Tin Drummers: Things have changed for the white, male, American loser. Now he understands the reasons why he failed. Now he knows that it wasn’t his fault. Donald Trump told him that the game was rigged from the start: designed to make losers out of people exactly like himself.
VERY LITTLE on this earth can match the agony of being
trapped inside your own skin. To be aware that you are not what those whose
opinions you respect wanted you to be. Your parents, your family, your pastor,
your teachers, your boss, your friends: all of them at one time or another
believed in you; thought you had what it took to succeed. Except you didn’t
succeed, you failed. You are not a winner, you’re a loser. A loser trapped
inside his own skin.
America is full of losers trapped in their own skins. Angry,
lonely, unwell, poor, white and male: and many of them beholden to people they
despise. Like the petite, close-cropped, college-educated public servant whose
good opinion the unemployed, former-warehouse-worker who never graduated from
high-school has to retain in order to remain fed and housed. Like the
overweight black woman at the second-hand clothing store who gives him “that
look” whenever he enters the building wearing his coat with the confederate
shoulder patches. Like the Latino dispenser of the pure “black tar” heroin he’s
become addicted to ever since the supply of prescription opioids dried up.
These are the people who make up the loser’s cast of “Them”. Until recently,
there had been no “Us”.
But things have changed for this American loser. Now he
understands the reasons why he failed. Now he knows that it wasn’t his fault.
The game was rigged from the start: designed to make losers out of people
exactly like himself.
Was it his fault the factories and warehouses either moved
offshore or got automated? Was it his fault the badly-assembled scaffolding on
the building site failed to prevent him falling and wrecking his back? Was it
his fault the big pharmaceutical companies convinced so many doctors that
opioid painkillers like Oxycontin were non-addictive? Nothing he did caused any
of these things to happen, but he’s the one who was left to pay the price. He
lost – but he’s not a loser. Thanks to Donald Trump he’s become something much
more acceptable – a victim.
It’s why he loves Trump. It’s why he’s willing to forgive
his President just about anything. Because Trump has made him feel free in his
own skin. His own male skin. His own white skin. His own straight skin. His own
“poorly educated” skin.
What’s more – much more – the President has alerted this guy
to the way in which the system has been rigged to the advantage of just about
everyone except him. Look at how much help has gone to women and minorities.
Look at the way the college-educated have grabbed all the best jobs for
themselves and their kids. Look at the faces of these “professionals” whenever
you step into one of their bright, airy offices. How do they make you feel?
Like you belong to a whole different species – an inferior species? Just think
of the way the media makes all this seem right and proper. Think of how the
hero of just about every TV series is a woman, or a black, or a gay, or all
three at once! And how the bad guys in all these dramas tend to be white,
working-class males: rednecks, trailer-trash, deplorables. People just like
himself.
That’s why the media hate the President and are always
telling lies about him. Because he’s seen through their game. He knows whose
interests they serve. He knows who’s picking up the tab. He knows how far
they’re willing to go prevent him from telling the Americans they’ve branded
losers that they and their country can be great again. When he calls them
“enemies of the people”, the people know exactly what he’s talking about.
Making America great again: that’s what its all about.
Except Trump has done much more than that. Not only has he transformed the
losers into victims, but he has also turned them into Americans again. Real
Americans: small-town Americans who live in the states that the privileged fly
over on the way to the “left coasts”. Americans who can strip a car engine down
to its component parts, figure out what’s wrong, and reassemble it again all on
their own, or with the help of a couple of buddies. Americans who can track a
buck through the woods and fell it with a single shot from their daddy’s deer
rifle. Americans who still know all the words of the Lord’s Prayer. Americans
who served their country in Afghanistan and Iraq. Who looked their country’s
enemies in the eye – and pulled the trigger.
In short, what Trump has done is create for the angry, the
lonely, the unwell, the poor, the white and the male the “Us” that had been
missing from their lives. Not forgetting the “Them” they had always known to be
out there but who, until Trump, had been little more than the vague and
indistinct shapes featured in Republican Party attack ads. By bringing the
losers back into the “Us” and by bringing the “Them” into much sharper focus,
Trump has created an extremely powerful political force.
Oh sure, it is possible to defeat Trump’s candidates at the
district level and reclaim control of the House of Representatives. But, as
progressive America discovered to its horror on 6 November 2018, the real power lies
not in the districts but with the states. It is the state which is entitled to two
senators – regardless of whether it contains four or forty million voters. And,
in 2020, it will be the states dispatching their electors to the Electoral
College – which chooses the President of the United States of America.
Trump’s “Us” may not be as numerous as the “Them” he has
created for his followers to hate, but, as he demonstrated in 2016, they don’t
have to be. What counts is where your supporters are located and how determined
they are to cast their votes. Having freed so many white, poorly-educated
American males from the agony of perceived personal failure: having cleared
their consciences; restored their pride; and stoked their fears; Donald Trump
has the American Republic exactly where he wants it – and needs it – to be.
This essay was originally posted on The Daily Blog of Thursday, 8 November 2018.
