Politics is Our Entertainment

Wonder how this became the state of our politics in 2020? In 2016 I wrote the following after the debates between Trump and Clinton.

I don’t know a single person who is happy with the current political situation. I hear everyone around me sighing and expressing irritation. We all roll our eyes, turn to each other and ask, “How is this the state of our politics?” We shrug our shoulders and move on with our day, but the answer is quite simple. This is the state of our politics because this is what we want. We want villains, and idiots, and heroes rather than actual people for candidates. We want to watch people insult each other and fight because that’s more entertaining than a respectful debate about government policies and social issues. Respectful debate? Yawn, how boring. We eagerly await the comedy sketches and impersonations. We create meme after meme, and joke after joke, and then we turn to each other and ask, “How is this the state of our politics?”

Imagine for a moment that in the very beginning, at the first declaration that this celebrity was going to run for president, we didn’t buy into it. Imagine we watched no coverage, we read no articles, made no funny parodies, and tweeted nothing. Imagine if we had all treated it as it should have been treated, a joke that wasn’t funny. Imagine if we had refused to acknowledge it because the mere idea was so asinine we couldn’t bring ourselves to comment. But we’ve made our politics into a joke, and so we easily, effortlessly ushered in this candidate, and we laughed as we did it because it was so unbelievably funny, and we turned to each other with scoffing smiles and asked, “How is this the state of our politics?”

We say things like, “we’re doomed,” and we laugh. We make pretend plans to leave the country if the 2016 election doesn’t go the way we want. Those who speak positively of the government, or of a candidate, or of a certain policy are dismissed by the opposition as being blind, ignorant, bought, or evil. We say we deserve better. We turn to each other and ask incredulously, “How could these be our candidates?” We shake our heads and say that politics is a joke. And it is because we have made it a joke. Our posts, and gifs, and mash-ups, and witty commentary about a candidate’s wardrobe, hair, sex-life, voice, body, children, etc. (instead of about their actual policies) have all made it a joke. We built the arena with every click and view, and it’s all for our entertainment. We routinely take pleasure in the pain, suffering, and humiliation of others. We use the comment section to gleefully, and viciously eviscerate complete strangers. We watch reality TV to see people make fools of themselves, and our politics have become the greatest reality show of all.

And here it is! The main event! The candidates are fighting in the arena we’ve built, and it’s coming to us live! We can watch it from our comfortable couches on our various TVs and devices. We play drinking games while the livelihood of people we may or may not know hinges on the outcome of the fight. The next day we get to see the highlights. Humorous videos are created and posted within minutes. We can even read running commentary from our favorite celebrities or media sources as the fights play out. We laugh, and joke, and mock, and impersonate, and turn to each other and ask, "How is this the state of our politics?"

We litter the internet with our cartoons, gifs, and clever jokes about how awful the two candidates are, and how terrible the debates. Yet we’ll watch, and read, and laugh, and click, post, tweet… We act as though we’ve had no hand in it all. That they are the government and we are the people, and we don’t have any influence or say in what they do. We act as though our clicks aren’t worth anything, and didn’t build the arena. We act as though our jokes didn’t create the publicity that brought about the rise of the very people we claim to despise. We act as though we are not the hungry mob shouting and cheering as we watch two people tear each other apart for our entertainment. We act as though we’re watching from somewhere else besides the seats of the Colosseum.

Entertainment is our drug, and we’ve turned our politics into entertainment. We’ve sold almost all that we are to buy more. We don’t even care that the drug is killing us because at least we’re laughing. We don’t care that this attitude of not taking our political policies, candidates, and constitutional values seriously is killing us. It’s been so long since we’ve taken anything seriously we don’t know how to not make jokes. We don’t know how to cope with the fact that we’re about to overdose on this drug.

Don’t tell me you’re moving to Canada, because you’re not. Don’t tell me it’s the apocalypse, because it’s not. Don’t tell me your latest joke. Don’t show me your hilarious impersonation. Tell me you give a damn. A real, serious, damn. No jokes. No laughing. No clever wordplay. Tell me you’re going to vote based on logic, policy, ethics, ideals, and not on fantasies, gender, spouses, or personality. Tell me that you care about our country, and that you’re done laughing. Turn to me and say, “This is the state of our politics, and I am going to change it.”