We're all in this together alone
As we see the likes of Donald Trump in the US or Pierre Poilievre in Canada, or Danielle Smith in Alberta, and many other similar characters rise to power through elections around the world, many of us are left wondering
why on Earth would anyone vote for these people.
I think I know the answer to this.
When COVID-19 first started flying on airplanes around the world, and very little was yet known about it except that it was horribly lethal, the slogan that immediately began to pop up was “We're all in this together”. But that didn't last long. Instead we began to be swamped by the very opposite message: don't trust vaccines, face masks are a violation of your freedom. Conservative governments rushed to hide statistics and bully public health advocates, to prevent collective and mutually protective action. The slogan itself was quickly retired.
Solidarity requires an understanding that other people's suffering is your suffering. Or more accurately, that there isn't “my” suffering and “your” suffering. There is only suffering.
Only then can people come together and collaborate towards healing everybody's suffering. Only when I feel there is no difference between your risk of getting sick and dying a horrible death and my own does it make sense for both of us to get vaccinated and wear a face mask. There isn't “my” risk and “your” risk. You and I are at risk.
Solidarity also requires understanding that there is strength in numbers. Hence unions and blood banks and pension funds and mammoth hunts. Cooperation and coordination work.
Conservatives hate the idea of solidarity. Once when I was out door knocking during an election campaign, a man asked me “why should I pay for somebody else's child care?”. I couldn't think of how to even begin to answer the question. If he was able to understand why, he wouldn't have asked it.
If there was a conservative motto, it would be something along the lines of “We're all in this alone.” You wear a mask and get vaccinated; I'll take my chances, and you take yours, you snowflake. For the conservative mindset there is always “my” risk and “your” risk. Distinguishing between the two is freedom. Cooperation is oppression. Why should I pay for your child care. Why should I get vaccinated to protect you. In the mammoth hunt, the conservative is the one trying to pay someone else with some coloured beads to get him a big piece of mammoth.
The Donald Trumps speak to this mindset. Is it really that surprising that they have such a following?
But they didn't create the mindset, they just exploit it. Who does create the “we're all in this alone” mindset? And how do we replace it with the mindset that leads naturally to solidarity?