I've been an activist for 15 years. I've been to protests both big and small. And so when I watched what happened on January 6, I thought about the following.
First, most protests contain a diversity of people. I've seen both Catholic peace activists and anarchists at the same protests. At a celebration of May Day I've seen members of the Party for Socialism and Liberation (PSL) and those from Antifa before Antifa became (in)famous. The people from PSL have been, in my experiences, peaceful protesters. And I've seen more diversity at protests than I want to list here. So when I saw what was happening at the Capitol on January 6 and was corresponding with a friend about it, I was reminded of my past experiences.
Not all who marched on the Capitol went into the Capitol. So we should resist the temptation of regarding all who attended the protest at the Capitol as being the same. And my experiences tell me that neither all who stayed outside during the protest were the same, nor were those who entered the Capitol were the same.
I can understand why many who entered the Capitol did so because of the excitement of the moment. Some simply walked and toured the Capitol. Many tried to push their way past the police. Some did juvenile vandalism while others caused serious destruction. Some threatened people while others attacked people and some did both. And the intent of some was to enable a coup.
For many who invaded the Capitol, what they were doing was participating in a riot. And as seriously wrong as that is, we need to remember what Martin Luther King Jr. said about the riots in the 1960s. He both condemned the violence and destruction in them as well as told us to consider this point: 'a riot is the language of the unheard.' And because of the court decisions that dismissed the evidence those protesters firmly believed in, they felt unheard. But part of that is their fault. For regarding the evidence they believed in, many of them equated hearing their evidence with accepting it as well as relied on faulty sources.
We should also add to their grievances is the existence of the swamp of Big Tech, Mainstream Media, the Democrats, and some Republicans. Actually, while Trump portrayed himself as anti-establishment, his policies primarily helped the establishment more than any other group. And we should note that there are multiple swamps, not just one. And that what the violence of January 6 could not bring, money already has in that it has already greatly corrupted our democracy (click here).
At this point, some might think that I am excusing or even justifying the behavior of those who participated in the protest outside and inside of the Capitol. I am not. I am still very much frightened by the lack of self-restraint that those who invaded the Capitol showed. But at the same time, I am aware that our responses to traumas, and watching the invasion was traumatic, tend to exhibit a simplistic way of thinking that show more impatience and fear than any careful weighing of the events would cause.
Nor am I minimizing the various crimes committed on that day. It is enraging to see people so disregard the laws that protect our democracy and election rights. The election is clear, Biden won. But none of those protesters accepted that verdict. And perhaps that is because of how the political tribalism and authoritarianism in this nation have caused some groups to morph into cults. For many of those protesters are members of one of the several cults that support Donald Trump.
What happened on January 6 inside the Capitol building included acts of terrorism. Thus, it is not surprising that some have compared the January 6 insurrection with 9/11. Here it might help to read what Jason Burke, a U.K. journalist, wrote about the terrorists of 9/11.
When addressing why those terrorists participated in those atrocities, Burke stated that deciding to participate in those atrocities was not a decision to make. Rather, their decisions to attack on 9/11 was both made over time and due to a resignation to the belief that there were no political avenues in which they could have their significant grievances adequately addressed. Again, here, the courts were the Obi-Wan Kenobis of those who believed that the election was stolen from Trump. Nevermind that Trump set the stage for such disenfranchisement in both his 2016 and 2020 campaigns when he claimed that the only way he could lose was through a rigged election. Add to that the multiple cults that have been supporting him, and it is easy to see how invasion of the Capitol and possibly future terrorist attacks are seen as the last resort.
How should we respond? We could respond with the same animus, thinking, and frustration that drove the insurrectionists of January 6 over the edge. We could employ lazy, black-white thinking in categorizing all of the protesters, including those who illegally entered the Capitol, as being evil people. If only anger rules our response, then we will imitate those who regard us as their enemies.
But what if we also tried to understand what and why those protesters did and said? Doing so does not imply that we are not enraged at their actions. We should be furious because many of those protesters who entered the Capitol were trying to silence our votes and replace our democracy with an autocratic personality cult leader.
But we should note the following. By asserting that they alone were the representatives of America and patriotism, they assigned themselves to a role that many dictators have followed. For the Tsars in Russia believed that they were sole representatives of Russia. Thus, how one responded to the Tsars was seen as how one responded to the Russian nation and people people. Similarly, the Bolsheviks did the same with the proletariat. Both groups became brutal dictators in Russia.
In allowing both anger and understanding to govern our response to Trump's insurrectionists, we find that we need to challenge the various cults supporting Donald Trump, cults that firmly believe that the election was stolen. We need to address why they feel ignored by the government as well as sending many of them to prison to protect the general population from their ambition, their lack of self-restraint, and, from some, their cruelty. We can do that by explaining why the courts rejected the evidence and arguments that seemed to them to be conclusive proof that the election was rigged. For by helping some to understand why the courts rejected their evidence, it might help them to realize that they were, in part, listened to by the government and political system. It might help them to realize that they were overly dependent on the wrong sources of information. It might help them question their cult-like allegiance to self-proclaimed authority figures.
If all we do is to respond to these insurrectionists and terrorists with anger, then we will be playing the same game that they play and engage in the same overly simplistic, emotionally driving thinking they employ. And doing so might add to their numbers.
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