Civil Discourse or Civil War?
The Democrat and Republican conventions are over and both sides are in a full sprint to the November (hopefully) finish. I say hopefully because I am one who watches history and have seen this in other places before. One side wins a close one, and the other side brings in lawyers, courts and recounts until they win, and it stays in a convoluted mess of bitterness, guile and hatred from both sides for years to come.
It seems we are at that point in American today. One doesn’t have to be a fortune teller to see what is coming. Regardless of which side is declared the winner, the other side will do all they can to take it away.
In looking at history, I was always fascinated about the Civil War. I could never fully comprehend how friends, neighbors and immediate family members could disagree about politics so much that they would actually turn their differences of opinions into hatred and real honest-to-goodness war. Yet they did.
Everyone likes to say the war was about slavery, and it is true that slavery was a large part of the issue. The key issue however was states’ rights, including western expansion. Again, the southern states wanted to take slavery into these territories while the northern states wanted to keep it open to white workers only. According to the video What Caused the Civil War, the newly formed Republican party was strongly against taking slavery into the western areas. When their candidate, Abraham Lincoln, won the presidential election, the southern states realized they had lost all influence. Feeling excluded from the political system, they turned to what they felt was the only option – succession. That decision led to the inevitable war.
Today, we are again at similar crossroads. Political parties and their followers are being led blindly into the night by political leaders and media talking heads from all sides without stopping to research facts and think for themselves.
We are being not only preached at but literally yelled at and confronted about all sorts of political agendas such as police, race, immigration, masks, statues, protests and more. All the while, we are told free speech for me but not for you, protests for me but not for you and these laws and mandates are for you but not for me.
The do-as-I-say-not-as-I-do attitudes and actions of politicians and elected officials at all levels of government is mind-boggling. This past week a city council member who was probably the strongest proponent of the unenforceable city mask mandate has been seen on social media in groups without a mask. That is no different than Dr. Anthony Fauci wearing a mask on the pitcher’s mound then not doing so in the stands with his friends, Nancy Pelosi walking through San Francisco’s China Town, or funerals of thousands for some in the political limelight, while the grandmother in rural America cannot have a service.
Discussion of different ideas and philosophies can be a good thing, and that is called civil discourse. However, we have reached a point where riotous criminals have taken over cities and neighborhoods. When a U.S. Senator is attacked while leaving his party’s convention or when couples are sitting at dinner on a restaurant patio and are being surrounded by angry mobs, things have gone too far and need to stop.
America is free. You may not agree with the other side, but you cannot force them to do what you want through fear and intimidation. If this keeps up we will have a war, and there will be absolutely nothing civil about it.
Randy Gibson is the CEO of RDG Communications Group, LLC, and the former director of the Tahlequah Area Chamber of Commerce and the Texas State Rifle Association.
