I want to talk to all the old-school Democrats and run-of-the-mill liberals for a second.
This is a conservative Christian site, so we run a lot of memes and articles poking fun at your camp. But one thing I don't find funny is this:
Or this:
Or this:
Or this:
Or this:
What are we on the Right supposed to think when we see this?
I'm not trying to fear monger. I know the Right mobilizes its troops with sensationalism and hyperbole at times; it's as guilty of it in some cases as the Left is. I understand that there is a personality cult around Donald Trump. I know that liberals are often demonized by conservatives as much as conservatives are demonized by liberals.
But I'm concerned about what the "democracy" folks in your camp are doing.
Trigger warning: I've never been worried about Donald Trump being a dictator.
If you took away the massive effort to slander him and remove him from office during his first term, it really wouldn't have been that eventful of an administration. Trump is an '80s-era pop icon Democrat - a center-left real estate mogul who used to be on reality TV and rub elbows with everyone in Hollywood. He's vain and flashy and crude like literally everyone else in that world.
But a dictator? The second coming of Hitler? Yeah, that's the weirdest can of snake oil that people have ever tried to sell to me in my life.
And I get why you don't like the man. Aside from his own bombast, he represents a party, platform, and worldview that's in opposition to your own beliefs and ideas.
But in a democracy (let me pause here to dissuade the conservatives in the comments who are going to say "BUT WE'RE A CONSTITUTIONAL REPUBLIC" as if that's helpful in solving this issue), people with opposing, drastically-different opinions are supposed to have an equal say in the public sphere.
They not only have the right to say those opinions, but to elect people to wield political power that will turn those opinions into actual law. And unless those elected leaders have actually been convicted of high crimes that legally disqualify them, they should be allowed to represent the people who chose them.
(As an aside: I wish you could see the irony at play around Trump. Democratic leaders attempting to convict him so he can't be democratically elected is the most anti-democratic thing I've witnessed in my lifetime.)
Democracy is supposed to be open and fair and free ("liberal"). If people democratically choose a a government based in Christian morality and biblical teaching (the "Christian nationalism" boogyman we keep hearing about), then that would be a government "of the people, by the people, and for the people." THAT is democracy.
Alternatively, if people believed that democracy was too much of a risk, and that they needed to make the government totalitarian so that only their opinions had the force of law, they could vote for such a system.
But they wouldn't be able to vote their way out of it.
That's why I'm concerned about what I'm seeing on your side.
- The people who want to remove the 1st Amendment - heck, get rid of the whole Constitution and our current government as an outdated experiment written by racists - are not on the political right.
- Those hunting down, prosecuting, and excommunicating their political opposites within corporations, the academy, government, the military, and media are also not on the right.
Instead, I hear a lot about "protecting democracy" from those on the Left who are actively jailing enemies, shutting down dissent, destroying those who disagree, and attempting to make their voice heard.
And when those measures don't work by themselves, I see things like this:
Conservatives don't want to keep people from voting. I voted for Trump twice (three times, if you include my recent state primary), went to a Trump rally, and have known conservative voters in my inner circle of friends and family for decades.
Never once have I heard any of them talking about taking away the votes of Americans who are black, gay, liberal, immigrant citizens, or [insert group here]. What they are concerned about are efforts to silence or drown out their own votes - to dilute their own voices in the body politic. They are concerned that the game isn't fair and the referees are actively working against them.
That's what drove the confusion and anger of 2020. Mail-in ballots, recognized the world over as a cheater's paradise, were widely used, being pushed by liberal leaders as a compassionate and efficient way to make our democracy even more "democratic."
Conservatives are also afraid of an open border where unvetted people can show up by the millions, have no stake in the nation, then go to polling places where photo ID is not required because it's considered "racist." They then note that liberal leaders are pushing for both an open border and no voter ID laws simultaneously.
What should a reasonable person conclude from this?
If you care about democracy, where a nation is free to debate and choose the best course of action - whether that be secular pluralism, Christian nationalism, socialism, or heck, monarchy - then I ask you to hold your liberal leaders accountable.
