Speak to nearly any American about their tribalism and you will probably get a blank look, except if the question contains the word “political.”
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As a people, we have come to accept that there is a them and an us and that the major difference lives within our political persuasion.
The question of whether the world’s biggest melting pot is still the land of diversity when it comes to holding a moderate thoughtful opinion without being accused of being unloyal to old glory is moot. We are no longer that pot. We are now: either/or, red or blue, good or evil, pro or anti-American, fascist or anti-fascist. We have become a nation of litmus-tests that determine whether we fit or we don’t, where we are welcomed or not.
In a word, we have become the binary state of America.
We are a country left without a philosophical middle ground, a neutral space or a tiny patch of objective soil where God-fearing and patriotic people can figuratively check their firearms at the door and enter a political de-militarized, hatred-free zone to discuss their values. We have morphed into the likes of the Hatfields and McCoys, the Hutus and Tutsis and the Serbs and Croats. We do not trust each other enough to exchange our views in public or even in private. Instead, we prefer the anonymity of polls to tell the rest of America how we feel … or we succumb to the lure of tribal social media to vent our spleen using fake monikers to hide our identity.
Political campaigns should bring out the best in Americans, but the reverse is true. We race to the bottom of the decency barrel where there is no clear line of demarcation between what is above board or below it. American political contests have reached their nadir, their absolute zero where nothing worthwhile can survive. The last time I heard the word “decency” used was way back in 1954 when Joseph N. Welch, the chief counsel for the U.S. Army, speaking to Senator Joseph McCarthy during the Army–McCarthy hearings said to McCarthy: “Have you no sense of decency, sir, at long last? Have you left no sense of decency?” Welch was rebuking McCarthy after the Senator from Wisconsin brought up the past political association of a young lawyer in Welch’s firm.
When was the last time you heard decency being defended against attacks during an election? I daresay you would be hard pressed to find someone in the media do it as the fourth estate rarely calls out the very people who help them get high ratings … unless the perpetrator is one Donald Trump. Then everything is in-bounds and decency has a champion among the CNNs, the MSNows and Politicos of the American press.
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We Americans pride ourselves as people who have taken the rocky road towards democracy. We sucked up servitude to the English crown until we revolted. We fought and killed 600,000 of our own brothers to preserve a union based on freedom for all men and we sent 14 million of our countrymen to defend other nations’ freedoms in two world wars.
Has our values-based tribalism cost us dearly? Absolutely. Has it been worth it? Again, I would say, absolutely, but there are many of my own citizens who say that the tribalistic value system of supporting free speech and all the other freedoms we revere is passé, a relic of “the olden days” when America was “misguided” and acted solely in her own self-interest.
I have little in common with those people who are only too happy to re-write history and make us all both oppressors and victims, but these people are everywhere when the prospect of gaining political power is within their grasp. We have less than one month to go before we exercise our most precious franchise…the right to vote. If that right becomes a casualty of the battle for our values then we have lost the war. Vote on Nov. 3 or stop complaining.
Image: Pixabay // Pixabay Content License
Stephen Helgesen is a retired career American diplomat specializing in international trade. He has lived and worked in 30 countries over the course of 25 years under the Reagan, George H.W. Bush, Bill Clinton and George W. Bush administrations. He is the author of fifteen books, seven of which deal with American politics. His latest book deals with the Danish-American relationship, written in both Danish and English. He has penned more than 1,500 articles on politics, economics and social trends. He now lives in Denmark and is a frequent political commentator in Danish media. He can be reached at: [email protected]
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