Around the world, millions of young people don t-shirts portraying Che Guevara, the anti-capitalist Cuban rebel who loathed blacks, executed homosexuals, and slaughtered thousands. Yet, this piece of apparel does not elicit a strong rebuke from the average person – they may even envy the hip kid for having such a rad t-shirt. But do you know what provokes a fierce response? A red ballcap.
Since the 2016 presidential election, red hats, particularly with the words “Make America Great Again,” have triggered the left. This is because red caps and MAGA are affiliated with President Donald Trump.
Roland Scahill, a former theater agent and convicted fraudster, recently tweeted that he had seen the fifth MAGA hat “in my ‘hood in the last week” and it’s “time to move.” But how did such an innocuous piece of material and a placid political slogan – one used by former Presidents Ronald Reagan and Bill Clinton – cause people to get so perturbed that they need to assault strangers, cry on college campuses, and even relocate to another bubble, er, neighborhood?
Simple: The Democrats, especially those in the media, polarized Trump’s message – and the left ate it up.
Polarization is an essential political tactic used by the left, likely on the advice of community agitator Saul Alinsky, who penned the 1971 book, Rules for Radicals. In Rule 13, Alinsky writes, “Pick the target, freeze it, personalize it, and polarize it,” adding:
“Cut off the support network and isolate the target from sympathy. Go after people and not institutions; people hurt faster than institutions. (This is cruel, but very effective. Direct, personalized criticism and ridicule works.)”
Who is more of an unsympathetic and polarizing figure than President Trump? A mere mention of the man’s name creates marital breakups, fights, and fits of rage.
Democrats Polarize Everything
Let’s be honest: Both the left and the right have used Alinsky’s 13th rule over the years. For eight years, the GOP’s target was President Barack Obama, but the main difference is that the Republicans were not successful in metastasizing him into a polarizing figure on a national level – just in red states.
Obama’s name didn’t whip the media into a frenzy, even though he imprisoned journalists, famously said he has “a phone and a pen,” and exacerbated spying on American citizens. It was the opposite – anchors, hosts, and reporters were giddy and had thrills running down their legs, eh Chris Matthews?
Trump, on the other hand, is permanently entrenched in the left’s hive-like mind. He coaxes them to do stupid things, such as release records to prove you’re 1/1024th Native (possibly) or stand on street corners and scream at the sky. This is indeed the workings of a puppet master, and Trump is making them dance in the same way an organ grinder makes his monkey bop for nickels and dimes to a Giuseppe Verdi tune.
Over the last two years, the left has adopted “direct, personalized criticism and ridicule as a strategy.”
It is rare to find Trump attacked on policy; it’s usually for something he uttered or did that sends his opponents to psychiatrists. He’s a racist, he’s a Nazi, he’s a homophobe, he’s a fascist. This is part of the reason political discourse has turned into “us vs. them.” Because Democrats, the press, and swamp creatures have done such a good job at freezing, personalizing, and polarizing Trump, it feels like the nation is on the cusp of a second Civil War at any moment – if millennials can put down their iPhones, Starbucks lattes, and man-purses, that is.
But it isn’t just Trump the left has turned into something perverse. It’s that anything they disagree with is equal to some odd concoction of Mein Kampf, The Prince, and The Russians Are Coming! Now you understand why the meme “Everything I Don’t Like is Literally Hitler” is so popular because it encompasses leftist indoctrination in a nutshell.
When you effectively polarize your counterpart, this is the formula that floods the leftists’ minds:
White + Conservative = Hate
Black + Conservative = White Supremacist
Republican = Racist
White + Christian = Hick
White + Christian + Republican = Nazi
The next time you see black-clad mobs hold placards that say “Love Trumps Hate” while they’re beating a senior citizen, you know they have fallen victim to the polarization putsch.
Pointing Out Mobs
The Counterfeit News Network was apoplectic when opinion journalist Matt Lewis referred to leftists as mobs. When Lewis made the allusion, left-wing outlets censured him, demanding that he recant this statement because harassing a black conservative and kicking her out of a restaurant is not mob-like behavior. It is using your voice.
Noticing an opportunity, the Republican marketing team has produced several viral videos of these mobs, whether they’re destroying public property, suppressing free speech, or hassling lawmakers and their families. We will see in November if these “unhinged” clips worked, but making these incidents garner national attention should be the objective – both in 2018 and 2020.
No matter how much the left tries to rationalize and defend fascist tactics, the average person isn’t in favor of this behavior. And they will mobilize and remember this on the way to the ballot box.
Finally, the GOP has realized this is how you “pick the target, freeze it, personalize it, and polarize it.”
An Olive Branch?
And they will mobilize and remember this on the way to the ballot box.
Perhaps it is time to cease declaring our opponents the new Adolf Hitler. Instead, we should return to what a normal and civilized society would do: Debate ideas, weed out the bad ones, and remain polite.
Just because you believe the state cannot abolish poverty through welfare does not mean you hate the poor. Just because you think applicants should be accepted to a university based on merit does not make you racist. Just because you maintain that babies in the womb have rights does not suggest you want to take away women’s rights and turn them into serfs. The same courtesy should be extended to the other side, too.
Unfortunately, because the public has been inundated with propaganda from our intellectual and moral superiors, like Hollywood sexual predators and gender studies professors, it is difficult for the political arena to host civil dialogue in today’s hostile, toxic environment. Alinsky conceded that his 13th rule is “cruel,” but being uncouth and crude takes a backseat to power and control. When everything is polarized, you can’t even enjoy a baseball game in July without a protest ruining the event. Sad!
