chicago Tribune,
progressive columnist Erie Zorn argues that the true strength of the National
Rifle Association is
not in the money they spend, but rather on the voters they rally to their
side. He’s not wrong on that. Yes, the NRA give millions to the paid
political whores that are in or aspire to be in elected positions of power and
influence, but their money is no different than those of the Teamsters or the
Chamber of Commerce or the various millionaire and billionaire financiers that
give money to both of the dominant political parties that have run America into
the ground.
But while elections cannot be won without money, they also cannot
be won outright through money. We still
pretend that elections are the “will of the people”, so you need actual votes,
and thus you need actual voters that actually show up at the polling place and
actually vote. This is something that
progressives and liberals have recently failed to factor in. They can get all the endorsements they want,
they can register all the people they want, they can spend all the money they
want, but it will mean absolutely nothing if they can’t get enough people to
the ballot box and actually vote.
This is what the NRA does.
They don’t just provide money.
They provide voters. They know
that they can count on millions of NRA members and supporters to show up at the
ballot box to vote however the NRA tells them to vote. And not just “sometime”. Not just on “certain” elections. Every time.
In every election. In every
campaign. From town dog-catcher to the
President of the United States, the NRA decides which candidate they should
tell their loyal members and supporters to vote for. There is not a year that goes by in America
that does not have an election for some office at some time at some level, and
groups like the NRA make sure that no office gets ignored.
This is important to know, people. And it’s not just the NRA doing this. Religious groups do this. Business groups do this. Parents groups do this. The lobbying groups certainly do this. And they do it every year, in every election
that they can reach.
So someone shoots up a school full of kids in Florida and
now the survivors of that shooting are pissed and they are demanding
change. But they can’t vote yet. And the parents of those survivors are pissed
and they are demanding change. And their
friends are demanding change. And the
survivors and friends of survivors of all past school shootings and all past
domestic terrorist acts are pissed and they are demanding change.
That’s good. It’s
good that these people are taking action instead of just accepting those empty
“thoughts and prayers” that keep getting offered in lieu of action.
But how long can you stay pissed? Can you stay pissed long enough to make it to
November for the 2018 mid-term scam? Can
you keep being pissed for the off-off-election in 2019? If you can’t even make it to November, how
the hell can you counter groups like the NRA, who are able to bring their
committed voters to every election, every year?
Anger is a temporary emotion. You can only be angry for a short period of
time. You get angry, and then time
passes, and the anger lessens, and then you move on to other things. Groups like the NRA know this. They know that no matter how pissed other
people are about what they do and what they represent, that emotion is
fleeting. Pissed-off students go on with
their studies and they graduate from school and they forget. Pissed-off parents go about their daily lives
and they forget.
Why people stay with the NRA and with other political
groups, no matter how extreme the position of that group, has nothing to do
with anger. The true secret behind their
power has to do with something far more lasting and far more perpetuating.
They have power because of fear.
Anger is fleeting, but fear is eternal. Fear stays with people. Fear overrides rational thought. Fear paralyzes people.
The NRA have power because they have continually gotten
their supporters to live in fear that the government is going to take away
their guns, their means to defend themselves.
Not just some guns. Not just the
most dangerous of guns. Not just the
guns of certain groups or certain individuals.
All guns. Every gun. From everyone… except, of course, from the
government.
And it doesn’t matter which party is in power; those members
and supporters will continually believe that “the government” will take away
their guns. Not just “can” or “might”,
but “will”. They can have a
die-in-the-wool card-carrying eternal lifetime member of the NRA in office, and
that group will still tell their followers that “the government” is coming to
take away their guns, and they will believe it with every fiber of their being.
That is the secret behind the National Rifle
Association. They keep their supporters
on their side through fear and fear-mongering.
They have brainwashed their supporters into believing that any measure,
no matter how slight, no matter how “reasonable”, to limit any access to guns
is an invitation to take all the guns away.
Imagine what it would be like if that cult-like devotion to
the Second Amendment could be applied to all other Amendments. If that same passion could be applied to the
First Amendment, to the Fourth Amendment, to the Fifth, even the Fourteenth Amendment,
we’d have a different nation than we do today.
But we don’t, and we really can’t. And the reason why we can’t is because the NRA
are not the only ones that keep their followers in continual fear.
Religious groups have spread this continual fear that
Atheists, Satanists, and Muslims – which, I kid you not, they actually lump
into one group because they cannot see they are diametrically opposing beliefs
– are coming for “your God”, just like “the government” is supposedly coming
for “your guns”. Anti-abortion groups
continually keep their supporters in fear that “the government” is coming for
“your babies”. The Chamber of Commerce
keeps businesses in cult-like fear that unions and “the government” are coming
for “your money”. The fear is always there,
the threat of “the government” is coming “for you”, unless you do what these
groups tell you to do and that you support these groups without question at
every election.
And tying all these groups together, the conservative
political faction in America are certainly the masters of fear-mongering and
controlling people through fear.
It doesn’t matter the specific party; conservatives have
wielded fear like a barbarian cudgel. In
the 1950’s and 60’s, it was the fear of communism. In the 1980’s and 90’s, it was the fear of
drugs and drug lords. And especially
after September of 2001, the conservatives have kept America living in
continual fear of terrorism.
There is always an enemy for conservatives to use; some
force that is seen as more powerful than they really are, trumped up to be more
than just a physical threat, but an existential threat. “The enemy”, they assert, is coming not just
for “your guns” or “your children” or “your money”, but your very lives and the
very country that we claim to cherish.
America was driven into endless war around the world based
on that fear. We are still in a war in
Afghanistan and in Iraq because of that fear.
And we could possibly go to a nuclear war with North Korea because of
fear, which could then mushroom – no pun intended – into conflict with China
and possibly Russia.
And it’s not just fear from outside forces, but fear from
those inside this country as well.
Our current President of the United States, Donald J. Trump,
got into office because of that fear.
Trump capitalized on that fear of “outsiders” in this country. Illegals.
“Dreamers”. Immigrants. They’re all “coming for you”, right? Fear of Muslims, fear of Mexicans, fear of
China, fear of North Korea; it doesn’t matter the nationality or belief as long
as it can be used to get the masses to Trump’s side.
And his solution, as well as those of the conservative
faction, is painfully simplistic: aggression.
Force. Guns. Isolationism.
It’s a primal response to the primal emotion of fear. Fight or flight, or, in this case, both. Don’t worry about the details: let “them”
sweat those out. Just let “them” do it
without question and we’ll be “safe”.
Let’s get brutally honest here… the reason why nothing will
seemingly be done about anything involving politics is because we in America
have been led around by our fears, and because the conservative factions in
politics have come far too accustomed to using that fear to lord over us.
Of course I would be remiss if I do not point out that the
liberals have their brief fear-mongering episodes as well. The elderly and the poor are petrified that
what little they already get from Social Security and other social services
will be taken away from them. The
problem is that those fears are far from being unwarranted or irrational. Those things really are happening, thanks in
no small part to the conservatives.
Because they learned that they could get those groups to be afraid of
something else.
No, the government is not going after your guns, your God,
or your children. But no amount of
rationalization will convince the conservative masses to believe otherwise
because they have been that far conditioned.
Fear keeps them in line, and all so they will vote according to the
dictates of their fear-mongers.
As someone who considers himself a practical libertarian, as
well as someone who cherishes freedom, this is a subject where I differ sharply
from the conservatives. Fear is the
natural enemy of freedom. Fear irrationally
eliminates options
from the mind of the individual, forcing them to believe that the only real
options are both few and poor. Fear
prevents the implementation of both positive and negative
consequence of certain choices, especially when it comes to dishing out
justice for bad choices. And fear certainly subjugates the
individual, turning them into an emotional slave to what they are afraid of
and to whomever is wielding that fear.
Every cult – both religious and otherwise – use fear to keep
their people in line, especially when their leaders begin abusing the trust and
power they are given. Look at Jim Jones
and David Koresh. They used fear to keep
the faithful in line right until their grizzly deaths. And the more outlandish their perversion,
such as forcing themselves on women, the more they ratcheted up the fear. They were no different in mindset or motive
than the modern-day fear-mongers who use fear to keep us in endless wars, keep
us subjected to endless restrictions, and keep us bound to one dominant and
overbearing political party over any other option.
Fear keeps battered spouses staying with their abusers. It keeps harassment victims from reporting
their predators. It keeps people from
moving on or improving their lots in life.
And it gives politicians power over us that they should never have. And as long as we keep living in their
generated fear, not only will things remain the same, but things will only
continue to get worse for us all.
