{46} When hyperbole fails

Having lived through the “end times” of acid rain, two Bush presidencies, Y2K, 9/11, and the AIDS epidemic, I tend to take a dim view of hyperbole.

Yes, those were all very legitimately scary things, and in three cases (AIDS, 9/11, and the Bushes) many lives were lost. Acid rain is a forgotten ecological disaster, but was a very real danger that was only reduced by science and luck and policy (it remains an issue, but not a catastrophe). Y2K is often remembered as a joke but if you actually worked in the IT industry in 1999, chances are you were probably working 70 hours a week retrofitting code so everything didn’t crash on the turn of the clocks.

None of those things were harmless, and some were truly awful. Yet, it’s the 2016 election season, the continuation of over 200 years of tradition. We have 50 states and a federal government in place, and over 320 million people living here. Things can get very bad but humanity, and the nation, will muddle on. Even the Civil War, which was a horrible blood bath, didn’t destroy the country. Dented it up and spilled a lot of lives, but nothing new there.

(Yes, I’m being purposefully flippant.)

My point here is that, well, I’m jaded. It’s hard for me to take catastrophe seriously. I’m appalled by racism and police brutality and online harassment and child abuse and rape and rape culture and…it’s a long list, okay? Things are very appalling these days.

Still, I usually maintain a “keep calm and carry on” perspective.

Usually.

Watching the Trump rally, aka the RNC, in Cleveland — or rather, watching clips and reading the coverage — scares me. Maybe as the daughter of a WWII veteran, I’m too steeped in the history of Nazi Germany to not see parallels. But hell, pundits have even called on the suspension of Godwin’s Law for the duration because it’s just too accurate.

I wonder if any middle aged woman in 1933 Germany felt as I do now: disbelief, fear, denial. No, this isn’t happening. Not in the United States. We are a nation of many faults but “dictator” has not been one of them. Has never even been a possibility. I never thought it could be.

I am terrified that I am wrong.