I do not believe in heroes, but I do believe in heroic virtues.
I have spent much of my life with teachers and State Police officers, and thus with men and women who love children and protect them, who believe in the ideal of service, who treat others with respect, especially those less able to protect themselves; who confront wrongdoing with courage, honor integrity as a matter of faith and live each day within the scope and moral requirements of duty.
We now have a President and associates who believe in none of those virtues.
Trump is the most powerful insult comic in the world; a man with no discernable sense of humor other than that found in mockery. He is the rich man who boasts of being self made who was made by his daddy, by theft and by cruelty, the ladies man who for much of his life seemed intent only in sleeping with as many as he could, whether he was married or not, his wife pregnant or not.
He curses out many who work for him, mocks them, belittles them. He is a type of aberrant antihero, a person who relentlessly searches for anyone weaker to abuse and then radioactively mutates that abuse into a version of strength for 40% of the population. He says, “Look how savage I can be.” Trump has made punishment a part of a new ethic, a Trumpian ethic.
This then is the Trumpian hero, the incarnation of the Trumpian ethic:
Be someone both arrogant and shameless. Crush your enemies. Demand bootlicking. Cruelty is strength. Everyone is corrupt. Humility is weakness. Integrity is weakness. Duty is a scam. Honor is suicidal. Serving others is for suckers. Just enough voters are suckers who will believe anything they are told. Performance is reality. Evidence, knowledge, fact — those are disposable. Spread conspiracies instead. Cultivate paranoia. Aggression covers every flaw. Never accept responsibility. Blame everyone else. Be both the victim and the king. Stir up any hatred. Inflame any fear. Lie. Cover up. The Trumpian ethic combines viciousness and vacuity. All that matters is ‘me’. Say anything to win. Believe in nothing except winning. Just win.
The Trumpian ethic is the sociopath’s profile. There is no difference between them.
Trump’s trial in the Senate then is the distilled essence of the Trumpian ethic: “The almost aggressive bad faith with which they [his lawyers] parrot Trump’s “defenses” – no matter how false or contradictory – makes no effort to persuade. It’s a display of power. Just as the cruelty at the border is the point, the open dishonesty is the point. It’s authoritarian theater.”*
What is most worrisome is that this anti-virtue has found a home with at least 63 million Americans. For his supporters, the Trumpian Ethic may be the new American ethic. It will linger in his wake. The toxic effects of poison are long lasting.
*from a twitter account: choking victim@seamopper
