Perhaps more so this election cycle than any has the Hawaii Filipino Chronicle showed its true color of independent reporting and editorializing. We’ve already ran critical editorials on Joe Biden’s shortcomings as a leader and his C-grade policy accomplishments in his first two years and F-grade this past year-and-half going into the General.
We’ve also ran editorials on Donald Trump’s legal troubles, his divisiveness and anti-immigrant rhetoric of the past. What we haven’t tackled – largely because this topic is being exhausted in mainstream media – is the potential for Trump becoming a dictator and a threat to democracy.
Instead of regurgitating mainstream media’s fearmongering of Trump as dictator – which is a valid possibility which reasons why, most have already heard – an editorial here on the appendage of what a dictatorial rule would bring is a topic equally important to discuss that’s getting partial, but not full-blown coverage. What is it? The potential for political violence, sectoral violence, or even the taboo subject (now being seriously discussed by political scientists) of civil war.
Threat of political violence Since Jan. 6, 2021, the storming of the U.S. Capitol, talks of political violence most can agree is a legitimate one. The elements that fueled that violent insurrection haven’t gone away. There is continued proliferation and pervasiveness of political divisions and conspiracy theories. Both racism and xenophobia – not quite to the extremism as it were under Trump’s presidency – remains real and exploited by demagogic politicians on both sides of the political spectrum.
Even now, Trump is a prognosticator and provocateur of political violence, who has warned there would be “bedlam in the country” should the criminal charges against him lead to a 2024 election loss. This is the same kind of rhetoric Trump weaponized prior to Jan. 6.
With far more at risk this time around for Trump – his losing would most likely mean jailtime, which is why he’s running for a second term in the first place – it doesn’t take a political scientist to tell you this kind of rhetoric will only worsen.
Not only is the “bad political actor” in Trump still in the picture, but it’s also clear MAGA hasn’t gone anywhere. MAGA hasn’t received the same intensity and frequency of coverage by the mainstream media of late. But Trump’s polling indicate MAGA is alive and well, even the most extremist of them like the gun-toting, militia-type white supremacists.
Accelerationism Political scientist Barbara Walter wrote in her 2022 book How Civil Wars Start: And How to Stop Them, “we are closer to civil war than any of us would like to believe” because of a toxic mix of political extremism and polarization, social and cultural tribalism, the popular embrace of conspiracy theories, proliferation of guns and well-armed militias and the erosion of faith in government and the liberal, Western democratic state.
She cites this concept “accelerationism” which is not an original idea espoused by her but already known among political academics. What is it? It’s the belief that modern society is irredeemable and that its end must be hastened, so that a new order can be brought into being.
Accelerationism has long been embraced by right-wing, fringe groups, militias in the South and Midwest, predominantly among groups wanting the breakup of the United States, those advocating secession. These groups – often featured by mainstream media since Jan. 6 – are ready to exact violence towards this goal.
A new development, but without advocacy for violence as the far-right, is that there are sectors of the political far left who are also adherents to accelerationism, in that they are willing to vote independent and abandon Biden and the Democratic Party to bring about a new order of new Democrats after a would-be Trump dictatorship.
And both the far right and far left want the collapse of (at least in degree) the existing order for different reasons and opposing goals.
Extreme political toxicity The unstable, chaotic political climate has even caught the attention of Hollywood with one studio releasing earlier this spring the movie “Civil War,” which is as the title suggests, but more of a warning of what the aftermath of toxic politics and deepening sectoral divisions could look like, especially if a demagogue leader like a Trump comes to power.
Biden could be accused of many things like exploiting racial divisions in this country as many Democrats do, but at least, Biden is not a Trump being a provocateur of political violence to save his behind.
Is political violence alarmist? Two polls conducted by the University of Maryland’s Center for Democracy and Civil Engagement and the Washington Post suggest otherwise. Both polls, conducted in 2021 and 2024 show Republicans believe the use of violence against the government is “somewhat justified” at 40%. In the second poll, it found “Republicans are more sympathetic to those who stormed the U.S. Capitol and more likely to absolve Donald Trump of responsibility for the attack than they were in 2021.”
There are other more dismal assessments from other political scientists who link increased political violence as an inevitable symptom of a superpower reaching its downfall, stating also that the excessive number of firearms in private hands in the U.S. could facilitate such widespread violence.
Not prophetic While there are clear elements in our nation that could spark political violence (stated above) particularly with a leader in power who has demonstrated its use for political gain (Trump), Americans have the power to avoid it. Nothing is prophetic. There is always another way out, especially with violence looming as a deterrent.
Passion and advocacy are fair game in this election cycle as it has been prior. But let us remember that our country’s greatness has always been tolerance (unity is mythical) of each other’s differences in the hope of personal gain. And nothing squashes more in personal gain and advancement than violence and destruction.
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