THE BLAME GAME

By Ruth A. Sheets

Blaming is part of life.  As far as I can tell, everyone does it at some time or other.  Blaming people for what they have done makes sense when a crime has been committed, for example, but not when the blamed person could be killed by a government or individuals who don’t like what that person stands for or has done. 

One can blame people and circumstances for doing or causing something and that blaming can be true, like that storm blew down a tree or Joe started the fight.  Blaming can also be a powerful lie that identifies the wrong person or cause for something that happens, like me blaming my siblings for something they didn’t do or Trump blaming everyone but himself for his bad (one might say criminal) behavior.  The latter I call lie-blaming.  Lie-blaming can even be deadly:  vaccines cause COVID and  vaccines and wearing masks caused all those COVID deaths, or the 1994 genocide in Rwanda.  Lie-blaming can be especially problematic when wielded by politicians and others in authority:  Marjorie Greene and her Q-anon BS, Moms for Liberty (a group name that is already a lie before the blaming begins), and an indicted former president who lie-blames nearly everyone he has ever heard of who does not give him total loyalty.    

Alas, guilt is rarely a side effect of lie-blaming.  It would be great if political leaders around the world would feel some guilt when they start their lie-blaming of others for either things they themselves have done or that the blamed have not done.  I know that is wishful thinking, but it sure would save a lot of suffering.   

Just imagine it, Gov. DeSantis of Florida deciding to rightly blame himself for the harms resulting from the various anti-American and inhumane laws he pushed forward to prove his bonafiidies as a macho, white Christian nationalist Republican man!  I think DeSantis and others see racist, homo/transphobic, misogynistic, and fascist ideas as positives though they wouldn’t use those terms.  Most people don’t agree, and to some extent DeSantis and his club know he must “please the minions somewhat if he would gain the level of power he craves.  It works for DeSantis to blame the “woke,” a group he never has to define so it can morph as needed to reflect his purposes/biases at any particular time.  You see, DeSantis sees himself as god’s gift to the world, smarter and just plain better than everyone else.  Ugh!

Lie-blamers also sneak in the old “they made me do it” line, the “blame the victim” strategy that has permitted enormous suffering over time.  “If they hadn’t done ____ I wouldn’t have had to ____.”  They act as though they have no biases; they are just telling it like it is.  For DeSantis, The insignificant people are making it so hard to be a rich, white, “straight” pseudo-christian man in Florida, America, you know.  Where have we seen such blaming, such abuse of power before?  Could it be . . . 1930s Germany and Italy?  Or, is it just privileged people who make assumptions that everything they have and are came only from themselves and their own efforts because they are just soooo special?  And, if they don’t get everything they want, it must be that someone else is to blame.

Putin of Russia is a terrific lie-blamer, a master because he knows the majority of his people are too cowed to do anything about it.  He blames the West for making him attack Ukraine, his generals for failing to give him an instant victory, and his super rich playmates for not sufficiently bowing and scraping to him and his every whim.  People die because of Putin’s blaming, individually as they happen to fall out of windows (or succumb to poison), and collectively from his wars on his neighbors and his support of other dictators.  Despite Putin’s (and some Republicans) lies, the West didn’t force Putin into attacking his neighbor Ukraine; his desire to be Putey the Great did that.  His generals may have been inept, but they did not know what they were getting into due to their master’s magical thinking.  The oligarchs were just doing what Putin wanted, making lots of money for themselves and, by the way, Putin too, and Putin wanted a much bigger cut.

Then, there’s the Blamer in Chief,  I imagine Donald Trump rarely if ever accepted responsibility for a single thing he did in his life that harmed others or caused chaos.  He lie-blamed people around him for his own shortcomings or actual criminal behavior.  He has clearly broken numerous laws and violated expected norms over and over, but it couldn’t have been his fault!  For him, impeachment twice was a joke he didn’t worry much about because he knew his senatorial cult members would acquit him.  Trump knew full well he lost the 2020 election and that the January 6th insurrection was his followers responding to his call to a coup but he chose to blame ANTIFA (whatever that is).

Now, Trump is blaming President Biden for the indictments and potential indictments he has faced and will likely face.  Biden has deliberately absented himself from the whole process, allowing local prosecutors and the special counsel to do their jobs, but our Baby Donnie doesn’t care about what is true or even what makes sense.  As the spaghetti guy, he just keeps throwing spaghetti lies against the wall hoping at least some of them will stick and he will know which strands of his lie-blaming will work with his cult.  Since they don’t seem to actually listen to what Trump is saying as it makes little sense these days, they cling to the mood of self-righteousness and “poor little me” he is projecting.  As long as he blames, insults, and threatens the right people and programs they will stick with him, even though many of his proposals will actually do harm to them personally.  They will be hurt but he will be sure to tell them whom to blame for their pain as he has done all along.

We keep hearing from pundits and occasional reporters that the polarization in our nation is terrible, yet they neglect to inform viewers, readers, and listeners that the Republican Party and conservatives in general are the primary orchestrators of this polarization through their whining that everything is not the way they remember it or that someone must be taking the American dream from them or that those people “aren’t like us and are trying to erase us white people.”  American right-wingers initiate and stoke the politics of fear, which is very effective among vulnerable people who choose not to find out if any of what they are learning is true.  They cling to Fox or whatever news source gives them the most comfort that they are right because it affirms their fears of the other.  Then guns are thrown into the mix and the right-wing hope is that their decades-long preparations will lead to chaos they can exploit to cement their power-grabbing, then blame it on someone else.

We can stand against this culture of lie-blaming and lack of accountability and We the People would do well to get started then, keep moving.

-              The media could stop daily playing Trump’s mouthing off with his lie-blaming and whining, or just mention occasionally that Trump is still out there, same old same old.

-              - President Biden could publicly call out the bad behavior, tell the stories of some of the people whose lives have been threatened and changed as targets of folks blaming them for just doing their jobs.  This must be a major speech, given in a community where its residents have experienced the harm.

-              - Credible threats are not protected speech, online or not and need to be investigated and prosecuted.

-              - Push voter registration (automatic registration would be best (Republicans truly hate that, though).  Amendments 15, 19, & 26 say every citizen 18 years and older has the right to vote, not just those Republicans approve of.

-              - Vote in every single election for candidates who actually care about this nation and are not caught up in childish whining and blaming, but have positive ideas for improving life for all of us.  There are a lot out here if we look for them.

-              - Question  public officials and media who are lie-blaming.  Ask where they got their information.  Demand proof.  Make it clear if they are lying and blaming the wrong people it must be made known, or shock, maybe in that situation, no blame should be handed out at all.

-              - Stay informed as to what is going on and get information from more than one reputable source.   

I know if we think about it collectively, we can come up with even more strategies for identifying the lie-blaming, who it is aimed at, and who benefits.  Then we need to find even more effective ways of confronting the political lie-blaming that threatens people’s lives, demanding our media and public officials call it out wherever it appears. 

Keep in mind, though, sometimes it is essential to blame the right people for their bad behavior, like the fossil fuelers who hid a report that proved they knew about global warming mor than 4 decades ago and did nothing to move toward ending it, in fact fought against other people’s attempts to act.

We can act if we remember our democracy is on the line and rather powerful groups are using lie-blaming and other strategies to take democracy away in favor of power for rich white men and corporations.  We did that rich white man thing throughout history and it brought us to nearly constant war and possible climate disaster.  We need to try something different.  It’s time!