"The Politics of Victimization"

A most... remarkable... essay.

The other day, Best of the Web Today noted this grotesque screed by Mel Gilles at Deride and Conquer. One can hardly imagine a viewpoint more intellectually degenerate and morally bankrupt.

[Mel Gilles, who has worked for many years as an advocate for victims of domestic abuse, draws some parallels between her work and the reaction of many Democrats to the election.— Mathew Gross]

Watch Dan Rather apologize for not getting his facts straight, humiliated before the eyes of America, voluntarily undermining his credibility and career of over thirty years. Observe Donna Brazille squirm as she is ridiculed by Bay Buchanan, and pronounced irrelevant and nearly non-existent. Listen as Donna and Nancy Pelosi and Senator Charles Schumer take to the airwaves saying that they have to go back to the drawing board and learn from their mistakes and try to be better, more likable, more appealing, have a stronger message, speak to morality. Watch them awkwardly quote the bible, trying to speak the new language of America. Surf the blogs, and read the comments of dismayed, discombobulated, confused individuals trying to figure out what they did wrong. Hear the cacophony of voices, crying out, “Why did they beat me?”

And then ask anyone who has ever worked in a domestic violence shelter if they have heard this before.

They will tell you, every single day.

The answer is quite simple. They beat us because they are abusers. We can call it hate. We can call it fear. We can say it is unfair. But we are looped into the cycle of violence, and we need to start calling the dominating side what they are: abusive. And we need to recognize that we are the victims of verbal, mental, and even, in the case of Iraq, physical violence.

As victims we can’t stop asking ourselves what we did wrong. We can’t seem to grasp that they will keep hitting us and beating us as long as we keep sticking around and asking ourselves what we are doing to deserve the beating.

Listen to George Bush say that the will of God excuses his behavior. Listen, as he refuses to take responsibility, or express remorse, or even once, admit a mistake. Watch him strut, and tell us that he will only work with those who agree with him, and that each of us is only allowed one question (soon, it will be none at all; abusers hit hard when questioned; the press corps can tell you that). See him surround himself with only those who pledge oaths of allegiance. Hear him tell us that if we will only listen and do as he says and agree with his every utterance, all will go well for us (it won’t; we will never be worthy).

And watch the Democratic Party leadership walk on eggshells, try to meet him, please him, wash the windows better, get out that spot, distance themselves from gays and civil rights. See them cry for the attention and affection and approval of the President and his followers. Watch us squirm. Watch us descend into a world of crazy-making, where logic does not work and the other side tells us we are nuts when we rely on facts. A world where, worst of all, we begin to believe we are crazy.

How to break free? Again, the answer is quite simple.

First, you must admit you are a victim. Then, you must declare the state of affairs unacceptable. Next, you must promise to protect yourself and everyone around you that is being victimized. You don’t do this by responding to their demands, or becoming more like them, or engaging in logical conversation, or trying to persuade them that you are right. You also don’t do this by going catatonic and resigned, by closing up your ears and eyes and covering your head and submitting to the blows, figuring its over faster and hurts less is you don’t resist and fight back. Instead, you walk away. You find other folks like yourself, 56 million of them, who are hurting, broken, and beating themselves up. You tell them what you’ve learned, and that you aren’t going to take it anymore. You stand tall, with 56 million people at your side and behind you, and you look right into the eyes of the abuser and you tell him to go to hell. Then you walk out the door, taking the kids and gays and minorities with you, and you start a new life. The new life is hard. But it’s better than the abuse.

We have a mandate to be as radical and liberal and steadfast as we need to be. The progressive beliefs and social justice we stand for, our core, must not be altered. We are 56 million strong. We are building from the bottom up. We are meeting, on the net, in church basements, at work, in small groups, and right now, we are crying, because we are trying to break free and we don’t know how.

Any battered woman in America, any oppressed person around the globe who has defied her oppressor will tell you this: There is nothing wrong with you. You are in good company. You are safe. You are not alone. You are strong. You must change only one thing: stop responding to the abuser. Don’t let him dictate the terms or frame the debate (he’ll win, not because he’s right, but because force works). Sure, we can build a better grassroots campaign, cultivate and raise up better leaders, reform the election system to make it failproof, stick to our message, learn from the strategy of the other side. But we absolutely must dispense with the notion that we are weak, godless, cowardly, disorganized, crazy, too liberal, naive, amoral, “loose”, irrelevant, outmoded, stupid and soon to be extinct. We have the mandate of the world to back us, and the legacy of oppressed people throughout history.

Even if you do everything right, they’ll hit you anyway. Look at the poor souls who voted for this nonsense. They are working for six dollars an hour if they are working at all, their children are dying overseas and suffering from lack of health care and a depleted environment and a shoddy education. And they don’t even know they are being hit.

Mel Gilles at 07:31 PM on November 07, 2004

I posted a comment. Two more-worthy comments were posted afterwards.

Were this kind of psychobabble directed specifically against liberals, women, or minorities, it would be openly called what it really is: hate speech.

Posted by ELC at December 1, 2004 07:15 PM....

I'm a atheist who strongly supports gay marriage. I'm pro-choice and hate the drug war. I have mixed feelings about the war in Iraq and I would love to see gambling and prostitution legalized.

And I voted for Bush !

That's how bad the left has failed. I am waaaaay to the left on most issues and I won't vote for them.

Why ?

I believe in the freedom of the individual and not some collective, group-think mindset.

Democrats celebrate weakness and make everyone into a victim. Republicans celebrate stregth and success. It's time the dems drop the victim crap (race, environment, money, sex, etc). Get off your ass and make something of your life and stop looking at government to solve your problems.

Democrats are socialists. Socialism has failed repeatedly and becomes totalitarian. That scares me. I vote against socialism and for economic freedom.

After the totally classless behavior of Michael Moore and others of his ilk, folks like me are no longer going to sit in silence. We will now stand up for what we believe in and not be told that all 60 million Bush voters are just stupid rednecks.

Perhaps it's time America's left takes a good look at the other side and for once realizes that there are a lot of very smart, very passionate, freedom-loving, honest people who totally disagree with them. Perhaps America's left needs to try a little tolerance for other's views. The left preaches tolerance, but only on things they agree with.

Americans are tired of Dan Rather and CNN and the obscenely liberal media that knows nothing about science or economics.

I am tired of Christians being denigraded while no one is allowed to say a bad word about other religions. And remember, I'm an atheist.

Americans are tired of local governments telling us we have to spend 2% of our budget (my money, taken by force) on arts and regulating how many parking spaces our business must have and whether or not we can smoke in a resturant or not. And I hate smoking and love the arts... but I respect other people's right to make their own decisions in these matters and I expect them to pay for the own symphonys.

Americans are tired of race-based preferences (known by victocrats as affirmative action) and long for people to be judged on the basis of the quality of their character, not by the color of their skin. Yet for this stance, conservatives are called racists.

I am tired of the most successful 5% of Americans being forced to pay 50% of the tax burden and then having some liberal billionaire say that "the rich don't pay their fair share" What the hell is my fair share ? Do you want me to pay for everything ?

Frankly, we are tired of being told that a Harvard MBA and Yale graduate who has been elected presdent twice is "stupid". We are tired of being told that a President of conviction, honesty, courage and just an all-round nice and classy guy, is a mean a**h*le and that he lies. We simply don't see it that way.

I don't agree with many things the President says and have serious issues with the Republican party platform, but I sure as hell don't want to vote for socialist weenies and their collectivist mindset.

I believe in individual freedom and accomplishment, not "group rights" and victimhood.

Fortunately, I still can vote.

Most people are too set in their ways to change their vote. But to win in '08, you have to get people like me back. Otherwise, no way.

Posted by Lostalefty at December 2, 2004 12:48 AM....

Amen to brother/sister Lostalefty. I couldn't have written it better.

I too, am a pro-choicer who hates the drug war, supports gay marriage and legalized prostitution.

And I too, am tired of the hypocrisy of the left in this country and voted for Bush.

I am tired of hearing how badly our government manages itself but that we should allow it to manage 1/6th of our economy and our entire healthcare system.

I am tired of hearing how abortions are a personal choice, but owning a gun, setting aside personal Social Security accounts and Medical Care accounts are matters best left to the government to decide.

I'm tired of hearing that federal money solves all problems while our schools are the most over-priced Daycare centers in the world.

I'm tired of Bush voters being classified as racists when the so-called 'enlightened progressives' snicker at parodies of Dr. Rice and refer to her as the "House Nigga".

Along these same lines, I'm tired of the NAACP, a supposedly non-partisan organization, calling the Bush White House 'the most racist in history of the country' when the 4th in line to the position of President is the first Black Female Sec. Of State. I would have settled for a simple "Congratulations" to Dr. Rice from an organization who's abbreviations stand for "The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People."

I'm tired of hearing that the "World" hates Bush. There are over 5 billion people on this planet. Over half are illiterate and many live under the reins of far-leftist regime's that don't permit any dissention or disloyalty. The fact is that most of the world has no opinion on President Bush because they've never heard of him, never read anything about him or simply don't give a dam.

Which reminds of hypocrisy of the left: The simple fact that you can write this whiney, diatribe of idiotic and insane notions and still be a free citizen of America proves you can dissent from the majority. Meanwhile our college campuses are rift with so-called "Speech Code" restrictions and laws.

Furthermore, 11 states had Gay Marriage bans on their state ballots, two of which voted FOR Kerry. That means out of the 31 states Bush succeeded in winning, only 9 were for the new "Morality Values" the leftists keep harping is the reason they lost. How could they come to this conclusion when the majority of the states voting for Bush had no imitative against Gay Marriage and most respondents of exit polls picked the War in Iraq and the economy as their biggest motivations in voting?

I'm tired of hearing how the popular vote is the primary measurement of one's success at the polls of a Presidential Election, but re-counting these votes in a state that would not change the popular vote is imperative.

Republican Party and candidate contributor, like Enron, is seeking favors and special treatment, but a Democratic Party and candidate contributor, like Enron, is merely expressing their freedom of speech and expression.

I bet Federalism is looking mighty attractive now. Funny it took this long.

Posted by John at December 2, 2004 02:25 AM

Yesterday, BotWT published a comment from David Bricker, reportedly "a psychologist who specializes in marital therapy":

Gilles takes the position that the Democrats are looking a lot like a battered wife, and there is something to this. Some of the behaviors do overlap. But the logic breaks down immediately. Gilles sets it up so that the partner in this analogy is the Republicans, who defeated them. And she suggests that the 56 million Kerry voters form a kind of really big support group to get by. But where does this lead? And specifically what are they going to do about the next election? Is Gilles suggesting that they secede and only deal with good folks like themselves? Because if they come back to contest the next election, they are going back to the abusive spouse, something that no one in the domestic violence field is ever going to feel too good about.

A better analogy is that the partner is the country as a whole. The marital analogy is a good one if we see the Democrats as the rejected spouse and the U.S. as the rejecter. This makes much more sense. The insistence on recounts is like the husband who stalks his ex-wife, who doesn't understand what "no" means. The denial, the rationalizations, the vilification, the aimless depression are all typical of someone who's in the early stages of rejection and can't figure out what to do next. Likewise, Ted Kennedy and Hillary Clinton experimenting with finding religion look a lot like someone trying anything to get the partner back. "Maybe if I get a hairpiece, she'll come home."

Gilles also errs in assuming that since the Democrats are acting battered that someone must be battering them. It doesn't work that way. As the saying goes, "If you walk around with a hammer, everything starts to look like a nail." Closer to home, if you walk around with control issues everyone looks like a bully.

The Blog from the Core asserts Fair Use for non-commercial, non-profit educational purposes.

Lane Core Jr. CIW P — Fri. 12/03/04 07:20:51 AM
Categorized as Political.