Abuse Without Responsibility
By now, everyone has heard and/or viewed the “60 Minutes” interview with Cult45. True to form, he began by demanding softball questions and then proceeded to lie his way through the process. Once it was clear that nobody was accepting either his lies or his bluster, he ran away, and hid behind his press secretary. The theme of this presidency has been a whirlwind of Cult45 demanding that people be impressed with him, and his pitching fits when people are indifferent. The truth is this: he willingly chose to run for office. No one made him, and he had plenty of opportunity to disengage. Many abuse survivors have been chastised, even by intimate circles, for being abused and putting themselves in such a position. It is high time that we as a society accept that abusers made choices, too, and they are responsible for the consequences of those choices.
Too many in leadership demand absolution of the responsibilities that they chose to assume, and they would rather spend a lot of time and money getting studies to prove that the cause was anything other than their actions. When people assume power and choose not to hurt others, they deserve to be seen as reasonable and kind. Those who choose to hurt others under their control — while demanding positive imagery — become monsters. Other than deflecting blame, people in power have no excuse for traumatizing anybody. Nobody ever said that certain people could do whatever they wanted, and that it was the responsibility of everyone else to account for the fallout. Only irresponsible people believe that kind of behavior is acceptable. When a leader accepted the role as a leader, that leader further accepted the responsibilities included with leadership, without exception.
All of the crises of this year have demonstrated one thing: much of the political infrastructure that existed was working exactly as the people in power decreed it should. Those with money have been able to enjoy an existence where others serve them, and everyone else has been commanded to serve. If a group of people create the infrastructure for unethical and immoral inequality and maintain it, those people are not entitled to then plausibly deny responsibility for creating these circumstances. No one ever asked for the creation of the Electoral College, and plenty of people have requested its abolition. No one asked for politicians to maintain lifetime appointments, and plenty of people have requested term limits. How convenient it is that the only people capable of determining term limits and the Electoral College are the people whose terms would be limited, and too many of them have committed to nothing but power.
What is more galling than anything else this year is how repulsively everyone has continued to blame and shame the most vulnerable, and to worship voting as if that was the only thing people with privilege could do. Black and brown people have died more, gone bankrupt more extensively, and lost more businesses and nonprofits than anyone else in the United States this year — and we are still being blamed and commanded to internalize our own oppression. More than half of the White voting population lied when questioned by pollsters in the 2016 election, and our oppression is still our fault. The richest people in the country are all White men, and we are still being blamed for being broke. During a rise in homelessness, more White people own property than any other demographic, and are laughing at Black and brown people for not owning property. The downtrodden literally have nothing left to give, and the privileged are still lurking over them with a smirk and an outstretched hand.
People like to mock the exploited by telling them that nobody forced them to endure those circumstances. Almost nobody is looking at exploiters who demand to be seen as blameless. Exploited people have no sympathy for this behavior because most of us are forced to accept responsibility for the mistakes we make. We are not entitled to buy large volumes of real estate, and then whine about tax incentives because we leveraged too much debt or excuse ourselves from the responsibility of raising the cost of living. No one forced large companies to eat up all the smaller businesses, so they are not excused from their rolls in the excessive job losses throughout the nation. Moreover, no one works to respect our image when we are considered flawed, such as being homeless or unemployed.
By the way, too many Democrats are obsessed with the impression that the only responsibility they have includes being Democrats. Let me be clear: if you own property that you kept demanding payment for during a recession and pandemic, you became a monster, too. If you refused to put pressure on investment companies and billionaires to hire and/or pay staff during a recession and pandemic, you became a monster, too. If you do nothing to support the creation of more than two parties, thereby ensuring that gerrymandering will continue, everyone should see you as a monster, too. Most importantly, if you refused to use your platform to do anything other than promote yourself when you have the attention of the people, you became a monster, too. Not being someone else is not enough of a qualification to remain in power when you refuse to accept that you are part of the mess.
No one is entitled to constantly make a mess and be seen as a victim, instead of being viewed as a dangerous individual with poor impulse control. That is akin to looking at domestic violence survivors and saying, “Don’t hate the player, hate the game.” Real meritocracies would have a variety of people in charge because not everyone has the propensity to lead with an eye for the socioecosystem. Long-term problems require those in power, especially unearned power, to make extraordinary efforts to amend the harm caused to all. It is no longer morally acceptable to demand that other people give up their lives in order to validate lifestyles to which others have become accustomed.
