Political rhetoric can be dangerous. Like clay, it is frequently manipulated and fashioned for a specific purpose, often one that is ill-willed. How was Adolf Hitler able to rise to the power that he then used to murder over six million Jews? During a time of economic and social instability, he used political rhetoric to convince the people of Germany he was what they needed to be a strong country once again. The history of Nazi Germany proves that rhetoric can be used to make even someone as despicable as Hitler seem initially trustworthy. And so, if that’s true, then it’s certainly reasonable to conclude that political rhetoric can have the opposite effect — making someone appear evil, even when they’re not.
As The Washington Stand’s Joshua Arnold articulated, we’ve watched “dangerous rhetoric” lead to an assassination attempt on former President Donald Trump. “What could provoke such intense hatred for Donald Trump?” Arnold asked. Only that of “a coordinated campaign to compare him to one of the greatest villains of the last century,” Hitler himself. According to the Left, including President Joe Biden, Trump is “a threat to democracy.” This, and more, has circulated social media for years. Countless individuals, both young and old, have been convinced that Trump is the epitome of evil, and that he must be destroyed. This rhetoric may have led to his assassination attempt, and it’s what led to the numerous Democrats who have openly lamented over the fact that Trump survived said attack.
This trend of condoning violence and supporting murder is a reality you couldn’t miss even if you tried. Within days of the shooting, prominent conservative social media account Libs of TikTok was exposing accounts saying they were sad, mad, or annoyed that the shooter missed his target. In fact, a recent snap poll from Unheard revealed that “one-third of Democrat respondents agreed with the statement, ‘I wish Trump’s assassin hadn’t missed.’”
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The author of the poll, Eric Kaufmann, wrote, “Looking beneath the numbers, the new moral absolutism of the progressive Left picks out which Democrats support assassination and which do not.” He went on to say, “Support for the statement hardly varies by age, race or education, but is connected to ideology and partisanship.” In other words, the patterns Kaufmann uncovered in the survey demonstrated the common denominator within those who supported the attempted murder was nothing short of radical left-wing ideology.
What Kaufmann discovered in the surveys he conducted in 2020 is that “woke beliefs make people moralize politics, increasing intolerance and totalizing black-and-white thinking.” This observation ties into the findings of this recent poll, which noted that 55% of the respondents agreed that “White Republicans are racist.” This data, alongside the data Kaufmann presented that showed growth in an “unwillingness of liberals to date and hire Republicans or Trump supporters,” reveals some startling truths. There’s a “moral absolutism” at play here, and for the Left, it’s inseparable from identity. This kind of worldview, the kind that turns Trump into Hitler, puts us in a precarious position. We’re left wondering: just how bad could this intolerance get?
Kaufmann summarized it this way: “Now, identity politics has moralized the outlook of the Left, painting conservatives as evil rather than wrong. This fuels catastrophizing language around ‘white supremacy,’ ‘fascism’ and ‘danger,’ leading to a high-stakes emotional atmosphere. Given our new politics of identitarian sacredness and moral absolutism, we should not be surprised to see a rise in political extremism.”
In response to the survey results and Kaufmann’s analysis, David Closson, Family Research Council’s director of the Center for Biblical Worldview, shared with The Washington Stand, “The events of July 13th are forever a part of American history.” He continued, “The fact that an assassin’s bullet came centimeters away from ending the life of a former president and leading nominee for the Republican nomination shocked and stunned the entire nation in the immediate aftermath of the failed assassination attempt. [Most] Americans expressed gratitude that … Trump did not succumb to the assassin’s bullet.”
However, as Closson went on to say, “in the hyper-politicized times that we live in, it is not altogether surprising that some people are now saying that they wish Donald Trump had been seriously hurt or even killed, as evidenced by one recent poll.” This speaks to the reality that “many Americans view politics with an almost existential sense, that if their candidate doesn’t prevail, then the world as we know it will cease to exist.”
Closson further pointed out that “the fact that anyone would suggest they would be pleased with a more serious injury to the president speaks to a reprehensible moral ethic that shows how decayed much of our society has become today.” Ultimately, “Political violence is not unique to the Left,” Closson stated, but “there has certainly been an uptick in violence perpetrated against those on the political Right.”
Closson argued that “the rise of political violence on the Left tracks with a rise in politically extreme rhetoric” — shining light on the fact that this incivility and these behaviors “stem from a larger worldview.” According to Closson, these circumstances are only to be expected when the Left increasingly holds “to a worldview that sees politics as ultimate.”
When politics are placed on such a high pedestal, it becomes “the means by which they achieve their utopia, their revolution, [or] whatever aims that they are seeking.” Suddenly, it becomes clear they “will do whatever it takes to achieve those ends” — even if it means taking the life of another. But as Closson emphasized, this worldview ought to be the opposite to that of a biblical worldview. “Christians understand that no matter what happens in politics, we hold our wins and our losses loosely.”
Closson concluded, “Whether our bill dies in committee, or our candidate loses an election, we know that Jesus is still on His throne.” Regardless of how bent out of shape this world appears, “we know that Jesus sovereignly holds all things together, as Colossians 1:16 teaches. As Christians, we rigorously engage in politics, but we never allow politics to become ultimate. Because if politics becomes ultimate, and that’s where we find all of our meaning and our source of hope, then we’ll quickly also find ourselves being willing to excuse what is truly inexcusable.”
LifeNews Note: Sarah Holliday is a reporter at The Washington Stand, where this originally appeared.
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