Beyond the initial, senseless tragedy of innocent people murdered by Jim Adkisson in a Tennessee church, two disturbing facts about the killer were brought to light by the Knoxville police.
Fact one: the police found a four-page letter written by Adkisson in which he cited his hatred for 'the Liberal Movement' as motivation for the crime.
Fact two: the police found various writings by right-wing pundits known for their violent rhetoric on TV and radio present in Adkisson's home, including books by Sean Hannity, Michael Savage, and Bill O'Reilly.
Both of these facts touch on issues of law, politics, and more broadly: civil society. And while it may be easy to say that the letter is more relevant than the books, there is a strong case to be made that the presence of right-wing books in the house of a self-proclaimed murderer of liberals not only touches in some way on the horrific crime committed, but also invites a broader discussion about one of the most important topics in contemporary America.
That topic is: Violent rhetoric and its destructive impact on America's civic life.
Violence vs. Violent Rhetoric: the Physical Body vs. Civic Body
A basic distinction will be helpful in order to see the significance of right-wing literature in Adkisson's house. In order for the American democracy to work, two types of bodies must be functioning well--must be 'healthy.'
The first body is physical. If you make a fist with one hand and gently tap yourself on the chest, you will quickly discover the physical body. This is the easy body for us all to see and understand. Likewise, it is easy for most people to understand that if the physical body is injured or--as in the Knoxville tragedy--murdered, then any role in a democratic system comes to an end. The old political joke makes the point better than any anthropologist could,'Dead people don't vote--except in Chicago.' The logic in the punchline, of course, is that if a dead person is found to have voted, it is not a sign that he system is working, but that the system has given in to corruption.
The second body is political and, because it is not tangible, much harder to conceptualize. In fact, it's not really a 'body,' but we use the 'body' metaphor to help us understand what this abstract thing is. It is the civic body, the collection of all individuals in a given system engaging in the various acts that maintain our system of self-governing. If we were born in Jefferson's time, the easiest way to see that civic body would be to walk down the street and join your 20 neighbors at your local village meeting or pick up a broadsheet newspaper. Nowadays, the easiest way to see the civic body is to tune our television set into a political talk show. The civic body is primarily a place where people share ideas and information in conversation, the purpose of which is to know what we need to know in order to make the decisions necessary to do what needs to get done.
Whereas blood runs in the veins of the physical body, the veins of the civic body are filled with a certain kind of talk: an open and ongoing conversation.
Now, what we can see right away is that these two bodies are completely dependent on each other. If typhoid breaks out or a flood destroys a town, nobody will be around to participate in the conversation. Likewise, if one person acts in such a way so as to prevent others from speaking, no matter how healthy people are physically, the civic body collapses.
If the physical body comes under threat on a large enough or meaningful enough scale, the result is an almost immediate shift in the nature of American democracy. If enough people's homes are destroyed by flood or fire, or if a loved community leader is assassinated or imprisoned, the result is often a collapse in civic stability.
What is rarely discussed, however, but is absolutely essential to understanding the current state of American democracy, is that the same kind of shift happens if we the civic body is undermined--in particular if the kind of conversation running the civic body changes from a free and open exchange of ideas and information to one marked by violent rhetoric, violent ideas, and violent behavior.
When the dominant conversation in the civic body shifts from pragmatism to violence, the state of American democracy shifts, too. Rather than turning to civic space to communicate ideas, learn information, and work collectively to solve problems, a civic body marked by violent rhetoric becomes an arena driven by the need to vent frustration, enforce opinion, and eliminate rivals.
Violent Rhetoric: Poison in the Civic Body
Taken as a whole, violent rhetoric poisons the civic body, thereby undermining the fundamental dynamic of American democracy: people engage in an ongoing conversation for the purposes of getting things done.
Interestingly, the civic body is not such a fragile flower as many people believe. It can tolerate a certain amount of violent rhetoric from individuals and still maintain its overall health. The problem is not from violent rhetoric communicated from one individual to another individual, per se, but from violent rhetoric from one person amplified in such a way that it reaches millions of people all at once: broadcast media.
This is why the threat violent rhetoric poses to American democracy did not really appear until the advent of large scale broadcast technology--radio. With the rise of television and the accompanying industry of mass-scale book sales, individual sources of violent rhetoric have reached the point where they overwhelm the civic body.
The poisoning and subsequent collapse of the civic body from violent rhetoric initially takes the form of a shift in the way people talk and, but quickly gives way to a shift in how people act.
When violent rhetoric saturates the civic body via the media and other broadcast sources, people stop exchanging information, start hurling opinion. The dominant questions,'What is the information? What is the history? What is the goal?' gets displaced by the monolithic imperative, 'Do I agree?'
Civic identity shifts when the conversation shifts.
In a healthy civic body, an engaged citizen is someone who learns and analyzes information, examines problems, and formulates solutions. In a poisoned civic body, an engaged citizen is someone who offers opinions, expresses disdain for different opinions, and gathers with like-minded people to oppose those who differ in opinion.
O'Reilly's Violence: Theory, Metaphor, Performance
With this broader distinction in mind, it is important to note that Bill O'Reilly's work poisons the civic body with three distinct kinds of violence that he broadcasts via TV, radio, and large-scale book sales.
First is O'Reilly's violent theory. To see O'Reilly's violent theory, one need only crack open a copy of Culture Warrior. In that book, O'Reilly claims that the United States is engaged in a 'war' between traditionalists and progressives. O'Reilly offers this broader theory as the explanation for the kind of work he does--including both is on-air persona and his writing.
Second is O'Reilly's overuse of violent metaphor. Everything that O'Reilly writes is framed through metaphors of war, boxing, and physical confrontation. Watching O'Reilly on TV or reading his books, one can hardly find an idea that is not presented in violent metaphoric terms.
Third is O'Reilly's signature violent style of performance. In many ways, O'Reilly's popularity is due to his ability to play act violence or near violence on TV in a way that is credible. In the 1980s, there were many TV personalities whose talk shows often erupted into fights or thrown chairs. O'Reilly uses the same tools, but on a much more sophisticated level--often leaning forward in his chair with violent gestures towards his guests. To detractors of O'Reilly, this behavior is often critiqued as childish. To his supporters, it is exhilarating.
From Frustration to Violent Habits
O'Reilly's books and broadcasts are significant in the Tennessee murder because they are part of a broader media market that undermines the civic body and turns individual frustrations into violent civic habits.
In learning of Adkisson's hatred for 'the Liberal Movement' and his collection of right-wing books, one is struck by the sheer amount of right-wing punditry that advances a similar logic of liberals destroying America--and pushes the idea that the destruction of liberals is a logical response.
The overlap between the style of talk, the intellectual themes, and the performance put O'Reilly and Adkisson in a disturbingly common arena.
That arena can be described as a place where civic actors turn their frustration into violent habits--into violent expression, violent theories, and violent performance.
The broader issue, of course, is not whether Bill O'Reilly's book--and Michael Savages's book and Sean Hannity's book--caused Jim Adkisson to pick up a Remington shot gun and kill members of a Tennessee church who he perceived as worth of death because they were liberals. The more important question is how Bill O'Reilly's work--layered as it is with multiple forms of violent rhetoric and performance and broadcast to levels that it impacts millions of lives daily--has contributed to a fundamental collapse in the civic body. And once that collapse happens, violent results follow.
'Take a Stand' Against Right-Wing Violent Rhetoric
What Americans should demand coming out of this Tennessee shooting is not just more compassion towards other citizens, but that the American media 'take a stand' against right-wing violent rhetoric.
We should also demand that the conversation that results form this demand not be undermined by small talk about people being nice to one another. Certainly, manners are important, but the larger problem is not individual acts of hate or intolerance--even if those are often the acts that result in so much pain. The real issue is a privately held media industry that amplifies violent rhetoric and broadcasts it so much that the result is a poisoning and collapse of our civic body.
By calling for a return to a healthy civic body, we can do our part to honor the victims of the Tennessee tragedy last week.
(cross posted from Frameshop)
Update [2008-7-30 14:4:7 by Jeffrey Feldman]:
As generated by my staggeringly quick kossack commenters, a contact list for everyone to push their favorite media outlet to take a stand on this issue:
ABC News
77 W. 66 St., New York, NY 10023
Phone: 212-456-7777
General e-mail: netaudr@abc.com
Nightline: nightline@abcnews.com
20/20: 2020@abc.com
CBS News
524 W. 57 St., New York, NY 10019
Phone: 212-975-4321
Fax: 212-975-1893
Email forms for all CBS news programs
CBS Evening News: evening@cbsnews.com
The Early Show: earlyshow@cbs.com
60 Minutes II: 60II@cbsnews.com
48 Hours: 48hours@cbsnews.com
Face The Nation: ftn@cbsnews.com
CNN
One CNN Center, Box 105366, Atlanta, GA 30303-5366
Phone: 404-827-1500
Fax: 404-827-1906
Email forms for all CNN news programs
Fox News Channel
1211 Ave. of the Americas
New York, NY 10036
Phone: (212) 301-3000
Fax: (212) 301-4229
comments@foxnews.com
List of Email addresses for all Fox News Channel programs
Special Report with Brit Hume: Special@foxnews.com
FOX Report with Shepard Smith: Foxreport@foxnews.com
The O'Reilly Factor: Oreilly@foxnews.com
Hannity & Colmes: Hannity@foxnews.com, Colmes@foxnews.com
On the Record with Greta: Ontherecord@foxnews.com
NBC
30 Rockefeller Plaza, New York, NY 10112
Phone: 212-664-4444
Fax: 212-664-4426
List of Email addresses for all NBC news programs
NBC Nightly News with Brian Williams: nightly@nbc.com
NBC News Today: today@nbc.com
Dateline NBC: dateline@nbc.com
MSNBC
One MSNBC Plaza
Secaucus, NJ 07094
Phone: (201) 583-5000
Fax: (201) 583-5453
CNBC
2200 Fletcher Ave.
Fort Lee, NJ 07024
Phone: (201) 585-2622
Fax: (201) 583-5453
List of Email addresses for all MSNBC news programs
Hardball with Chris Matthews: hardball@msnbc.com
MSNBC Reports with Joe Scarborough: msnbcreports@msnbc.com
PBS
1320 Braddock Place, Alexandria, VA 22314
Phone: 703-739-5000
Fax: 703-739-8458
The NewsHour with Jim Lehrer: newshour@pbs.org
National Radio Programs
National Public Radio
635 Massachusetts Ave. NW, Washington, DC 20001-3753
Phone: 202-513-2000
Fax: 202-513-3329
E-mail: Chantal de la Rionda, assistant to the Ombudsman ombudsman@npr.org
All Things Considered: atc@npr.org
Morning Edition: morning@npr.org
Talk Of The Nation: totn@npr.org
List of Email addresses for all NPR news programs
The Rush Limbaugh Show
1270 Avenue of the Americas, NY 10020
Phone: 800-282-2882
Fax: 212-563-9166
E-mail: rush@eibnet.com
Sean Hannity Show
E-mail: Phil Boyce, Program Director phil.boyce@abc.com
National Newspapers
The Los Angeles Times
202 West First Street, Los Angeles, CA 90012
Phone: 800-528-4637 or 213-237-5000
Fax: 213-237-4712
Letters to the Editor: letters@latimes.com
Readers' Representative: readers.rep@latimes.com
L.A. Times Contact Information by Department
The New York Times
229 W. 43rd St., New York, NY 10036
Phone: 212-556-1234
Fax: 212-556-3690
D.C. Bureau phone: 202-862-0300
Letters to the Editor (for publication): letters@nytimes.com
Write to the news editors: nytnews@nytimes.com
New York Times Contact Information by Department
How to Contact New York Times Reporters and Editors
USA Today
7950 Jones Branch Dr., McLean, VA 22108
Phone: 800-872-0001 or 703-854-3400
Fax: 703-854-2165
Letters to the Editor: editor@usatoday.com
Give feedback to USA Today
The Wall Street Journal
200 Liberty St., New York, NY 10281
Phone: 212-416-2000
Fax: 212-416-2658
Letters to the Editor: wsj.ltrs@wsj.com
Comment on News Articles: wsjcontact@dowjones.com
The Washington Post
1150 15th St., NW, Washington, DC 20071
Phone: 202-334-6000
Fax: 202-334-5269
Letters to the Editor: letters@washpost.com
Ombudsman: ombudsman@washpost.com
Contact Washington Post Writers and Editors
Magazines
Newsweek
251 W 57th Street, New York, NY 10019
Phone: 212-445-4000
Fax: 212-445-5068
Letters to the Editor: letters@newsweek.com
Time
Time & Life Bldg., Rockefeller Center, New York, NY 10020
Phone: 212-522-1212
Fax: 212-522-0323
Letters to the Editor letters@time.com
U.S. News & World Report
1050 Thomas Jefferson St., Washington, DC 20007
Phone: 202-955-2000
Fax: 202-955-2049
Letters to the Editor letters@usnews.com
News Services / Wires
Associated Press
50 Rockefeller Plaza, New York, NY 10020
Phone: 212-621-1500
Fax: 212-621-7523
General Questions and Comments: info@ap.org
Partial Contact Information for the Associated Press by Department and Bureau
Reuters
Three Times Square
New York, NY 10036
Telephone: 646-223-4000
Reuters Editorial Feedback
United Press International
1510 H Street, NW
Washington, DC 20005
Telephone: 202.898.8000
FAX: 202.898.8057
Comment and Tips: tips@upi.com