Yes, the Republicans Are Weird, and Deeply Creepy
In 2016, I noticed a disturbing trend in the Trump Campaign to bring fringe conspiracy theories to the center of their campaign. This was weird and creepy. But, more critically, the language used in invoking “the Great Replacement” or “antivaxxer sentiment” or “hydrophobia,” was designed to excite a segment of American society that was festering in the body politic for years — latent racism and xenophobia, fostered in fringe groups, cults, and even certain demographics of combat veterans. They knew that shouting the N word at Black Folx, or picking fights with gay bars was off-putting, so, these weirdos, rather than put old-timey racism away and join the 1990s, decided to integrate into mainstream culture and populations. They learned from the mistakes of Ruby Ridge and Waco that declaring war on the neighbors and declaring the yard “Lebensraum” wouldn’t win a plurality of the American voters. So, they put their 17th century ideology on their mental back-burner, got jobs, and patiently waited for race war whilst biding their time.
That whole “Nazis in the Attic” thing isn’t as far-fetched or conspiratorial as it sounds. I’ve met people who decided that basic decency and modernity was preferable to sharing a concrete bunker with four dozen other paranoid, doughy men (I try not to judge, but, as a surface dweller, that seems like a weird existence, to me), and they’ve discussed how the KKK and other beige-forward entities have been pushing cultural integration, with a mind toward an eventual, Turner Diaries style holy war. I don’t know if they actually bought Clarence Thomas dinner, but it’s not outside the realm of possibility. As an unfortunate byproduct of being forced to live amongst human beings who recoil at the Swastika, these mediocre white dudes developed all sorts of dogwhistles and euphemistic language to make themselves presentable to neighborhood children.
Most educated Americans’ horror at Drumpf is how he openly and fluently used dog whistles and euphemistic language to communicate to His odious followers. He was linguistically preparing them for political violence.
That has been met in full, equal measure by the Harris Campaign’s formidable decision to tap into a similar, new, euphemistic language that every family in America now speaks: interventions. Before we take Grandpa’s keys away from him, we notice some weird behaviors. Eventually, that becomes “disturbing,” then, “creepy,” then there’s a family meeting to make sure that someone checks in on Grandpa for several hours a day. Every family has — or knows — someone with addiction issues. Before the inevitable check-in to rehab, the word “weird” is used.
I am, of course, talking about situations in which most of us see an obvious need for a timely, responsible person to assume power of attorney and steer the situation, but there’s a nasty underbelly to that. In a kindly, progressive family, Little Timmy is “weird” for a while before everyone figures out that he’s probably gay, and needs a little extra care and attention. In a dysfunctional family, Weird Timmy doesn’t get to become the family’s gay kid — he gets shipped off to conversion therapy. In a different dysfunctional family, the dangerous, uncontrollable, ignorant child is sent to a military prep school in hopes of reformation.
You actually know that last example, if you’ve been alive since 2015. That is literally Donald Trump’s super-secret origin story — he displayed extreme cruelty and impulsiveness at a young age, and his abusive father sent him away from home.
That’s the secret sauce in this language; the first is that the Harris Campaign has NOT officially said, “Guys, come into the family room, we have to talk about Uncle Donald,” but that’s the subtext for every American in the 21st century. We’ve all handled — or been witness to — family crises, and the Harris Campaign is strategically — but accurately — telling us all that the fascists in the room have become an intolerable problem, and we’re going to have to chip in to solve it.
The second, truly wonderful aspect of the “weird” label is that it is undoubtedly a truly traumatic label for both The Donald and Vance. Both of them come from exceptionally dysfunctional families, if biographers, family friends, and court records are any indication. They’ve been the “weird” kid in the family, and those discussions were inevitably a prelude to social workers, disruption, and some sort of removal from the family. Calling them weird hurts, because it reinforces a label by which they’ve been victimized for decades.
I hope it hurts. I really do. I hope they wake up every day with as much fear about their individual futures, exiled from the public eye, as humans fear either of them having a nuclear arsenal. They can work through their psychological crises like normal, healthy people — with therapy, community, and social support. This horseshit about running for President before becoming an emotionally stable adult needs to end. And we need to remind them that they are perpendicular to reality. Every. Single. Day. It’s time to have a national discussion about what to do with these weird people.
