In ‘mirror world’, Trump is martyr and Biden is autocrat, as calls for violence erupt on internet after ex-president’s conviction
The posts are ominous.
“Pick a side, or YOU are next,” wrote conservative talkshow host Dan Bongino on the Truth Social media platform in the aftermath of Donald Trump’s 34 felony convictions.
The replies were even more so.
“Dan, seriously now,” one user wrote in response to Bongino. “I see no way out of all this mess without bloodshed. When you can rig an election, then weaponize the government and the courts against a former President, what other alternative is there? I’m almost 70 and would rather die than live in tyranny.”
That’s a common version of how many people on the US right reacted to the ex-president’s verdict, drawing on a “mirror world” where Trump is seen as the selfless martyr to powerful state forces and Joe Biden is the dangerous autocrat wielding the justice system as his own personal plaything and a threat to US democracy.
Calls for revenge, retribution and violence littered the rightwing internet as soon as Trump’s guilty verdict came down, all predicated on the idea that the trial had been a sham designed to interfere with the 2024 election. Some posted online explicitly saying it was time for hangings, executions and civil wars.
The human race is so dumb. We could be building spaceships and exploring the stars and the depths of the oceans. Instead we are being manipulated by propaganda to fight with each other while nefarious forces wrestle for power. This timeline sucks….
Nonsense. They aren't mobilizing. Loud pundits are telling them to mobilize.
Where are they gathering? They weren't even outside Trump's trial in any sizable numbers.
This is some fearmongering bullshit based on stupid nonsense people like fucking Dan Bongino of all people on said on fucking Truth Social. Even most of MAGA world isn't on Truth Social.
I'm not really sure it should be up to 70 year olds whether we have a civil war. It's the young people that will have to live in it's wake, should it happen.
"When you can rig an election, then weaponize the government and the courts against a former President, what other alternative is there? I’m almost 70 and would rather die than live in tyranny."
I hope the country does reconstruction properly after Civil War II instead of coddling traitors and letting them put roughshod Confederate statues in town squares.
Class civil war being instigated by wealthy oligarchs who don’t really care how it happens, but they’re intent on bringing about a coup one way or another. So they amp up the chaos and division and will look to take advantage of it. Right-wingers are being fed a bunch of bullshit and they’re trying to deify Trump, one of the worst examples of a human being in history, and getting pushed to violence to protect a living piece of excrement.
The Justice Dept really needed to come down harder on Trump and everyone else involved in Jan. 6. They showed their cards then and what they’ve been planning all along, we shouldn’t gave given them a second chance.
No one is mobilizing shit, people are still fed and clothed, housed and have jobs and still have their entertainment...these loudmouths aren't going to do shit. They just talk a lot but at the end of the day, they're not going to start shit.
You guys don't understand, this time they're double-super-mega-serious, not like all the other times these overly fearful ammosexuals talked a good game from behind their screens but completely failed to follow up in the real world.
One thing to note is that Republicans have been talking like this for years. Minion Death Cult (tagline "The World Is Ending. Your Uncle’s Facebook Feed Is Responsible. We’re Documenting it.") have coined "Minion's Law", which is that right-wing comments on a news story will have at least one person calling for civil war.
Does this mean we are at zero risk for a second civil war? Of course not. But finding people online calling for civil war isn't sufficient cause to be worried; there needs to be at least some evidence of mobilization, as there was leading up to January 6th (for instance).
“Dan, seriously now,” one user wrote in response to Bongino. “I see no way out of all this mess without bloodshed. When you can rig an election, then weaponize the government and the courts against a former President, what other alternative is there? I’m almost 70 and would rather die than live in tyranny.”
I remember watching movies as a kid where the children were these clever little heroes and the adults were morons or bad guys they had to deal with. It’s fun for kids to see the tables turned and watch the children in the movie save the day or outsmart the dumb adult.
I got a very strong vibe like that (but worse) while reading this story. These people are caught up in a fantasy they’ve been sold where they have to save everything they love from evil. They seem to live in a fantasy movie world where if you feel like the righteous underdog, and other “good” people tell you the same thing, then surely you are the hero! You can’t listen to evidence and reason from outsiders, they’re just trying to trick you!
Honestly, I'm inclined to agree. I also don't see a way out without bloodshed. Not because I want Republicans to die or think that Democrats are so great that I am ready to die for them, but rather because we have split so far ideologically that I cannot see us ever being united again and we seemingly don't have any method available for a peaceful divorce.
My personal plan is to leave the country permanently as soon as I retire, but that is 15 years away. I can only hope that things stay somewhat together until then and I will use my vote to try to help it do so.
Getting a bit concerned about my allergies. My father's mother had to go on some pretty strong allergy meds when she got older. I hope this isn't what happens to me. Should probably talk to my doctor at my next checkup.
Nobody accepts that they're going to win, because Biden's institutional-inertia & assumed-entitlement aren't sufficient to win.
Also, the economic house-of-cards that both China & the US are trying to keep from collapsing must go down, sooner or later, & if it goes down before the US election, then the incumbent's hosed.
( that is true no matter who the incumbent is, and I believe it always has been true: that it's a general rule of elections: economic-collapse automatically rips the rug out from the incumbent )
Nobody understands that they need to do the ideological psyching-up, in order to "justify" all the butchery, all the "getting even" their side's committed to enforcing, so that they will later be able to maintain they weren't responsible..
( it makes me wonder if there was similar unconscious-understanding, & similar setting-up-non-responsibility, among other violent political, or religious, movements' people )
shruggeth
A dozen years from now, I'm going to be very surprised if more than 150 million are left alive in the US of A, after Civil War Part2 is finished.
There are currently around 400 million, iirc.
I'm expecting 2/3rds extinguished in the coming maelstrom, & its consequences.
And that is just within the US.
Trump's commitment to gut NATO & back Putin..
the butchery of the US of A will be only the beginning, obviously.
But for ideology-addiction, rampaging's "The Answer", isn't it?