LETTER: Where now?
A friend called Wednesday to ask if I was aware that a large group of people, who I gladly call hooligans, rioters, and criminals, were attacking the Capitol at the behest of the outgoing president. I admit my appetite for politics and politicians is minimal, so I was unaware of what was happening, but I watched enough coverage to have a good idea of what transpired, and I have a few questions about what we might have learned and how we might use that knowledge.
Social psychology tells us that one of the best ways to get two groups who disagree to begin cooperating is to introduce a “Superordinate Goal.” That is a goal in which both sides consider desirable but is so large that it can only be accomplished by both sides working together. I heard members of Congress talking about how Democrats and Republicans were forced into close proximity when they were sequestered, and how that led them to actually talk to each other rather than working separately – an apparently unprecedented occurrence in their daily lives.
Will the members of Congress remember, when things are back to “normal,” that they actually can interact in a civil manner, that it is their responsibility to work together for the benefit of the entire electorate, that neither party can function effectively without the other, and that “service to the country” should be their superordinate goal?
As I watched the behavior of the rioters, I was reminded of scenes we have witnessed in South America, Africa, and the Middle East, when an election was held and some despot decided the results were unacceptable. Thankfully we were spared tanks and troops with rifles, but the sentiment of the crowd in Washington, D.C., was the same. Our democracy has provided us with tools that reflect the wishes of the population much better than the behavior of those rioters. I like to think we are capable of much better.
Has our populace recognized, after four years of rancor and hostility, that we all want the same things: prosperity, a peaceful existence, and good health, regardless of ideology, party, or political view?
A number of people who reported on the events in Washington, D.C., commented on how police treated the rioters. When I saw people attempting to break down the door of the houses of Congress I naturally asked how they should be dealt with. Perhaps you feel the rioters’ behavior was justified, or perhaps you would have liked to have seen them dealt with much more harshly. Many felt the police response was substantially more tempered than the reaction to the “Black Lives Matter” protesters and, for whatever reasons, that certainly looked to be true.
Did the response of police and National Guard provide a blueprint that should be followed, regardless of the cause being protested or the ethnicity of those protesting, and are we able to react only to behaviors without looking at participants?
It was gratifying to listen to senators and representatives who planned to drop their challenges to the Electoral College votes to demonstrate that the “democratic process” should not be, cannot be, subverted.
Stanley Myers
Washington