Just because Republicans choose unreality doesn’t mean the media should ignore the facts of January 6.
On January 6, 2021, I watched CNN as thousands of Donald Trump supporters stormed the US Capitol. As someone well-versed in watching tragedy on television, I was struck by just how indisputable the facts were at the time: violent, red-hat-clad MAGA rioters, followed by Republicans in Congress, tried to stop democracy in its tracks. Trump had told his followers that the protest in Washington, DC, “will be wild,” and in the assault that followed his speech, some rioters smeared feces on the walls of the Capitol. Hundreds of them have since been convicted on charges ranging from assault on federal officers to seditious conspiracy. These are stubborn facts, the kind that do not care about your feelings. These facts include the inalienable truth that Trump is the first president in American history to reject the peaceful transfer of power.
It never occurred to me that these facts could somehow be perverted by partisanship. But three years later, we are seeing just that, as Republicans cling to the lie that the 2020 election was “stolen” by Joe Biden and are poised to make Trump their 2024 nominee. And perhaps even more dangerous than the GOP ditching reality is the news media’s inability to cover Trumpism as the threat to democracy that it very much is.
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But the problem is, when all you have is conventional political framing, everything looks like politics as usual. One candidate makes a claim; the other disputes it. Two sides are divided, etc. This framing only works if both parties operate within the frameworks of a shared reality. But Trumpism doesn’t allow for the reality the rest of us inhabit. Trump’s supporters believe their leader’s reality and not, say, the reality the rest of us see with our eyes. As Trump once told a crowd: “Don’t believe the crap you see from these people, the fake news. What you’re seeing and what you’re reading is not what’s happening.”
Journalists may be well-intentioned in trying to be “objective,” or they’re simply afraid of being labeled partisan. Either way, coverage of January 6 that gives equal weight to both sides—one based in reality, one not—is helping pave the road for authoritarianism.
You were the one saying first about the orangeoutan, wining, that is why I asked you that?
I don’t support Trump.
Then you are downplaying by inferring that the republicans aren’t as warmongers as the democrats.
I never said that.
Lol, you think that saying war is downplaying?
If you’re saying it because you refuse to call the genocide you live to support a genocide because Biden supports it, YES.
I mean you only compared centrists and democrats
I didn’t mention Democrats apart from genocidal centrists’ torchbearer Biden. I resent having all opposition to genocide immediately framed in bad faith as support for Trump by people who won’t even call it a genocide.
It’s like watching Republicans call January 6 a “protest.”
Sure bud, a centrist, that doesn’t complain about the conservatives. Sure bud.
Also republicans, remember, rhr have a house mayority, and can easily avoid the “evil” democrats that you complain about.
I asked you a question which so far you still haven’t answered, and i am still waiting to see in my fist comment where I stated that you were a orangeoutan supporter. But yet you claimed that I supported genocide… but sure bud, to which I never did, and ye mt you still claim… irony or hypocrisy, which ine is it?
Sure bud, a centrist, that doesn’t complain about the conservatives. Sure bud.
Also republicans, remember, rhr have a house mayority, and can easily avoid the “evil” democrats that you complain about.
I asked you a question which so far you still haven’t answered, and i am still waiting to see in my fist comment where I stated that you were a orangeoutan supporter. But yet you claimed that I supported genocide… but sure bud, to which I never did, and ye mt you still claim… irony or hypocrisy, which ine is it?
I’ve answered your question multiple times. You’ve ignored it every time.
You have done nothing but hurl baseless accusations and insults while refusing to condemn or even acknowledge that genocide is happening and that the US is supporting it. You keep downplaying it and calling it “war” like some January 6 apologist calling it a “protest.”
For the final time: I am not a Republican. I do not support Trump.
I asked you to stop polluting my inbox with your genocide apologia.
He was doing thr ad hominem, how comes that I got the message deleted and not him?
And yet my point still stands, do you think the republicans would do better?
Of course not. Let me make this clear: Just because I don’t like that Biden is supporting genocide, that doesn’t mean I support Republicans or think they would be less bad on genocide than Biden has been. I’ve said this multiple times and you’ve ignored it every last time.
Democrats should stop supporting genocide.
i can assume that you are a conservative or a russian bot, who won’t say a bad thing about republicans or the orangeoutan.
You started with that assumption because I’m critical of Biden’s support for Netanyahu’s genocide. Don’t pollute my inbox again with your disgusting genocide apologia.
