Our Nation Is Trapped in a Weird, Horrifying “Twilight Zone” Reality.

Can We Ever Get Back to Anything Resembling ‘Normal’ Life?

It’s amazing to think back and realize that just 10 years ago, Barack Obama, our first and only black President, resoundingly won his second term… and our semi-democracy still seemed fairly functional and resilient, and guarded optimism about our near future still percolated.

But no longer. By now, any surviving hopes have been thoroughly dashed.

Today, the societal reality of just one decade ago feels like a quaint and very distant memory. Over the past 7 years especially — ever since Mr. Trump started his presidential campaign in 2015 — we’ve seen one vital societal norm or structure after another fall by the wayside or get overturned.

Our society has been overwhelmed by a massive, expanding deluge of lies, disinformation, delusion, public bullying, hypocrisy, hate, bigotry, racism, and overt social manipulation enacted by far right fanatics who have succeeded in politicizing and undermining almost everything.

I’m sorry, but this deeply destructive pattern is not the least bit normal. It’s creepy, paranoid, highly strange and hostile behavior, and the best analogy I can think of is that as a nation we seem to have fallen into a real-life, endless, horrifying Twilight Zone episode. I say this without any hint of, or need for, exaggeration.

It’s a truly remarkable turn of events, the more so because it’s taken place quite rapidly. Ten years ago, no one (or very, very few) would have guessed that the U.S. could fall so far, so fast… yet it’s happening, and now here we are — stuck in an awful, crazy downward spiral that truly looks and feels like a bizarre, vertigo-inducing Twilight Zone episode.

Except, this is not a creepy TV show, this is our current abysmal reality. But what exactly is going on that makes our current social and political scene so much like a freakish Twilight Zone episode? Let’s go down the list, and examine what’s really happening all around us now.

First and foremost, I’d say, is the bizarre, increasing dominance of public lying and mass deception. While Mr. Trump clearly isn’t the only causative factor, having a total narcissist, major emotional abuser, and pathological liar as our President for 4 years — one who, amazingly, still wields vast, outsized influence — has gradually normalized or even overtly promoted the ‘benefits’ of constant public lying, bullying, and devious manipulation.

This pattern is not remotely ‘normal’ — not by a long shot. Nor is it the least bit friendly to democracy.

News flash: Across our nation, mass deception and deviousness are now considered… OK and quite acceptable if you get the desired result.

Frighteningly, in an ongoing worst-case — and truly Twilight-Zone-ish — scenario, this normalization of mass deception has now resulted in 1/3 of all Americans (minimum!) believing and spreading the ‘Big Lie’ that the 2020 election was totally fraudulent and that Trump is actually our true President. It doesn’t help matters — in fact, it greatly exacerbates the problem — when far right media and news sources insist on pushing utterly false narratives like the ‘Big Lie’ that deceive the public and severely undermine democracy.

These media groups keep on stoking people’s unjustified anger, every single day, and replace the truth with infuriating (but erroneous) beliefs that rile up their viewers, ramp up their engagement… and also produce great corporate profits. The resulting rage and resentment seething just under the surface in many Americans, due to their fervent belief in all these devious distortions and lies, is truly terrifying… and extremely dangerous.

But guess what: this pattern is not remotely ‘normal’ — not by a long shot. Nor is it the least bit friendly to democracy. Instead, it directly encourages sedition and the rapid growth of fascism — here at home, in the supposed ‘land of the free’.

Welcome to the Twilight Zone. And the Twilight of Democracy.

Along with this huge increase in public lying and deliberate deception, there’s another very dangerous and hateful trend — the massive use of projection, bullying, and intimidation by far right manipulators and control freaks.

It’s a classic political move lifted straight from the tyrant’s handbook: Dish out ever-nastier verbal abuse and harsh judgment on those you disagree with, and then enact potent legal restrictions against them… while simultaneously playing the ‘poor me’ game, and persistently accusing the groups you abuse and restrict of constantly abusing and restricting you.

These same groups and politicians are persistently pushing wrong-headed, extremist understandings of ‘free speech’.

This pattern of projection is very clear in the far right’s endless yelling and moaning about being constantly shut down or ‘cancelled’ by the Democrats, and progressives, and the ‘liberal media’ — even as far right politicians and pundits are in reality working overtime to control, minimize, or overturn and ‘cancel’ every liberal idea, law, meme, or movement that they dislike.

These same far right voices and movements that are supposedly being ‘cancelled’ are working hard — and often very successfully — to limit or ‘cancel’ LGBTQ+ rights, women’s right to appropriate health care and/or abortion, minorities’ right to easy voting access, the ‘evils’ of so-called ‘wokeness’, public access to books they disapprove of, librarians’ freedom of choice, and honest, direct teaching about America’s history of slavery and racism.

Far from being ‘cancelled’, these groups or politicians are usually enjoying far too much latitude and acceptance — due to rampant popular misunderstanding of ‘free speech’ and its intended limits — which they are taking full advantage of to advance their power and consolidate their influence.

Even further, these same groups and politicians are deliberately pushing wrong-headed, extremist understandings of ‘free speech’, and purposely creating even more public misunderstanding of what ‘free speech’ really means — in order to pave the way for public acceptance and embrace of repugnant far right ideas and restrictive, anti-democratic laws.

In our Constitution, ‘free speech’ does NOT mean anything goes, nor does it mean you can always say or do whatever you want. But to the far right, any limitation or restriction on their public speech is verboten… yet at the same time they — being total hypocrites and control freaks — are creating oppressive legislation to restrict or even forbid the free speech rights of thousands, even millions, of other Americans, including gays, transgender folks, blacks, teachers, librarians, historians, and ‘liberals’ in general.

Welcome to the Twilight Zone.

In reality, these same people — the ones who are always screaming about being controlled, suppressed, and bullied into submission — are working mightily to suppress and control others they dislike or disapprove of, often through the mechanisms of public shaming, bullying, civic interference, and direct intimidation (such as aggressive in-your-face public confrontations and issuing death threats against those they wish to silence, such as health officials and election staffers).

So let’s speak the truth about this dangerous, super-hypocritical political phenomenon: None of this is remotely normal, or decent, or civilized behavior.

Rather, it is irrational, fear-based, semi-hysterical, divisive, and highly contagious behavior more appropriate in a burgeoning fascist dictatorship than in our current semi-democracy. Which speaks volumes about where we’re now heading as a nation — at breakneck speed.

Trump, far right media, and many conservative politicians have loudly, endlessly lied for many years now about ‘fake news’ and ‘the fake news media’.

And speaking of breakneck speed: Exemplifying the heights (or depths?) of absurdity that we’re now reaching, Florida’s demagogue-in-chief, Gov. DeSantis, has basically gone to war with… the evil purveyors of bland family entertainment, the Lion King, and Mickey Mouse, the Disney Corporation (!), due to its inexcusable support for gay folks and its opposition to DeSantis’ legalized persecution of gay and transgender folks (the now-infamous “Don’t Say Gay” bill). Plus, DeSantis has sponsored a spate of awful new laws attacking and criminalizing ‘wokeness’, CRT (Critical Race Theory), free choice for librarians, and other ‘liberal’ ideas he detests.

DeSantis’ intense arrogance reminds me of the cruel, haughty Queen of Hearts in ‘Alice in Wonderland’. His tyrannical, mean-spirited solution to any crisis or opposition — which, not coincidentally, plays quite well with his enthusiastic far right audience — is basically some version of “Off with their heads!”

None of this is remotely normal, decent, or civilized behavior. What it IS, is abnormal, uncivilized, anti-social, and anti-democratic behavior.

Rah-Rah, Go Team U.S.A.! And by the way… Welcome to the Twilight Zone!

Last, but certainly not least, is the ongoing and still-intensifying ‘war on truth’. Trump, far right media, and many conservative politicians have jumped on this highly subversive, anti-democratic bandwagon, and for years now have yelled and loudly, endlessly lied about ‘fake news’ and the ‘fake news media’. Of course, in their view the only trustworthy public sources of information are Mr. Trump (a devious pathological liar) or far right media and news outlets.

The problem — and it’s a whopper — is that Trump and far right media and politicians routinely lie, twist facts, and invent their own preferred ‘alternate reality’. In truth, this is just another creepy example of effective mass projection at work.

Once again, here we have a vast group of liars and manipulative commentators and ‘reporters’ actively deceiving the public — while loudly (and quite effectively) accusing the ‘other side’ (mainstream media) of constant lying and always deceiving the public with made-up ‘fake news’!

I mean, how devious can you get? Since it’s really, really hard to fully ‘grok’ the intense, super-manipulative craziness that’s spreading through our society like wildfire, it bears repeating: none of this is remotely normal, decent, or civilized behavior. What it IS, is abnormal, uncivilized, anti-social, and anti-democratic behavior. It’s abhorrent, hostile, ruthless behavior that will lead to the collapse of our once-great nation if we can’t figure out a way to bring these people and forces under control.

No society can survive such a tremendously undermining onslaught, if it continues for long.

Why will it lead to our nation’s collapse? To really answer this question adequately, I think we need to ask and answer another: What are we LOSING when all these grotesque events and trends are happening and building up steam?

Overall, I’d say we’re in the process of losing most of the things/ideas/ beliefs/qualities that make us ‘civilized’, and support a (mainly) smoothly operating semi-democracy and a fairly functional society.

We are now rapidly losing:

* Belief in the basic good intentions of our fellow citizens.

* Trust in the fair and effective functioning of our voting/election system.

* Any real hope of having future peaceful elections and a relatively peaceful, functional society.

* Our ability to openly discuss issues and problems, and hash out options and solutions.

* Trust in our basic system of government.

* Trust in the news and both local and global media.

* Our ability to distinguish truth from lies, and honesty from manipulation.

* Our ability to agree on even very basic, crucial information about our world and our society.

* Our willingness to work together for the common good.

* Our once-shared belief that there even IS such a thing as the ‘common good’.

* Our ability to communicate and cooperatively work toward a functional society that can work for everyone, and not just the few in power or grabbing for power.

* Our ability to see through — and reject — the false promises and divisive, dangerous ‘group-think’ of American-style fascism.

So, what do we stand to lose? ALL of the above, and much, much more. Under-appreciated things that we’ve long taken for granted, like a fairly functional economy, and a fairly open, functional society, and fairly open, (mainly) pleasant human interactions.

What is rapidly replacing all these emotionally and socially necessary ‘common goods’? More and more, it looks and feels like an accelerating descent into darkness: Endless conflict, hate, tyranny, distrust, anti-democratic hysteria, and ever-increasing antisocial behavior.

No society can survive such a tremendously undermining onslaught, if it continues for long. After all, even a truly horrific, devastating Twilight Zone episode eventually… ends. And then we can all breathe a sigh of relief and come back to our real lives and ‘normal’ everyday activities.

But what if the horror never ends, in the near term? What if there is no ‘normal’ anymore to return to? What if much of our society succumbs to the forces of evil, untruth, division, hate, bigotry, and endless rage?

That’s what we’re really facing now in our society. Sadly, that’s the real unfolding picture here, the factual truth of our situation.

I really, desperately wish I could say differently — and still be telling the truth.