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The Man in the Mirror
28th October 2016Donald Trump is not an outlier, but the distillation of our dominant values
By George Monbiot, published in the Guardian 26th October 2016
What is the worst thing about Donald Trump? The lies? The racist stereotypes? The misogyny? The alleged gropings? The apparent refusal to accept democratic outcomes? All these are bad enough. But they’re not the worst.
The worst thing about Donald Trump is that he’s the man in the mirror.
We love to horrify ourselves with his excesses, and to see him as a monstrous outlier, the polar opposite of everything a modern, civilised society represents. But he is nothing of the kind. He is the distillation of all that we have been induced to desire and admire.
Trump is so repulsive not because he offends our civilisation’s most basic values, but because he embodies them.
Trump personifies the traits promoted by the media and corporate worlds he affects to revile; the worlds that created him. He is a bundle of extrinsic values – the fetishisation of wealth, power and image – in a nation where extrinsic values are championed throughout public discourse. His conspicuous consumption, self-amplification and towering (if fragile) ego are in tune with the dominant narratives of our age.
As the recipient of vast inherited wealth who markets himself as solely responsible for his good fortune, he is the man of our times. ...
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Comments
Further reading on the nightmare that our American election has become:
Donald Trump and the Religion of White Nostalgia
The Trump candidacy has made it extremely clear that mentality-wise good portions of the US are little different from ISIS, Nazi-era Germany or fundamentalist Sharia law, and they're getting worse. Even if Trump loses, the US has lost a lot of influence and respect, something that was already at an all-time low due to how the Republicans decided to [tsk!] over the rest of the world the last two decades. Even a Clinton presidency isn't going to do much to make people trust the US again. A political system, a population that unhinged simply can't be relied on to make sensible decisions no matter who's the president at any given time.