A recent news story caught my attention. A Hamline (Minnesota) University professor was fired for showing images of Muhammad in a class about Islamic art. The professor was careful to warn students, on a number of occasions, that the art would be shown and if offended they could leave the classroom. A senior student complained to the school administrators which resulted in the professor being fired. This is an example showing how minority rule down to the individual is becoming increasingly problematic in this country.
Small groups of individuals are becoming increasingly empowered to exert their will to challenge many things that the majority takes for granted or even fully supports. Critical Race Theory (CRT) is a vivid example of taking an obscure issue that is viewed negatively by a minority of the people and making it a huge issue that can decide the outcome of elections. CRT is defined as the cross-disciplinary examination, by social and civil-rights scholars and activists, of how laws, social and political movements, and media shape, and are shaped by, social conceptions of race and ethnicity. There is no real evidence (something profoundly lacking in much of current discourse, particularly on internet social media) that CRT is being taught in any K-12 school. CRT is perhaps discussed at the collegiate levels in isolated locations across the country. Yet, CRT was used by manipulative politicians across the country as emotional fodder to feed the ignorant and gullible voters for political advantage.
Book banning has now become commonplace throughout the country. Usually, the banning of books involves a small group of individuals taking it upon themselves to be the morality or philosophy police for everyone else in their community. The banning of books is a growing phenomenon that seems to have no end in sight. The most frequently banned book is 1984 by George Orwell. Because the novel offers insight to those under the leadership of oppressive regimes, this book has been banned and even burned. While book burning is not yet routine given the right circumstances it surely could make a comeback as part of this era of political theater. We seem to be now living in a time when unscrupulous and dishonest politicians stoke emotions rather than put further solutions to the problems confronting US citizens. The banning or burning of books is another example of the act of a minority imposing their will on the majority because most citizens don’t pay much attention to what is going on in any community, city, or state from a political standpoint. A majority of Americans support access to knowledge through books that can enlighten and educate the reader. As with many things if you do not agree with a political position, a book, a movie, or anything else you don’t have to read the book, view the movie, or agree with the political position because we, at least for now, have free will.
An interesting juxtaposition is that we have a minority of the population concerned that ethnic minorities will become more than 50% of the US population. This will happen in a few decades, so the future minority of the US population, largely comprised of white Americans, can solidify their political control, by any means possible, before, in their mind, it becomes too late. It seems there is an effort to establish some type of American Apartheid (any system or practice that separates people according to color, ethnicity, caste, etc.) throughout the country. This effort is often hidden under the disguise of some form of nationalism, most notably white or religious nationalism, to make it palatable to the most ignorant and gullible of our society without revealing that underlying belief is built on bigotry and racism.
During the past few presidential elections, the individual with the most popular votes was not elected president thanks to the antiquated Electoral College. The Electoral College is something created more than 150 years ago to give small states more power in electing a president. So, a few times in the past 20 years a majority of people voted for a certain individual for president, but that person did not serve as president. In the past 20+ years, less than 70% of eligible voters actually voted for president (2020 – 66.77%). Off-year elections, when there is no presidential election, have seen 50% as the high-water mark and it has been as low as 36%. Slightly less than one-third of eligible voters choose to vote in 2020 and in 2014 only 36.7% voted to choose the person that would represent their interests in Congress and the various other levels of government. By global standards, voter turnout in the US is much worse than in most other developed countries. In 2014 if you won a close election to Congress, you probably had less than 20% of the eligible voters in your state or congressional district vote for a Senator or House member to represent their interests in Congress.
There was a time when both political parties actually legislated through cooperation, compromise, thoughtful discourse and ultimately producing bipartisan legislation that advance the whole of society. Gradually the domination of our political process by money and the whims and wishes of the very wealthy and a few hundred major corporations increasingly tribalized our politics. Cooperation, compromise, and thoughtful discourse rarely exist because the wealthy and corporate overlords increasingly dictate what is allowed in Congress. We now have an entrenched minority of the very wealthy, primarily men, and a few hundred corporations that control much of what Congress does on behalf of the people. The wealth inequality is continuing to grow given that an estimate of up to 70 trillion dollars is being siphoned off from a declining middle class over to the wealthy over the past few decades. The most recent off-year national election produced a situation in Congress where tribalism was intensified and at least for the next two years. Political theater in the House designed to stoke emotional responses from the voters will trump anything being accomplished of substance for the American public. Most of this political theater will be done by a few dozen House members which will clearly present a good example of minority rule. Those few individuals will dictate what gets accomplished by Congress over the next two years until the next elections. As you watch this theater production be revealed remember that the world is watching the once greatest democracy on the planet decline into something to be ridiculed by other world powers, only our military might stops these world powers from looking on in horror.
