I was walking around my neighborhood today mulling over a couple of GOP campaign ads that had really troubled me.
One of the ads was by Nancy Johnson of Connecticut and the other was that RNC hit job in support of Bob Corker in Tennesse.
I cared enough about both ads to call the offices of the ad firm (Scott Howell & Co.) and Congresswoman Johnson's office in DC. I was polite and simply conveyed how troubled I was. I called not as a Democrat, but as a fellow citizen. "We're better than this," is what I said.
That being done, I took a walk today. I wanted to get at why these ads disturbed me so much.
Here's what I came up with...
I keep coming back to one sentence:
We believe in the inherent dignity and equality of every person.
This is not a new sentiment. You can find it expressed in our Declaration of Independence, the United States Constitution and the Bill of Rights. You can find its religious and philosophical underpinnings in the traditions of the Chrisian Gospel, Judaic Law and Islam. Martin Luther King's "I have a Dream" speech, essentially, expresses just this thought: We are equal. As persons. We each have dignity.
I think what disturbed me about these two ads was, quite frankly, that I don't think they share this viewpoint...ie. they were made at the direct expense of others
You can say that the ads are simply partisan cheap shots taken late in a campaign. That "both sides do it." You can say that using "mean spirited humor" is still fair play.
However, in this case, I don't think that's true.
In the Nancy Johnson ad, a fake version of her opponent approaches the door of a house where a "stoner" dude greets him with open arms and invites him inside. In the Corker ad, a "pornographer" muses about Harold Ford and a "hooker" beckons the Congressman for a hook up.
These are meant to be shocking and funny. Getting upset about them is supposed to be a sign of a "liberal PC mindset."
But here's what I come back to.
I don't think you can make and run ads like that and embrace the ideal I expressed above.
Let me put it this way: it's fair game to make fun of your political opponent. Both sides do that all the time. (Think Jib Jab.) But these ads do something different. These ads use caricatures of people whom it's supposed to be okay to loathe and hate: "pornographers" "pot heads" and "hookers." These ads then associate these loathesome and despicable people with the Democratic candidate.
Think about that for one second.
This has been the standard Republican m.o. for decades. One year it's "rapists" and "child molesters". Another year its "gangsters" and "welfare queens." The last few years it's been "terrorists" and "thugs."
In each case, however, the point has been to use a dehumanizing attack and then associate the person or class of person you are attacking with your opponent.
There is something deeply wrong here. And it's complex. I mean, the obvious rhetorical goal of these ads is to put the Democrats in the position of defending the indefensible. Willie Horton. Osama bin Laden. A "pot head." It's all the same. You are damned if you defend yourself and damned if you attack; either way you play into the GOP message.
But that's not what I'm getting at.
There's something deeper going on here. The rhetorical start point of these ads is that it's okay to use the appeal of dehumanization to try to persuade someone.
Simply put, for the GOP, for too long, it's been okay to use hate to motivate.
You see, one cannot sincerely embrace the statement: "We believe in the inherent dignity and equality of every person"...and then choose to run ads like that knowing their destructive and divisive effect.
And that's not because someone who embraces that ideal finds any redeeming value in the moral errors and wrongs committed by terrorists, thugs, hookers, pot heads and pornographers. No, instead, it's because anyone who embraces the values of dignity and equality understands that using the "dehumanizing" appeal is an assault on the humanity of every single human being. It is fundamentally immoral to win an election at the direct expense of the dignity and equality of others.
When you dehumanize any one of us, you dehumanize all of us.
When you use racism and fear and divisiveness and base prejudice to win elections, you poison everyone.
Most of all, you poison yourself.
It's that simple point I wanted to convey tonight. It's what I was thinking about as I walked my neighborhood. It's what I saw reflected in the faces of the folks, young and old, of all backgrounds and life situations, whom I encountered on the streets of the city I live in.
It's time to put the dignity and equality of every person back at the center of the moral and political life of this nation.
It's time to stop the hate.