We Are Watching a Slow Motion Coup

What is happening in this country is nothing less than a coup. There may not be armed militia in the streets or a storming of the President’s office. But it is a coup all the same.

We know what we have seen over the past few years, violent protests in defense of Civil War generals, an open disinformation campaign, a literal storming of the Capitol, politicians denying that there was a storming of the Capitol, sweeping laws being enacted representing a dramatic limitation in the enfranchisement of huge segments of the citizenry, and now laws banning the teaching of aspects of our history that are uncomfortable for us.

Several states have already passed laws making the use of Critical Race Theory verboten. If you are unfamiliar, Critical Race Theory is a lens through which content is examined, paying special attention to the role that race played in determining who wrote that content, which stories were told, who is lifted up and who is marginalized by it. Critical Race Theory helps us to recognize the absolute tragedy and horror that slavery was in this country and how it has continued to shape our society in repugnant ways.

We are watching what may be predictable the effects of a society that inflicted a genocide and refused to acknowledge and confront that truth. Slavery in the Americas was no less an atrocity than the Holocaust, killing between 5 and 25 million enslaved persons. However, America has refused to acknowledge the absolute horror of this era in our history, and therefore we cannot clearly see how it continues to influence our society.

It is still routine to hear of politicians or teachers talk about the “benefits of slavery, as though it were a system of government to be studied, like a representative democracy vs a direct democracy. Because we refused to confront the horror, we have had to deal with odd constitutional issues, like the 3/5ths compromise — I contend it is not possible to find a more explicit representation of the blatant disregard for humanity than officially calling millions of people not fully human.

These evil and base views of humanity are coming to the surface in a way that we have not seen in decades. It’s not that they haven’t been there, but they have not been socially acceptable. Just a few short years ago if you spouted racist rhetoric you would be drummed out of the public spotlight and banished with no hope of holding office. Now, it is not only acceptable, it is increasingly becoming a litmus test to belong to the Republican Party.

The slow motion nature of this coup should not fool the rest of us into thinking that we do not need to take action. The slow-motion nature of this coup does not make this a less dangerous coup. It is becoming increasingly important that we who hold human life valuable, and believe in the notion of inalienable rights for all, not just those of western European descent need to take action before our ability to do anything about it is taken from us.

The ultimate tragedy is not the oppression and cruelty by the bad people, but the silence over that by the good people.

— Martin Luther King Jr.