This column, from the weekly opinion piece MATTER OF FACT, first appeared on BrooklynReporter.com, the Home Reporter and Spectator dated October 1, 2021
Politics can be messy. It can elicit strong feelings in people and fierce debate. This is nothing new but, increasingly, politics is becoming something very different. It is becoming exceedingly ugly. Debate is overrun with disinformation and differences of opinion quickly devolve into divisive attacks.
There are people on either side of the political divide that engage in this, but one cannot simply “both sides” this issue. One political movement is now, at its core, built on derision and fear. Conservatism, in this day and age, purports to tell people what or who is making their lives harder or endangering them and casts the blame on what is now less their political opposition, but instead the embodiment of pure evil.
It sounds extreme, but the majority of the politics from the right has become just that: extreme. There are certainly still principled conservatives that believe in standard conservative principles like limited government but will not abide the ugly politics that yells “fake news” at any truth that is inconvenient and makes excuses for those who would attempt to subvert the free and fair results of elections. However, these principled conservatives are now pariahs within a Republican party in which they are far outnumbered.
For the past several years, the news has been dominated by this very ugly side of politics at the national level, but it has found its way to the local level throughout the country, including here in Brooklyn. There are local GOP candidates, recent and current, who were on the National Mall on January 6. As this November will see votes cast for all citywide offices and city council seats, election season is heating up and the ugly politics is on display right here in our own backyard.
Politicians cannot be responsible for everyone who supports them or what they say. However, there is a consistent pattern of elected officials and candidates on the right taking help from supporters who have bought into the most outrageous conspiracy theories and then standing by silently when these angry, misinformed supporters direct unhinged vitriol at their political opponents. Sadly, this can come as no surprise from leaders within a movement based on fear and anger.
“It sounds extreme, but the majority of the politics from the right has become just that: extreme.”
On the national level, we have seen how some conservatives truly believe that Democrats are bent on taking over the world as they eat babies in the basement of a Washington, D.C. pizza parlor. In Southern Brooklyn, an elected democrat will be accused of being a deviant who is in league with the devil to help destroy the community and conceal hidden money.
Most people, including most Republicans, understand that despite any political differences of opinion, these wild accusations are bizarre and ridiculous. Unfortunately, when those in leadership positions tacitly accept what comes from this fringe element, it becomes less of a fringe element and it enables other fabrications that are less ludicrous to seem more believable.
This is also how you get candidates for elected office who run campaigns based on disinformation. Southern Brooklyn will see multiple Republican candidates on ballots for city offices who have publicly promoted election fraud conspiracies that are total bunk. Candidates who will tell post on social media that the crime rate is soaring in Bay Ridge, but when confronted by someone with an article from this paper the same month showing that crime in Bay Ridge, as per the 68 precinct, continues to drop, they just quietly remove any mention of that verifiable fact, block the person who dared point it out, and quietly move on, letting their original disinformation remain for more to see and become angry and fearful about.
Fear and anger are great motivators. There is a long history of those seeking positions of power, feeding the public disinformation meant to stoke fear and anger. People can have valid concerns about crime and opinions on how to address such an issue can span the gamut, but if you choose to believe that the police in your neighborhood are overwhelmed by crime when the police in your neighborhood are telling you that crime keeps falling, you need to choose to see that you are being manipulated and decide not to be any longer.
