Following
the attempted political assassination of several GOP members of Congress this
week, calls for “unity” echoed through the halls
of power.
Democratic and Republican
leaders alike offered up their ruminations on the matter — ”ruminating” not in
the sense of offering profound thoughts on the latest tragedy, but rather, as
cows “ruminate” on regurgitated cud. That an American citizen would
take the ruling class’ dishonest and hyperbolic partisanship seriously enough
to actually start shooting congressmen is tough for the political class to
stomach, so for now, they chew on their hopes for national unity while
promising to temper their rhetoric.
Such calls for “national
unity” in the wake of violence are nothing new, and as I heard this latest
chorus of “Kumbaya” reverberate around the country, I couldn’t help but
snicker. I couldn’t hold back my laughter because I suspect too much about
American government, too much about the meanness and bad faith of contemporary
American politics, too much about the very nature of human beings’ relationship
to political power to take American politicos’ calls for unity, love, and
respect seriously. I have nothing against unity, love, kindness, and respect
(and I certainly do not condone citizens randomly shooting members of
Congress), but I cannot take the power-hungry seriously when they use the
language of peace and community to advance their national ambitions of
political control.
Political
invective, per se, is not the problem — the
drive for national solutions is. Even if the political class softens their
rhetoric for a time (don’t hold your breath), they will sooner or later find
themselves at one another’s throats again as long as they continue to
nationalize every political issue under the sun. There is too much power at
stake to behave otherwise. In fact, I expect we will soon see that rhetorical
game whereby partisan “uniters” criticize anyone who disagrees with their
political projects as “dividers.”
Contrary to popular political
opinion, “national unity” is not synonymous with basic human decency and peace
among men. Quite the opposite. But as long as “our” political leaders continue
to conflate the two, a cruel irony will be at work here. The more America’s
political leaders try to “unite” the nation through political power at the
federal level, nationalizing every issue in the process, the more divided the nation
will become. The United States is too diverse to be treated as one big happy
family ready to march in lockstep.
The political class’ appeals
to American ‘family’ and ‘unity’ is merely a means to obscure what’s really on
the agenda— an agenda that goes far beyond the purview of our actual families,
villages, townships, cities, and states. The political establishment continues
to falsely believe a diverse nation of 300 million-plus people, a nation of
nearly 20,000 actual cities, as well as countless families and cultures, can be
managed like a singular political body without negative consequences. If only
we surrender more of our liberties and governing decisions to Washington D.C.,
says the political class, “the people” of the United States can be prodded into
unity — as long as we are allowed to chew on a bit of happy talk and watch a
charity baseball game.
No doubt, how we speak to one another as fellow human beings is
important. Indeed, culture and rhetoric are important. And, yes, though
politics may often be downstream from culture, politics can also pollute the
river of culture and discourse if allowed to become too pervasive. Immense
political power has a way of rendering men suspicious and jealous of one
another. And once politics comes to define a people through the power of a
central state, all that is left is an impending battle over whose culture will
be imposed through the power of that state.
In the face of such a looming war, it is no surprise that people
often despair only to hurl invective, material threats, and people see actual
bullets towards “the others” as the source of their angst. In such a world
dominated by national political power, it is understandable that politicos,
whether elected officials or disgruntled campaign volunteers, see anyone who
opposes their national projects as a threat to humanity.
But the
tyrant in you is the tyrant in me, and if we are not careful — if we keep
offering the American people the immense national power to command and control
their fellows — even our reactions against tyranny and violence will
tend to mutate into movements to destroy one another for power’s sake.
If we truly wish to unite
the American people, we must abandon our greedy nationalist daydreams. We must
decentralize political power away from Washington D.C. and truly embrace the
diversity of the American populace. We must reduce the potential power we have
over one another so that tolerance for those we disagree with may flourish
absent the threat of political coercion. Let California be California. Let
Texas be Texas. Let Vermont go their own way and Alabama go another way, and so
on.
Furthermore, we should go beyond the idea of states altogether.
Local governments can be just as tyrannical as national governments despite
their limited geography. Rather than first saying, “We are all Americans,” “We
are all Alabamians,” or “We are all Californians,” suppose we instead say:
“We are all individual moral agents, each of us with our own unique
tastes and talents, each of us possessing the flame of our innate freedom, and
we can do as we please as long as we respect one another as free individuals.”
If one day that does become our motto, dare I say, what a statement of human solidarity it would be.
If one day that does become our motto, dare I say, what a statement of human solidarity it would be.
