Salt in the Wound

Donald Trump loves to gloat. He loves rubbing salt in America’s wounds. He violates norms, rules and laws with impunity, and loves getting away with it. He can barely contain his glee: “THANK YOU FOR YOUR ATTENTION TO THIS MATTER!”

His supporters are the exact same type of people. They know Trump’s a bad guy, but they elected him as revenge. Revenge for the so-called “border crisis.” Revenge for “Press 1 for English.” Revenge for These Kids Today With Their Weird Gender Identities. And definitely revenge for the COVID lockdowns.

Nothing we say about Trump matters to them: they just laugh and change the subject. They know he’s immune to consequences, so they just pretend that Democrats would be just as bad. They don’t want to make the country better; they just want to win the argument. They have answers for everything, even if they’re wrong. And nothing we say about Trump, Vance, or their whole sorry administration dilutes their message: Trump is good, Trump is right, the migrants are bad and the media is lying. Thank You For Your Attention to This Matter.

The last ten years have felt like repeated attempts to explain to a bully that No, We Are Not Hitting Ourselves. Because the people who support Trump aren’t really affected by any consequences of his actions. So they’re happy to see him win and make us furious.

And I think this gets to the heart of why Charlie Kirk jokes have become so popular. Because Republicans have proudly embraced the country’s empirically-worst human, it is a minor miracle that there still exists a way to hurt their feelings, or make them feel anything at all.

“HOW DARE YOU, GOOD SIR!” suggests that a personal nerve has been touched that is largely absent from any discussion of atrocities committed by ICE, the war in Iran, the disenfranchisement of voters, or the 10,001 ways in which Donald Trump has demonstrated himself unfit for the presidency. They are not bothered by any of these things. If it triggers the liberals, it makes them giggle.

Charlie Kirk? That’s different. He was their young promising MAGAvangelist, cut down in his prime. We can all agree that he didn’t deserve to be killed. But if you agreed with the things Kirk was actually saying, then the rest of us have every reason to question your character.

It’s not difficult to see how some might view these jokes as a means of fighting back against the bullies who have seized control of this country. It is a way of reclaiming the power that has been taken from us: the power to offend. MAGA treats many of us as a threat, but they are rarely actually threatened by us. Our government, our Constitution, and our human rights are but a joke to them. Our country is up for sale to the highest bidder. The slaughtering of their sacred cow is noteworthy primarily for the revelation that they considered anything to be sacred at all.

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