I know--we're running past Diogenes posts the way
broadcast TV used to do summer reruns. Just hang on a bit longer,
please, and enjoy these if you missed them first time.
Today's title is the favorite saying of a former workmate. It's harsh, but there are some cases in which it seems apt.
To wit: People who blindly follow Donald Trump.
Near the top of the long list of things I do not understand is why
anyone would follow Trump for any reason. I think they actually don't
follow, because he has proven himself not to be a leader. Perhaps a
better word would be adherents: they are drawn to him unconsciously, and
just sort of clump around him.
Having thought about this for a while I've decided Trump's human conglomeration can be divided into four groups, as follows:
Toadies and minions
These are people who are in some way beholden to the unpresident or feel
a strong attraction to him. The group includes his staff, the Cabinet,
associate Supreme Court justices Neil Gorsuch and Brett Kavanaugh, and
probably most Congressional Republicans.
For many politicians, bureaucrats, and functionaries, D. C. is Nirvana,
the Promised Land, and El Dorado. Most of them are power junkies who
prize being near the center of power above all. The closer they can bind
themselves to the chief executive, the more power adheres to them. Many
of this group don't care who the president is. All they want is to keep
hanging on to a job that keeps them near the Omphalos of government,
and they will do anything the incumbent asks of them to stay in it.
The Party Faithful
There is some overlap between this group and the toadies and minions,
but it isn't huge. By and large these people have been staunch
Republicans all their lives, and are likely the children of Republicans.
A good number of them have been in office far too long. They still
wistfully refer to the Grand Old Party, but deep down they know the
Republican Party is broken. The president is nominally Republican, but
they can't go to him to fix it, because they now know he's the one who
broke it. Nonetheless, when November 3 rolls around they will hold their
noses and vote for him, because, by God, they're Republicans, and they
vote for Republicans, period.
The Mob
I don't know if The Mob is the largest of these four groups, but they
are the ones who are most visible and make the most noise. I equate them
with British yobs, who can turn any soccer match into a bar brawl.
They're not political. They come out for the action, to confront
protesters and/or cops, to strut around shirtless waving Trump flags, to
pointedly defy rules (e.g. wearing masks), and to shout slogans about
foreigners and minorities. If they have a goal it is to show the
Dumbass-in-Chief that they are men, too, and they identify with his
anger and his displeasure with anyone who doesn't agree with him or
isn't like him. (I'm sorry for all the masculine pronouns, but this
group is testosterone fueled.)
The Fringe
This is the group I was thinking of when I decided on the title. The
fringe is the group that gets their news from social media and takes as
Gospel anything uttered by their ultra-right authority figure du jour, be it the Idiot Child-in-Chief, Archdemon Mitch McConnell, the faceless Q of Qanon, Sean Hannity, or their foreman at work.
They propagate and embroider conspiracy theories with such outrageous
premises that any reasonable (not to say sane) person would reject them
out of hand. Yet they hold to these beliefs like religion because
someone they believe to be in authority said it was so. It's easy to
dismiss them as gullible fools and paranoiacs, but we would do so at our
peril.
Because these people so desperately need something to follow or to
believe in, they will believe virtually anything. They become easy to
manipulate, and the darker corners of the Web where they like to hang
out are perfect places to recruit and persuade them to a cause. If all
this sounds just too "out there," I recommend this:
https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2020/06/qanon-nothing-can-stop-what-is-coming/610567/
Don't read it before bed.
--- Diogenes, 8/13/2020 Reposted 10/14/2020
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