'Fear Inoculum'

The stupidity that took hold of much of the United States on November 5th was decades in the making.

The dumbing down of our electorate, including much of suburban and rural red state America, was a long and carefully crafted process.

It was spearheaded by Rupert Murdoch on behalf of billionaires and bad actors across the globe.

Weakening our democracy for their own tactical and financial gains.

A litany of Bond villain-types obviously enabled and assisted him along the way; everyone from Jeffrey Epstein to Elon Musk played a hand in what occurred in our recent election.

They used the fear that many of our citizens are fed daily through chyrons and crypto bros against them; like a Judo master would use an opponent’s own weight to pin them to the mat.

Murdoch didn’t just pump poison into the minds of MAGA America through the ‘alternative facts’ of Fox News - which is and will continue to be ubiquitous on U.S. military bases and red state airports, doctor’s offices and hotel bars.

Rupert knew exactly the demographic he was after but understood one must first infiltrate and influence the culture to achieve the ultimate goal. He set out to do this over decades, not just in news media but in his acquisition of television and movie studios to pump content into the hearts and minds of Americans.

Much of that programming involved crime shows often involving white women as the victim du jour at the top of the show. Usually found scantily clad poolside or in a hotel room, the victims of sexualized violence appear as an objectification of the specifically tailored type of fear for sale in America.

The pithy comments that usually flow from the mouth of the detective on duty as he stands over a beautiful young woman, while his snarky sidekick chimes in with some retort about the ‘monster that did this’, reminds us that law and order are the antidote to fear or the aggressions of ‘the other’.

Trump would often reference sexualized violence and graphically describe it being perpetrated onto a ‘beautiful young woman or girl’ at his MAGA rallies.

It seemed to be one of his obsessions but it had its purpose.

It was programing in line with Murdoch’s carefully cultivated objective, the content deemed most effective to achieve their goals and those whose interests they serve.

We consume an awful lot of fictionalized crime-based violence in our entertainment universe - and 20th Century Fox and Fox Entertainment Group produce a sizable portion of it.

One cannot help but wonder if it all calcifies in the minds of voters and influences their political choices.

Especially when the layers of fear have been built up to respond to very specific and targeted stimulation.

It makes people more willing to believe a man like Trump will protect them with his fake tough guy act and his flags and followers. My hunch is that it does indeed make a difference, a big one.

Murdoch has known this for a long time and the garden he has dutifully seeded has borne fruit.

There’s an old Arabic quote that I heard from Anthony De Mello, it states: ‘The nature of the rain is the same, but it makes thorns grow in the marshes and flowers in the garden’.

Much of our current media brings this adage to mind.

A cult built around the illusion of the patriarchal white man as savior (in this case a rather orange man of course and wearing shoe-lifts, a girdle, a dead ferret on his head and a half a gallon of deck sealant slathered on his face but I digress).

It is perhaps no accident that Trump’s message of migrant criminals descending upon America’s cities and suburbs resonated with even more suburban white women than it did in 2016.

Much of what they consumed and ALL of his rhetoric was designed to address and inflate their irrational fears.

Even the absurd and outlandish claims of Haitian migrants ‘eating cats and dogs’ found a home in many of the minds Trump targeted.

There are obviously legions of smart, educated Democratic white women voters who stood up to Donald Trump and voted for Harris/Walz but the fact that any of my fellow Americans still voted for him will never not be staggering to me.

Especially when you consider the GOP’s attacks on women’s healthcare and SCOTUS’ Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health decision which essentially overturned Roe v. Wade and sent a good portion of this country back into the dark ages concerning reproductive health care.

As shameful and as abhorrent as I have seen in my lifetime.

It will also sadly be the most impactful on the lives of both women and men and should have been at the core of anyone’s decision in this election.

I would often hear young men being interviewed as ‘undecided voters’ in the lead up to election day and when they cited the economy as their ‘main issue’ my heart would sink a bit.

Their main issue should have been standing up for women’s health care and protecting the equality of their mother’s, sisters, girlfriends and partners.

Have they been desensitized to the suffering of women by a lifetime of watching them suffer or serve as crime props and objects of desire on T.V., for most of their years, not to mention social media and the influence of the far-right manosphere in shaping their adolescent mindsets.

Toxic masculinity seemed to reach its zenith during this campaign and the brofluencers did more than their share to deliver Trump his victory.

Young men should have viewed the threat against the women in their lives as a bigger threat than any vague notion that ‘Trump was better on the economy’ which is one of the most successful lies ever told a people.

It was also one based in fear, as the Dems have been portrayed consistently by the GOP as somehow ‘weak on the economy’ for decades now, even though the data shows the opposite to be true with Republicans repeatedly taking credit for Democratic legislation and economic policies.

Trump is an absolute fool when it comes to economics and as failed and corrupt a businessman as this country has produced but he has been protected and coddled by a billionaire class bent on leveraging his venality for their own gains.

They have succeeded beyond their wildest dreams and when they’re all congratulating themselves this winter at Bohemian Grove, they should save a special toast for their old pal Rupert Murdoch.

He did more than most to make this nightmare come about and he will be rewarded handsomely for it.

The country and world beyond will suffer but that is in many ways the point.

Some times the bad guys win and this is definitely one of those times.

We can fight back by examining all angles of what we are up against and beginning to address it. Arts and culture matter - and much of American lacks a lot of it.

Together we can help to change that: we can shape our future and realize it belongs as much to us as it does to a man like Rupert Murdoch or Donald Trump.

Or most especially an Elon Musk.

At least in theory. Its up to us to make it a reality, or at least see the one we are living in with clear eyes and awareness.

In these pages I will continue to do that as best as I can - and I truly appreciate your readership and support.

I believe we will get through this together, not just as a country but as a planet.