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THE NORMALIZATION OF THUGGERY

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Message Carol Stewart

But my fantasy is no longer pristine. It has been tarnished by an incident which occurred about two weeks ago in Roseburg, Oregon, the small city near my son and his family's rural home.   Heather Morse reported in "The Roseburg News Review" :

"A small political gathering of about 18 liberal thinkers at River Forks Park Sunday afternoon erupted in conflict when about 35 members of the conservative tea party intruded upon the meeting, waving flags and holding signs accusing the rival group of being Marxists, communists and socialists.

The liberal group -- organized by MoveOn.org -- decided to leave the park and move its potluck to a nearby home.  Members of the conservative group followed, parking at the entrance of a private lane leading to the home to continue their protest.

Roseburg Democrats Dean and Sara Byers said Monday they told tea party members who followed that they were not welcome to drive down the lane to their home.

The Byerses said they got out of their car to stop vehicles from entering the driveway and one tea party member almost ran them over.

Sara Byers said she was so shaken that she called 911. She said a Douglas County deputy called about an hour and a half later and said he had been unable to respond because of other incidents.

...Roseburg resident Lillen Fifield, 70, called the group's actions an "act of
domestic terrorism" and said she was appalled that a peaceful gathering -- mostly of women over 65 -- was interrupted."

In this incident, Tea Party members acted like bullies and thugs. Yes, thugs.  So sure of their "rightness".  So unembarrassed by their shameful behavior.

I recently finished reading a masterful novel, translated from German, which focuses on thuggery in a different time period. The Oppermanns, by Lion Feuchtwanger, tells the story of a large extended German Jewish family in Berlin as the Nazis came to power.  The author describes the incremental intrusion of Nazism into the lives of family members, starting with small inconveniences and harassment, followed by increasing intimidation which made going out of the house an ordeal.  Then beatings and arrests and the disappearance of some neighbors. The family discussed leaving Germany; all but one member decided to stay in Berlin a little longer, hoping things would improve.

This is the heartbreaking point where Feuchtwanger's story ends.   The Reischstag fire has occurred, but not the subsequent escalation of violence and demise of civil rights.  We, of course, know from history what will happen next, but the author, who published his novel in 1933, before atrocities on a large scale had begun, seems to predict the increasing peril of the Jews.  

The novel is disturbing, not only for its prescience, but also for its descriptions of the low-level Nazis who carried out the harassment, beatings and arrests of family members. They were street thugs, punks who had been given social permission and encouragement to bully and attack a group of people.  

I don't like comparisons of modern people to Hitler, or of modern events to the Holocaust, but I am struck by the similarity of attitude and sense of legitimacy displayed by the Tea Partiers in Roseburg and the Nazis in early1930's Berlin. The disregard for the conventions of civil society.   The lack of fear of censure.  My sense of dà ©jà vu frightens me.  I am concerned by my own tendency to dismiss extremists as stupid and inconsequential.  Not wanting to overreact, am I underreacting and allowing a dangerous movement to grow?  My dilemma parallels that of the Oppermann family.  What is an appropriate reaction to the normalization of thuggery?

 

 

 

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Carol Stewart is a writer of fiction and non-fiction, and an editor of academic papers, childrens' books, and memoirs. She is an avid reader of news, history, and psychology. She has a BA in Psychology and a Master's of Social Welfare from (more...)
 

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