The more I read and the more I listen (and the older I get) the more I tend to oversimplify. Today I am simplifying the difference between how people try to inspire and motivate us using either fear or hope. Politics is a great place to start, so let’s start there.
Is Donald Trump the new Joseph McCarthy? Is Trumpism the same as McCarthyism? In many ways it sure it. Those two (not so) gentlemen tried to prey on our fears. Many people fear the loss of their way of life in some way. Communists in the 1950s were supposedly going to threaten everything that is true blue American. What Joe McCarthy was doing was simply using these fears to promote himself. It’s not even clear that he believed most of the bullshit he was peddling – there were plenty of side conversations that revealed this. Trump is similar – he preys on (some) people’s fears of things foreign as well – immigration, people of color, LGBTQ types. He invented “deep state” to be afraid of and inspired many to protest and violence to “keep America great.”
Our greatest leaders inspired hope. Abraham Lincoln and FDR are a couple of examples. Their speeches were about hope and inspiration, not about fear. In fact, it was FDR who said that the only thing we have to fear is fear itself!
I take heart in the history that set Joe McCarthy aside (he was censured by the US Senate and died not long after) and hope (yes, hope) that Donald Trump will be relegated to the same dust bin. They both did damage to the reputation of the very America that they professed to be protecting. They were really simply promoting themselves.
Who among us will inspire hope next?
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