Dehumanization is built in to leadership training

Lauryn Ipsum tweeted images of Victorian era Christmas cards. From our perspective of 120 or more years later the images are quite bizarre. And some are frightening. They feature dead birds (they bring luck?), animals on the attack (birds with torches and worse), children baked into food, food on the attack (perhaps understandable when meat could be tainted), and violence close by. Brandi Buchman of Daily Kos shared some of the work by Rep. Zoe Lofgren, a member of the Jan. 6 Committee. Lofgren compiled nearly 2000 pages of social media content in support of the Big Lie and the Capitol attack posted by current lawmakers. Buchman shared some of the tweets and other content from Rep. Mo Brooks of Alabama, Rep. Andy Biggs of Arizona, and Rep. Paul Gosar of Arizona, Rep. Lauren Boebert of Colorado, Rep. Matt Gaetz of Florida, Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia, and Rep. Madison Cawthorne of North Carolina. This is a long post with a lot of images of tweets from each person. It all leads to a question – why aren’t they in jail for participating in an attempt to overthrow the government? These tweets have been around for almost a year. Buchman had previously posted a summary of the major players under investigation by the Jan. 6 Commission. She includes a description of each. I haven’t read the whole long post and didn’t know some of these people. The major players are Chief of Staff Mark Meadows, Meadows’ underling Daniel Scavino, Kashyap Patel who was chief of staff for Sec. Defense Christopher Miller, former White House strategist Steve Bannon, Assistant AG for the Civil Division of the Justice Department Jeffrey Clark, John Eastman who wrote the memo pressuring the vice nasty to overturn the election results, White House personnel director (and bag man) John McEntee, former national security advisor Michael Flynn, senior advisor (and architect of inhumane immigration policies) Stephen Miller, Bernard Kerik who was commissioner of the NYPD and Giuliani ally, vice nasty national security advisor Keith Kellogg, Jason Miller who was senior advisor to the nasty guy 2020 campaign, GOP operative Roger Stone, conspiracy theorist Alex Jones, Stop the Steal organizer Ali Alexander, Rep. Scott Perry of Pennsylvania, and Rep. Jim Jordan of Ohio. Buchman also included a long list of minor players. I had reported on a poll that said 71% of young Democrats said they would refuse to date someone from the other party. Republicans are in a frenzy. Aysha Qamar of Kos asks, “That’s a problem because?” Qamar wrote:

Dating is tough. Having to navigate dating someone who has different political views is even tougher. Let’s be real: If we’re allowed to be “choosy” about what it is about our partner’s appearance that attracts us, why not their mind and views? Apparently to some conservatives, it’s okay to be “picky” when it comes to choosing a partner appearance-wise, but god forbid you have an issue with their political views. ... Sorry not sorry, but I am one of those people who avoids dating and befriending individuals who voted for Trump. I merely cannot understand how one could support someone who has contributed to so much hate across the country. I am sure there are some “nice” people who voted for Trump, but they are not compatible with me. ... While some may think befriending someone from another party or with different views allows one to have dialogue, that’s not always the case. Sometimes it can negatively impact one’s mental health or create further conflict. It shouldn’t be your job to defend your views to someone constantly, especially if you care about them. Just like you have the ability to have your own views, you should have the ability to choose who you allow into your circle.

In response to a tweet about the nasty guy deliberately undermining the COVID response, Leah McElrath tweeted:

A significant number of people exist who see mass death events as net positive phenomena. These types of people tend to aggregate in political leadership and consulting positions. Their presence and impact are not limited to right-wing administrations. Dehumanization is built in to leadership training. Dehumanization as part of governance includes weighing mass death against economic needs and use of deadly force by the state against its citizens. Here’s a UK article about early parts of this process...

I’ll discuss the article below.

I strongly encourage people to stop imagining the government is your friend. Governments would be better conceptualized as potentially deadly beasts focused on survival who can sometimes be made to do helpful work. Like such beasts, they must be reminded of who is in control. For the love of humanity, I beg you to stop having “faith” in political leaders. Even the good ones. Because you know who doesn’t? The entities who do not care if you live or die but care only about increasing their wealth and power. They pressure political leaders endlessly.

That UK article is by Conrad Duncan for Indy100, written back in September 2019. The article describes an Eton College entrance exam question, asked of 13-14 year olds. The question imagines in 2040 there are riots in London because of a petrol shortage. Police have died, buildings attacked. The Army has been brought in and killed 25 protesters. You, as the Prime Minister, must write a speech explaining why the Army shooting protesters was necessary and moral. Yep, Eton is asking quite young men to justify police brutality, to get away with murder. Yes, this is for real. Yes, many British are horrified their future politicians are trained this way and trained so young. And it makes them wonder how current politicians were trained. Ten days ago Walter Einenkel of Kos wrote a post that is still one of the most shared on the site. It is a story of Jimmy Carter, long before he became president. Back in 1952 he was a Naval officer working on the nuclear propulsion system for the Sea Wolf submarine. He was one of the few with clearance to enter a nuclear power plant. An accident happened at the Chalk River reactor near Ottawa, Canada. Carter was called to help with the situation. The damaged reactor was highly radioactive. Carter and his team set up a model in the parking lot to practice on, then worked on the real thing. Team members would dash in for the short time the exposure limits would permit. As they removed bolts from the core they did the same on the mock-up. And Carter is still alive at 97. Mark Sumner of Kos discussed something he noticed in watching reality TV shows. That something became clear in watching the Great British Bake Off. As the reality part of a reality show is happening cameras are all around the event site. They capture as much ambiance and detail as they can. Then the editing room has to choose from dozens to hundreds of hours of video to create a 50 minute show. Sumner then compares the Bake Off to an unnamed American show that has something to do with chocolate:

On this American reality show, like almost every American reality shows, the situation was framed, through editing, to make it seem as if the teams of chefs were seething with hidden rivalries, disrespect, and ambition at the cost of all else. The editors on Bake Off simply take a different approach: Everyone’s a hero. ... American reality shows sift the hours of recordings and write a narrative that’s not just centered on heroes and villains, it’s mostly villains. The focus is on conflict, on the potential for treachery, blame, and betrayal. They don’t just assume that’s what audiences want, they don’t think it’s possible to take any other approach. The Great British Bake Off also creates its stories in the editing room. But the theme of those stories is kindness, hope, and cooperation. Overlay that with contestants who are deliberately chosen for diversity in age, gender, background, religion, sexuality, and race.