What the Protests tell us about Our Society

 

The protests at the capital on Wednesday tell us a lot about who and what we are, perhaps even more so when reactions are compared with previous protests in support of other causes.  I have several comments about that, but first, let’s review the basic facts.

               The Facts

• The 2020 presidential election was fraught with irregularities.  Many believe that there was widespread fraud and that the fraud resulted in a theft of the election.  Court cases have been filed, most dismissed or otherwise closed.  The Constitution allows Congresspeople to object to Elector votes when they are opened and counted.  That is a part of our democratic process and it was begun on this morning of Jan. 6.

• Also on the morning of Jan. 6, President Trump held a typically bombastic rally in the capital in support of the Congressional objections.  He promoted the exercise of legal protest and free speech rights, but at no time did he advocate violence.

• The Capitol police were on duty and the National Guard was called in.

• In the early afternoon some protestors violently stormed Congress resulting in a stoppage of Congressional processes, gunfire, and the alleged law enforcement shooting and subsequent death of a 14-year military veteran and Trump supporter.

• Calls for peace came from Trump and other Republican leaders and from Biden and Democrat leaders.

• By early evening the violence and protests had subsided, and Congress reconvened shortly after 8 pm.

Democracy, Protests, and Violence

• Peaceful protests are a part of free speech and are necessary to maintain a democracy such as ours.  As such, protests with reasonable and necessary restrictions are a Constitutional right.  Democracy, because it not only allows but encourages diverse views, can often be messy, and uncomfortable protests are a part of that messiness.

• There is no right to violent protests and indeed they violate our rule of law.  Yet, violence seems of late to have become a regular part of protests regardless of which party or cause they support. 

• This violence should tell us that something is drastically wrong in our society.  The assault on our legislative body should shock and appall all Americans.  It should also indicate to us that there are some people in this country who feel so frustrated and unheard that, like a child acting out for attention, they resort to violence.

• We should also note that the calls for holding President Trump or any other leader responsible for this violence are ridiculous.  The people who commit these heinous acts were not forced into battle; they made the choice to violate our laws and storm the capital.  They are the ones who should be held accountable for their actions today, just as anyone who commits such violent acts should be held accountable regardless of the cause for which they are protesting.

          The Reactions and the Hypocrisy

• The reactions to today’s events should concern us perhaps more than the acts themselves.  Hypocrisy was on full display and with it evidence of the deep divide in our country.

• Some complained that the violence was due to the objections to the election.  To be clear, the objections today were legal and the Democrats objected on this same date in 2005 and 2017; the difference is that the Press applauded the Democrat objections while condemning those of the Republicans.

• Trump had every right to hold a rally and people had every right to attend and to protest events at Congress.  Peacefully.  But those people who turned to violence chose that act, just as does any protestor.  Blame does not lie with Trump here just as in the case of BLM protests it does not lie with alleged systemic racism.  It is the protestor who commits the violence and should be held accountable.  But, in this protest full Trump Derangement Syndrome was on display as people not only blamed him (isn’t everything bad Trump’s fault in the eyes of the Left?), we also heard cries for invoking the 25^th Amendment, instant impeachment, and other similar calls up to and including death.

• Although Trump made several calls for peace via Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, etc., many refused to believe that he meant these calls (not unlike when Leslie Stahl finally acknowledged that Trump had indeed condemned White Supremacy, but then said that he had not said it in a way she liked so essentially it didn’t count).  Twitter censored some of Trump’s tweets because they did not approve of his verbiage.  Facebook put warnings on them.  And most on the Left denied he ever called for peace.

• Similarly, many asserted that Trump, in his rally, called for the violence.   Read the transcript – he did not.  But in typical Trump Derangement, those who hate Trump hear what they want to hear, not what was actually said.

• While the Democrats complained about Trump’s lack of call to peace or accused him of incitement to the protests, they ignored the fact that for the past 4 years any number of Democrats have called for violence against Trump and his supporters.  When violent protests occurred in support of Democrat causes there was no denouncement or even acknowledgement of the violence.  One cannot miss the hypocrisy in President-Elect Biden’s speech today calling for peace, when he was never willing to denounce Antifa or BLM violence.

• Some people were wounded today.  One protestor was shot and killed.  At least one person I know expressed delight that a Trump protestor was shot.   While protestors who enter into a violent situation should understand the risk to themselves, that risk should be the same regardless of what it is that they are fighting for.  I can only imagine what would be going on right now if this had been a BLM or similar protest and the woman shot had been a Black protestor and member of BLM.  Not only would the death be Trump’s fault, we would have riots against the death, against the police, calls for defunding, and probably more riots.

        Commentary

Let’s be clear, violent protests are always un-American regardless of whom or what they support.  Similarly, our legal and Constitutional processes are always proper and American regardless of whether or not one agrees with what is being advocated within those processes.  The problem is that far too large a number of our populace believe that violence is perfectly fine if it brings about what they want, and also believe those who would advocate for things with which they don’t agree should be silenced and denied access to legal and democratic processes.

Another problem is that violent protest is often rewarded.  During this past year we saw many Leftist protests lauded by the Press and Democrat leaders; Democrats bailed out protesters who had been arrested for violent acts; Commissions or similar were put together to give the protesters what might appease them.  This is like giving a child what she wants when she throws a temper tantrum: it only encourages more tantrums.  In this country we have legal processes and people need to understand that it is through those processes that we work to get what we want.

The hypocrisy we see exhibited in the reactions today compared with reactions to violence when it supports Leftist views does not belong in, nor does it support, a democracy.  Rather, it supports an authoritative form of government in which those in power decide what you must do, think, and believe.  If you act if favor of those views you are applauded, regardless of your acts, while supporting something else will always be condemned.  Unless and until the American people recall that in this democracy we tolerate differing and opposing views, our American democracy is in dire peril. 

What the above tells us is that we are in deep trouble in this country.  We must learn to solve our differences without violence.  But before we get to that point we need to learn about our Constitution.  We need to understand its history.  We need to understand how and why it is instrumental in making America the great country it is and in protecting our freedoms that are so dear to us.  

The Constitution gives us a common language and understanding.  It provides the basis for our rule of law.  Without it and an understanding of it we are bound for chaos and our democracy will become nothing more than a fading memory.