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This week, I had a conversation with someone from an investigative agency who had come down to my office. He was exactly my age, almost 50 years old, and I was surprised by what he said. I will tell you what they were in a bit. Let's first look at events in the United States. A man who was identified as a member of President Donald Trump's political party sent bombs to Trump's opponents. Among them were former President Barack Obama, former presidential candidate and Democratic leader Hillary Clinton, members of the intelligence agency criticized by Trump and a woman of Indian origin, Kamala Harris, who should report to the presidency in 2020.
We are all aware of the quality of the political debate in the United States, especially since the departure of Obama. Trump has reduced the problems to a childlike simplicity. Most things are good or bad, white or black. In the language of Indian political discourse, things are either national or anti-national.
Image of representation. PTI
In regards to immigration, Trump has been aggressive and furious in saying that the problem should stop and that he would do it by force. He erects physical barriers and separates children from their families from those who came to the United States without a visa.
Democrats and the business community say that the arrival of Mexican blue-collar workers helps the US economy. Silicon Valley insisted that Trump's proposed visa denial to Indian software engineers would hurt their business. But for Trump and his supporters, the problem is clear: America must stay pure. Mexicans are rapists and criminals and Indians are cutting jobs that should legitimately belong to US citizens.
Trump refers to countries that are not white as "shitty countries". It is the kind of violent rhetoric that, injected into the political debate, inspires and produces violence.
It is not surprising that if you look at the recent occurrence of this kind of thing in the West, it is the members of the "right" who are responsible.
An American member of the House of Representatives (their version of our Lok Sabha), Gabrielle Giffords, was hit in the head in 2011 by an individual identifying with the Tea Party, the extreme wing of the Republican Party. In 2016, Jo Cox, a woman in the British version of the Lok Sabha, the House of Representatives, was shot dead by a man who objected to her immigration policy and qualified her of "traitor to whites". This occurred in the run-up to the Brexit vote, while the most important problem was that of immigration.
In all these cases, and in others, there is a common theme. The individual identifies very strongly with the simplistic, generally very nationalist positions stated by political leaders. He (and the individual is usually a he) thinks that those with different points of view are traitors and enemies. It is amazing that the debate in America has fallen to such a low level that even a former president like Obama is now considered anti-national.
Now let me talk about this person I was talking about at the beginning. He was part of the raiding group and appeared to be a calm and intelligent man. The organization to which he belonged belonged to the Ministry of Finance. However, almost exclusively, their interest was in the work we were doing and that they considered "anti-national". One of them even used this specific word.
I was surprised that this is happening now even within the government. The meanness, hatred and anger of televised debates, which reduce complex problems to very simple and childish propositions, have become not only the mainstream, but also an integral part of the establishment. I tried, calmly, to reason with him, but he stopped me. He said that he was starting to get angry and that it was useless to listen to that any longer.
We arrived at a dangerous passage in this country and we arrived here very quickly. We see a lot of people, including particular communities, as enemies. But enemies of what? The answer is that they are the enemies of the worldview and politics that a party holds. If you do not belong to this party, you hate your country and you act against its interests.
The lynching that we see so often around us these days is the same manifestation as this madman who sends bombs to people whom he considers to be those of Trump and his own enemies. Violence is produced by political rhetoric and we are all infected with it. We must take a deep breath and reflect on what is happening around us as we head for a long and furious path to the next election.
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