by Greg Sargent in the WaPost
More broadly, we’re also seeing a re-centering of Trump as the primary victim in U.S. public life in other areas. Republican officials have launched efforts to make voting harder across the country, which they are justifying in part by claiming they will restore confidence in our elections among people who believe the election was stolen from Trump.
In short, the falsehood that the election constituted a hideous injustice done to Trump, and the fact that a lot of Republican voters believe it to be true, is becoming the rationale for more voter suppression and redoubled counter-majoritarian tactics — even though Trump and Republicans themselves spent months feeding this lie to them.
On top of that, Republican lawmakers who held Trump accountable for inciting the violent insurrection are getting censured everywhere, mainly by other Republicans who are demanding absolute fealty to the mythology that Trump remains the victim of that monstrous injustice.
It’s true that Trump’s exit creates a dilemma for the media. But it’s not the one Cruz has identified. It’s whether the media should continue giving a platform to Republicans who continue to traffic in the constellation of fictions that are organized around this central myth of Trump victimization.
As Sean Illing reports, some theorists have shown that merely allowing rank disinformation to seep into the media discussion actually undermines the possibility of consensus, allowing its purveyors to exploit the good-faith instinct toward openness to a full range of ideas toward unprincipled ends.
Press critic Jay Rosen has suggested that the media must seek to “decenter” Trump. If so, it may require the marginalization of that broader victimization mythology as well.
No comments:
Post a Comment