Pining for the days when society had ethics
As I’ve acknowledged before, I’m a fan of editorial cartooning, and a cartoon by the syndicated cartoonist Joe Heller recently caught my eye. It depicts a confrontation between a man wearing a MAGA T-shirt and Uncle Sam. The MAGA character is holding up a sign proclaiming, “BRING BACK THE GOOD OL’ DAYS.” Uncle Sam replies, “You mean the good ol’ days when cheating on your pregnant wife with a porn star would surely end a political career?” Point taken!
That cartoon speaks to the abiding sense of anomie I’ve been feeling ever since Donald Trump became the 45th president of the United States. Anomie, of course, refers to the anxiety and insecurity people feel when the standards, values, ideals, and expectations that governed our lives no longer hold sway. Thanks in large part to Donald Trump and his true believers, all our old verities seem to be collapsing.
Don’t get me wrong. I don’t miss the straitlaced moral and social norms that governed sex, gender and marriage. I’m a child of the 1960s. Whatever makes a person happy and hurts no one else is fine with me. I do, however, find Trump’s misogyny and mistreatment of women reprehensible. The behavior Heller satirizes in his cartoon is bad enough. Add to that the “Access Hollywood” tape in which Trump brags about groping unsuspecting women with impunity. That should have put an end to his presidential ambitions but didn’t. Trump’s behavior has hurt other people. But what I mostly miss are the old legal, ethical, and civil standards.
I grew up at a time when respect for the judiciary was a given and when there were serious consequences for contempt of court — including jail time. Trump, however, has made a mockery of his New York hush-money trial. He has repeatedly voiced his disrespect for the judge and the jury and has been fined for violating the judge’s gag order ten times. A second contempt-of-court ruling would land an ordinary citizen in jail. He has also misrepresented his gag order — at one point falsely claiming it barred him from testifying on his own behalf.
Along the same lines, how is it that so many Americans — including most Republicans — have become inured to dishonesty? Trump has told thousands of documented lies, misrepresentations, and exaggerations. Yet millions of Americans still support him.
And whatever became of our respect for education and recognized authority? Trump is clearly ill-educated, and people of his ilk seem to believe unreasoned, uninformed, and unlettered opinions should count as much as those of credentialed, recognized experts. And absurd conspiracy theories that once would have gained no traction are now being taken seriously.
Consider Marjorie Taylor Greene and her Jewish space lasers. She and Colorado Rep. Lauren Boebert are QAnon supporters and believers in a deep-state conspiracy. We used to expect members of Congress to be serious well-educated and reasonable people grounded in the same plane of existence as the rest of us. These days anybody will do when it comes to keeping a Republican majority in the House of Representatives. Note how long it took the House to expel the fabulist George Santos.
Not so very long ago, we also expected legislators to comport themselves with a degree of courtesy, civility, dignity, and mutual respect. Did you catch the recent name-calling cat fight in the House involving Reps. Greene, Jasmine Crockett, and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez? I understand contentious 19th-century politicians would even come to blows, but I thought we had long outgrown those days. It’s bad enough that Democrats and Republicans no longer view one another as the loyal opposition and not the enemy. Now they’re hard-pressed to get along in their own legislative bodies.
I also miss the days when our law enforcement and judicial institutions were universally respected. Defund the FBI? Seriously? And contrary to GOP belief, the Department of Justice has not been “weaponized” against Trump. His legal problems are all of his own doing, and I for one am appalled at how leading Republicans are eroding faith in our system of justice just to defend an undeserving, amoral, and unprincipled narcissist. So much for no one being above the law.
Even the formerly non-partisan Supreme Court now seems to have been corrupted by the ultra-rich and co-opted by Trumpists. I never thought we would hear about a Supreme Court justice flying an upside down flag in support of the January 6 insurrection. And let’s face it: The court is deliberately slow-walking the decision on presidential immunity. All the better to get Trump back in the White House!
Finally, I can’t understand how anyone can make light of the events of January 6, 2021. We used to think coup attempts happened only in banana republics. But Trump fomented one right here in America. And this is the man likely to be elected again to the presidency.
These are just some of the reasons why I’m feeling dispirited and uncentered these days. Are you feeling it too but didn’t know what to call it? “Anomie,” as the French would say, is le mot juste. “It pays to increase your word power.” The Reader’s Digest of old used to remind us of that.
For my part, I’m reminding you to pay attention to editorial cartoons. Editorial cartoonists are the prophets of our time.
Contact Ed Palm at majorpalm@gmail.com.
This article originally appeared on Kitsap Sun: Pining for the days when society had ethics
