As Two Realities Exploded in our Eyes
By: Evan J. Mastronardi
Tags: Racism, Sexism, Politics, Trump Administration, Protest

(The *Fantasy* House That Trump Built)

Donald Trump did not start any of this. He just gave it a new home.

Protestors in front of the White House in August watch fireworks with pro-Trump and USA excellence messages from the conclusion of the RNC on the White House Lawn during the 2020 Covid-19 pandemic (I took the photo).

We were leaving the protest — a combusting amalgam of slogans, dances, cries, demands, moral truths, and transcontinental voices — and then the second explosion happened.

Before the crowd, before the lawn, before the House on the Capitol, were a rainbow of sparks littering the night. Throwing a counterpunch at its competition in the sonic atmosphere.

Trump 2020

USA

MAGA

All flashing in the air — juxtaposed to the crowd mourning those who can’t breathe.

—

What we saw that day we already knew. It was just condensed to a horizon our vision could contain.

Trump’s America is a fantasy for its supporters and a horrific reality for its victims.

But it’s an old fantasy only trying to reinforce an old harm to the livelihoods of millions of Americans — just with a new vehicle.

While thousands are dead from Covid-19 (over 200,000 at the time of this writing); while we mourn those dead to police brutality, those who died on military bases, some celebrate.

Because to celebrate a fantasy has always been easier than to remedy a reality.

Fewer immigrants. White power, white excellence. American excellence despite statistics, results, and oppression. Nationalism. Racism, sexism, homophobia either gone all together or accepted or encouraged. Invalidating, muting “complaints” from minorities, marginalized people.

These ideals have been the common thread of a large segment of the American population. Candidates in the past have tried to sew this thread into their platforms for years.

But Donald Trump made fantasy a platform.

He knew he could win with just the string.

He ran this country like a fantasy football team. With no losers. Nobody who got captured. Nobody who challenged the leader. Only those loyal to the coach.

A fantasy doesn’t require much effort. It’s just dreaming. And planning. And Celebrating. And more dreaming.

The results don’t matter. And when the results don’t matter neither do the facts.

Why legislate when you can rally? Create policy when you can create fear? Why bother doing the work to improve lives when the same song has been the tune that keeps bringing people back — no matter what else is playing in the background?

But it’s just that, a song, a fantasy, a dream.

It’s air.

It’s the air that populates oppression, policy, and vitriolic rhetoric. Its effects are very real.

But its as thin as the air into which the embers dissipate.

—

In the end of the IT Chapter 2, the way to disarm the monster was to remind it what it is. A clown.

We must legitimize the pain this administration has caused and its destruction of institutions that have led us steps closer to fascism and a dictatorship.

We must not legitimize the clown’s tale.

He’s not a genius.

He ain’t tap into shit. It was tapped & lit.

This shit been around forever and is old as the day is long. He saw xenophobia, misogyny, those getting left behind in industrialization (an actually rational fear), and the (racist) fear of whites losing a majority and a dream where all this is accepted and the chorus keeps getting reprised and gave it all real estate with his name on it.

It ain’t more than that.

Fantasies get fans. Fan fiction don’t belong in canon and definitely not in the nonfiction section.

So let them have a group onlyfans and let’s rebuild an actual democracy.