FOR THE PAST CENTURY, politics in America have been a sort of taboo team sport: have your beliefs, vote accordingly, let the politicians and cultural commentators own the other side, and never – never – discuss politics with the people in your life. The usefulness (or, for that matter, purpose) of our politics notwithstanding, for a long time this advice seemed to work. Democrats and Republicans, progressives and conservatives, could get along so long as they held to the dictum: don’t ask, don’t tell.
Recent history has weighed the taboo and found it wanting. It turns out that one’s politics are rooted in a person’s moral beliefs, their vision of the good life. And because political utopianism has filled the meaning-making void left by religion, moral goodness consists in acting in ways that bring about utopia – or at least appearing to act. Like the Church of Laodicea, it is no longer possible to be lukewarm, prosperous but standing for nothing.
There’s much ado about Leftwing virtue-signaling these days. To trumpet your alignment with the progressive cause du jour is to mark yourself virtuous – and safe. But a majority of this “virtuous” behavior is performative, play-acting at moral courage. Madonna tweeting about muh patriarchy keeping her down is as absurd as the Obamas claiming to be oppressed by systemic racism. Absurd, but effective: it conforms to people’s vague priors about Western patriarchal and racial oppression (indoctrination courtesy of the public school system, whose bill you foot). The wealthiest and most powerful people the world has ever known get to claim victimhood – and aren’t we plebs lucky they can show us the way forward?
This occurs locally too. In the wake of George Floyd and amid the flames and destruction of BLM and Antifa riots, office-holders have spouted lots of “fight systemic racism” rhetoric and punching down without actually doing much. Perhaps they hope no one will notice that they are the system. Perhaps no one will.
At an individual level, Leftist virtue-signaling means #RESIST, #BLM, #MeToo, #VoteBlueNoMatterWho, black-square profile picture, exhausted et cetera. People do this because 1) at some level they believe these things, 2) they want to be trendy; 3) likes and social validation feel good; 4) there is zero social cost or drawback to publicly claiming these positions; and 5) it’s easy – who needs mass nonviolent protest or jail time when you can post a picture of a raised fist or slap a rainbow sticker on it and call it a day?
Action or mere rhetoric, sincere or not, what matters is ideological conformity. To do anything less means that you are in league with the Oppressors, “literally” denying the humanity of the various “oppressed” groups adopted by the Left. Abolish your whiteness – be less white – or you are a white supremacist. Raise your fist, or you believe black lives don’t matter. List your pronouns, or you dehumanize transgender folks. And whatever your identity category, you must support left-wing political positions – or you are a traitor to your race/sex/class.
This, of course, brings us to folks not 100% in the Progressive camp. There is a major cost to anyone who disagrees with the Left’s moral hegemony: cancellation on social media, getting doxxed, losing your job, being targeted for violence. The only group of Americans who have not become more self-censoring over time is Progressives. For non-Progressives, the “safety” that comes from virtue signaling has, for a time, extended to merely shutting up about your own beliefs. The Progressive gets to shout loudly about their beliefs, and everyone else has to remain silent or pretend to agree – or else.
This arrangement is untenable, and the authoritarian and establishment Left has made it clear that your silence will not save you. Scott Adams (the Dilbert guy) predicted in mid-2020 that Republicans would be hunted by their political enemies: within the past two months, Trump was banned from Twitter; Parler was erased from the internet by collusion between Apple, Google, and Amazon; the New York Times wonders whether apps focused on privacy are hotbeds of domestic terrorism, and national security experts are advising Democrats to give up on bipartisanship and treat Republicans like enemy combatants. Democrat officeholders seem to concur.
If your silence will not save you, and the Progressives can spout their moral and political beliefs, then why shouldn’t anyone else? If you believe that your own beliefs are true, then why should the cultural totalitarians hold the field? Since Trump’s cancellation, it feels like there’s a growing number of non-Progressives who are ready to resist – and wear cancellation as a badge. Is this its own form of virtue-signaling, from the Right?
The moral LARPing that social media has enabled is harming social cohesion and driving polarization: red states are getting redder, blue states are getting bluer; we have curated our information diet to include only those voices we agree with; we cheer on our politicians in spite of their searing idiocy, so long as they say the right things and support the correct bumper-sticker positions.
Naturally, polarization spreads to more arenas than politics and entertainment. Whereas once you could be friends with people across the aisle, it’s now a moral issue. Even if your Trump-supporting neighbors do something nice for you, don’t forget that they support “a man with near-murderous contempt for Americans” and that they might be domestic terrorists. It’s hard to overlook someone’s “dangerous” beliefs (or at least, what you believe about their beliefs) just because they’re fun to hang out with or extend you a kindness. This isn’t a new thing: cultural commentator and historian Christopher Lasch wrote in the 70s about the growing cultural clashes in the wake of the 60s that made deep and lasting relationships harder to achieve. It’s just gotten worse over time.
Fellow FoA contributor Joe wrote about how the January 6, 2021 Barbarian Invasion of Rome very nearly ended a friendship of 15 years: “anyone who can support a political party that produced these terrorists has no place in my life. I’m sorry.”
As I read his post, I found myself wondering about the fate of my own circle of friends. Many of them are Progressives, sure of their beliefs, who live on a diet of MSNBC and Vox. They spent four years complaining about Russian election interference, Trump’s hateful racism/sexism/transphobia, and Republicans. They knew that Kavanaugh was a rapist, that ACB was a theocrat-in-waiting, and that anyone who supported Trump was not only a rube but spiteful, hateful, and worthy of whatever came to them.
Suffice it to say, I’ve maintained political Don’t-Ask-Don’t-Tell with many of my friends. The closest I ever came to coming out as someone who voted for Trump – after voting for Obama twice! – was when I questioned the first impeachment trial. I discovered in that conversation that my progressive friends believed the only thing that Democrats have done wrong is not going far enough to stamp out right-wing lunatics. I imagine that, if I come out, I’ll get a text not unlike Joe. And in all honesty, I can’t help but think more about the spirit behind that text: Can you be true friends with someone if you do not share political and moral values? Can you be friends with someone if you think they believe or support terrible things? Can you be friends with someone if you must stay in the closet about your own beliefs in order to get along?
Right now, our culture is fracturing. Despite the establishment’s “unity” rhetoric, the Left – which controls nearly every institution – seems more interested in submission. As institutions swing hard to the Left, new ones will emerge to cater to the Right. Our bubble walls will get thicker – and our ways of viewing the world will harden, having less cross-over. As our two cultures consolidate and harden in opposition to each other – Right and Left, Rural and Urban, Liberal and Authoritarian – and as the true Liberals (not just Republicans and Conservatives, but anyone who questions the hegemony) grow aware that they are being hunted – they’ll grapple more intensely for the same government. How long can this last peacefully?
To me, the question of friendship, trust, and goodwill across ideological gaps is critical to the long-term survival and health of our culture. We need to figure this out or brace for the consequences of a house divided. And I don’t think the solution is to go back into the political closet.
