In the aftermath of the election, many are stunned and attempting to understand what happened. There is this common suggestion that we are surprised because we have been misled by our choice of media.
I cannot buy this explanation. I am not naive and understand that events are spun in different ways by different media outlets. However, this spin is still applied to something. The interesting thing about our digital capabilities is that we often have plenty of data to interpret. We can allow others to interpret these data for us, but typically we still have the data to interpret for ourselves.
Given I assume everyone had access to the same data I read, heard, or viewed (the tweets, debates and speeches, recorded behavior) and I assume others have the ability to think for themselves in evaluating these inputs despite whatever we were told about this content, I cannot understand how any thinking that followed could have resulted in the voting behavior that is now a matter of record.
My assumptions in interpreting Trump behavior:
- If you reject the science of climate change, I would normally assume you are ignorant. If I doubt you are that ignorant, I conclude you are manipulative for personal gain.
- If you say and do the things you claim to do to women, I conclude you are a pervert.
- If your comments frequently focus on the physical characteristics of women, I conclude you are shallow and a sexist.
- If you assume a US judge will treat you unfairly because of the location of the origin of his ancestors, I assume you are racist.
- If you assume that those entering the US through Mexico are frequently rapists and criminals, I assume you are either misinformed or a racist.
- If you assume the US is consistently taken advantage of by other nations without considering the behavior of the US by similar standards, you lack a realistic understanding of the historical behavior of the country you think you can lead.
- If you blame the behavior of protestors on the inflammatory rhetoric of a biased media and fail to acknowledge your own tweets following the re-election of President Obama, you either have a failing memory or are a hypocrite.
There now seems to be an effort to normalize the speech and behavior of candidate Trump. To explain that what was said was campaign rhetoric and I should now not accept this speech at face value is bewildering. (I assume this does not include the video of Trump boasting about the ways in which he has taken advantage of women.) Just what is this supposed to mean. If an unknown is trying to convince me of his suitability as the POTUS, all I have to go on is what I can see of his behavior and his speech. So, the racism, sexism, anti-globalism, and misogyny was some weird form of campaign rhetoric? How was I to know this was not behavior I could use to interpret in order to assess the candidate’s personal values and character?
If you are a parent, what have you said about what your children have seen? If you are a teacher, what have you said to your students? Don’t mind him, that was campaign rhetoric. Did you tell them Trump not really mean it when he said that a woman ate like a pig or that he was able to grab them as he said he did? Did you tell them that those from Mexico are not really rapists like candidate Trump claimed? Did you leave them struggling to interpret Mr Trump’s behavior on their own? Did you allow them to accept such speech as acceptable and the statements made as accurate?
I can’t agree with “explanations” for this behavior. I think what you say is what you get.