What Comes After Denial? Thoughts on Donald Trump’s Movement
By: The Hannah Arendt Center
Tags: Politics, Donald Trump, Hannah Arendt, Democracy, 2016 Election

“In an ever-changing, incomprehensible world the masses had reached the point where they would, at the same time, believe everything and nothing, think that everything was possible and that nothing was true.” —Hannah Arendt, The Origins of Totalitarianism

I was in the lobby of a theatre this week after the election, having an honest talk about Donald Trump. A lady came over to me and my friends and whispered, “keep your voice down or you’ll get arrested.” I told her she was being ridiculous and she responded that we all had to be careful. He would arrest his critics. I understand some people are upset. I’m upset. But paranoia leads to isolation. The worst thing we can do is silence ourselves, to act as if the danger is worse than it is. There are real problems. Let’s not pretend to have problems that don’t exist.

So what is the situation that shows itself in the election of Donald Trump?

Donald Trump is boorish and a bully. He is mean. Whether he actually is a bigot or just plays one on the national stage, his enabling of bigotry is real. The NY Times published a long list of the 282 people and ideas that Trump insulted on Twitter. Anyone who reads that list and doesn’t see that Trump is a stunted person has lost their faculty of judgment. It may be that 58% of those who voted for Trump don’t like him. Many say that he is different in private. But does it matter? What matters is less Trump himself than what his election says about us.

Trump’s most revealing line was early in the primaries when he claimed he could shoot someone on Fifth Avenue and still be elected President. He has been proven correct.

I am shaken by the lack of judgment of my fellow Americans. For Trump, the basic principle of nihilism, that everything is permitted, is a mantra. It is a sign of his ruthlessness, his willingness to do anything to win. And that is part of his attraction: that he will be a strong leader who will do anything to win. In business, Trump uses lawyers to refuse to pay his contractors. He uses lawyers to avoid income taxes (sometimes legally, but likely not always). He uses lawyers to bully those who would question him and journalists who report on him. Just two weeks ago he repeatedly threatened to not accept the election results. The very ‘win at all cost’ mentality that should disqualify him convinces us that Trump will succeed.

I say this as someone who very much understands the attraction of someone like Trump, an outsider who would come into Washington owing no one anything and “drain the swamp” as Trumps’ supporters like to say. I at times hoped Trump would prove himself worthy, for I am furious at political corruption and the culture of lobbying. I too want to attack the culture of privilege in government and in business and in cultural institutions. If Trump carries through his plan to reduce lobbyists, reduce regulations, and limit congressional terms, much good would come. But what in God’s name makes people think that Trump can do this? He has no experience in administration. No record of public service. And shows no evidence of being able to manage a sprawling Federal bureaucracy, let alone being able to oversee foreign policy. He lies with abandon and insults everyone. How have we put our hope in such a man?

When we lose our willingness to judge, when we come to accept vileness into our political world, we prove that we have made peace with our nihilistic faith that “everything is permitted” so long as it is useful. We show ourselves for who we are, a people whose indifference to ethical vacuity exemplifies our own banality with regards to evil. This election is a necessary mirror, and we should all be looking at ourselves.

What drives the pundits crazy is that the data doesn’t support their simplistic narratives. Trump won more Latino and more African American voters than Mitt Romney despite the fact that Trump legitimized angry denunciations of illegal immigration from Mexico and fanned racism and antisemitism; Clinton didn’t carry women voters by as much as Barack Obama did and Trump won the majority of working-class-white women, even though Trump bragged about sexual assault and was accused of assault by eleven women; and white lower-class voters began to abandon their traditional democratic leanings even though Trump is a plutocrat with absolutely no record of public service, no history of philanthropy, and no record of being concerned for the average American. The pundits are befuddled, since they thought and think the election was about race, gender, and class. But the data around racial and gender support are all equivocal.

Too often left out in this litany of resentments is the fact that Trump’s popularity was fueled by a deep, abiding, and angry resentment against the pundit class itself, the elites — that is those of us in positions of authority throughout this country. More than racism and sexism, and even more than class, this election was a rebellion against elite power.

The elites have given themselves the keys to power. Seventy-two percent of all voters in the New York Times’ exit polls (voters for both Hillary Clinton and for Trump) say they “believe the economy is rigged for the advantage of the rich and powerful.” Sixty-eight percent of all voters believe that “politicians from Republican and Democratic parties don’t care about people like you and me.” If we want to know where Trump comes from, we should be looking at those of us in the political, business, media, and cultural elite.

What stands out in the election polling and is obvious from watching the frenzied and enthusiastic support for both Trump and Bernie Sanders is that the electorate is furious at the power of the elite. The people feel spurned. The forgotten people are rebelling. We are witnessing a rejection of elite power. Eighty-three percent of Trump voters say “bringing real change” is the most important quality in a President. We are seeing a rejection of ourselves. And we need to take that seriously.

Throughout history, the people don’t despise or resent power in itself. What they resent, as Alexis de Tocqueville noted in his description of the French Aristocrats about to lose their power, is unjust and illegitimate power.

“[T]he French people hated the aristocrats about to lose their power more than it had ever hated them before, precisely because their rapid loss of real power was not accompanied by any considerable decline in their fortunes.”

The people loved the aristocrats until the power of the rich seemed unnecessary and “the people felt them to be parasites, without any real function in the rule of the country.” The lesson Hannah Arendt took from Tocqueville is that “neither oppression nor exploitation as such is ever the main cause for resentment; wealth without visible function is much more intolerable because nobody can understand why it should be tolerated.” In other words, when people rebel, it is because they come to see the power elite as useless and superfluous. They are usually right.

Trump has tapped into the growing realization that the wealth and power of the connected business, political, cultural, and media elites has no visible function. When the economy is growing, when schools are functioning, when health care is accessible, when jobs are plentiful, and when hard work leads to success, the people generally tolerate and respect the powerful. For the last 50 years, however, the elite has made a promise to the people. “Let us — the college-educated, the social-scientists, and the experts — let us run the country. Give us your taxes. You live your lives and don’t involve yourselves in politics. Let us take care of you.” And after fifty years, the people are looking at the system that the elites have created and crying foul.

Trump’s election is an opportunity, if we grasp it. It is an opportunity to break down our prejudices and reach out to the people who are so angry that they were willing to risk voting for Trump. We should hear their stories with an empathy and solidarity that is currently lacking. Yes they must listen to us as well. Both sides need to reach out and engage in deep and ethical listening of the kind imagined in this public living room conversation between Trump and Clinton supporters. And that will require revising our worldviews, admitting our own failures and limitations, and renewing our respect for people very different from ourselves.