Armed and Ready

The tactic of weaponizing existing American racial tensions seems to work. And maybe that's because there's just a lot to work with.
Long Before Facebook, The KGB Spread Fake News About AIDS

Articles like this, I think, let us off the hook somewhat. Racial tensions in the United States were weapons-grade LONG before the KGB came around. Thomas Jefferson predicted that there would never be harmony between White and Black Americans, which is why he advocated sending former slaves back to Africa. He predicted that Black people would have long memories for the harms done to them, and what White people would keep adding to the list. And, after more than 200 years, we're still not at a point where we can say that he's finally wrong about that. The KGB simply took steps to say to people, "Your suspicions about those who govern you are correct." And since they were already pretty much convinced of that to begin with, the message felt like validation, rather than manipulation.

But the KGB weren't, and aren't, the only people to indulge in this practice. American politics is rife with appeals to (and reinforcement of) people's deep-seated suspicions towards their fellow citizens, and constant reminders of how they've been unjustly impoverished by cynical actors who hide behind smiles and platitudes. And because it lets people off the hook for their own condition in a society that actively dislikes the idea that "sometimes you're the windshield, and sometimes you're the bug," it's appealing. "My community is ravaged by drugs because the government is out to get us," is comforting when compared to, "We have problems that are too large for us to fix on our own, and that makes us less deserving of support and assistance." A society that subscribes to a Just World theory tends to tell people "you're unsuccessful because you're morally subpar." Someone coming along and saying, "actually, you've been targeted by a bad actor," provides relief from that. And so it's a constant undercurrent. And the fact that there are plenty of bad actors out there, and that they can go unpunished, if they're careful about their targets, doesn't help matters.

While people are quick to say "That was in the past," when it's their group being accused of a historical wrong in the context of a present injustice, they tend to be slower to want to part with the entries they've placed in other groups' Catalog of Sins. But until a society decides that "we're all in this together, so old slights are now genuinely forgiven," there will be a domestic incentive to play on those lingering resentments, because even if you want to enact policies that would heal them, you have to get into office first, and that often means telling people what they already understand to be the Truth. And given that many people understand that a) the forgiveness of transgressions is an invitation to further transgressions, and b) that the unforgiving are themselves unworthy of forgiveness, it becomes a difficult stone to roll up a very steep hill, even when there is an understanding of the consequences of it staying at sea level.