When The Outrageous, The Unethical And The Criminal Become 'Normal'

In the months since the Orange Ogre became the American President, I am sure that, like me, many have become inured to his daily debasement of the fundamental values that most profess to hold dear, justice, dignity, truth and respect being but four of them. What was once an esteemed office, the presidency, has been reduced to the equivalent of a wrestling arena, where over-the-top stereotypes of villains abound. American politics, and perhaps the larger American society, will never be the same again.

Henry Rollins, an American actor and musician, has penned an interesting piece in LA Weekly that examines this phenomenon.

It feels like a long time since the election of comrade Trump. I remember the first few days, the frustration and accompanying exhaustion I felt knowing that the country was going to go backward. Several weeks later, I was resolved to “reconfiguring my pack,” as I like to say. I had to do my best to understand this new landscape as America now lurched toward greatness. There were some familiar echoes of the Bush years: the homophobes and misogynists taking a victory lap now that they had one of theirs in the executive position, the environment with a target on its back, science getting sucker-punched in the schoolyard once again. All part of the greatness.

The outrageous behaviour continued and accelerated, but Rollins realized something:

Late last year, the first few tweets — the comrade’s seemingly preferred way of communicating to his base — struck millions of people as the actions of a rank amateur. A president wouldn’t do that, right? It took me I don’t know how many news broadcasts to become accustomed to variations of, “The president tweeted today that ....” Then the shock wore off and it became how it is.

An administration with zero accountability. Took a while, but it registers as normal now.

I will leave you with one more excerpt from his essay:

No matter what, we adapt — but most important, we forget and then repeat.

Perhaps not a profound insight, but surely an illustration of how, in this case, human resiliency has become a decided liability.