Tuesday, December 08, 2015

No 50 Shades for Donald Trump

I've finally figured out what Donald Trump's agenda is. He wants to turn the USA into a giant reality show. 

In the world of reality TV, life is simple. Things are right or wrong. People are good or bad. There are no shades of grey. There's also a person in charge who makes the rules, with no reference to anyone else. Their decisions can't be challenged, and their power is absolute. 

In the real world, things are different. There's complexity, uncertainty and shades of opinion. Not everything is binary. It's much more difficult for one person to have absolute power, since people must be persuaded to follow a course of action, rather than told what to do.

I suspect that a large part of Mr Trump's appeal to a certain sector of the US population is that he has simplified everything. He says Muslims are bad, non-Muslims are good. He says Mexican immigrants are thieves and rapists, but US citizens are honest. He says gun owners are patriotic and strong, but those who argue for gun control are liberal and weak. There's no grey in his world at all.

People often yearn for simplicity. They want to be told who is good, and who is bad. Back in the days of the Wild West, it was easy - white hats or black hats. Now it's so much more difficult, and Mr Trump has provided a solution - just look at someone's religion, politics or country of origin.

Of course, life is not a reality show. Even "reality shows" are scripted these days. They often end in tears, just as Mr Trump's naive and simplistic view of the world will do when faced with political reality.  

Image credit: Creative Commons license

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