CORRECTING THE RECORD

10. Nov 2016

INTRODUCTION
one or two weeks before the us election my opinion about the common narrative started to shift. not from, and not to what you might
think.
initally, i thought trump would be the lesser of two evils. (shocker already!)
slowly, i started to realize the unprecedented positive chance that a win for trump could bring for culture and society. i can feel your
anger growing while you read this, but try to read on.
the reason that i even start to ramble about this now even tho i just wanted to keep my mouth shut is, that i found two articles who
manage to articulate the core of the point im trying to make and always struggle to articulate. these articles will be part of my rant later
on, but first some points:
since quite a while (and i had multiple discussions already just about this in the past years) i have this nagging feeling that lots and lots
of problems in society nowadays come down to just a few aspects in our modern behavior, that require to really take a few steps back
from ourselves first. and with this i mean that probably ALL thats dividing society culturally right now comes down to a simple solution
that everyone, even the people who sincerely seem to want that positive change to happen, seem to be unable to fully grasp and apply
in a consequent way:
1) empathy
2) common sense
now, many people might think - what does empathy have to do with donald trump of all people? - its a much larger context. let me
continue.
also, you might think,hey, you know me, im full of empathy and full of common sense. i respect and cherish every minority, thats what
my common sense tells me anyway, what the hell do you want from me?
what i am talking about is not the easy empathy. the empathy for the tortured puppy if youre an animals rights activist. the empathy for
supressed minorities if youre a human rights activist. and so on. im talking about the, lets call it, inconvenient empathy.

CAUGHT IN THE FILTERBUBBLE

i disapprove of what you say, but i will defend to the death your right to say it - based voltaire
the problem in our modern ways of interaction is, that the convenient, fluffy, safe filterbubbles that we grew so comfortable in - which
get more and more specialized and narrow - more and more limit the way people are able to communicate, discuss and in general are
able to show empathy in a broader way. in a way like the facebook algorithm that only surrounds us with people who share our opinion
and make us preach to the choir day by day on issues that seem so important to us and the people who share our little filterbubble. all
the issues that the other side just doesnt seem to get, which makes us hate them even more, and makes us continue to preach to the
choir about our unability to mentally grasp the fact how un-empathic the other side is being again. might it be in a ineducated way (they
took errr jobs!!!) or in an arrogant pseudo-intellectual way (we have to overcome as a society the collective hate coming from misogynist
trump supporters!!). it is a spiral of nodding and agreeing within ones circle that ultimately enforces the big disagreement, on a much
larger scale, the big division of society.
at this point i want to stop for a moment and point your attention to the aforementioned articles i stumbled upon. please read this
clickbaity-titled article called

http://www.cracked.com/blog/6-reasons-trumps-rise-that-no-one-talks-about/
and then come back here.
(ok. if this read didnt inflict too much rage in you and youre still reading, we can go on. if you identify too much with the actual people
described in the article, i urge you to read this one too by the same author, which is basically the other side of the medal and might be
more suited to prove my point about inconvenient empathy to someone like you: http://www.cracked.com/blog/5-helpful-answers-tosocietys-most-uncomfortable-questions/)

REALITY CHECK
now, that you read at least the donald trump article, i would like you to not just think like, yeah, there might be a point, you have to think
about these/all peoples problems too, but sexist, racist..
NO! the article is way more diplomatic and sugarcoated than i would have communicated its content in a conversation, cause everyone
who knows me knows i am a big fan of the concept of trolling (opposed to mobbing) to get a point across. so excuse me while i troll into
your face in all caps: WHEN YOU ARE WHINING ABOUT THE IDIOTS WHO VOTED DONALD TRUMP, WHEN YOU ARE VOICING
OUT LOUD THAT ALL HIS SUPPORTERS ARE DEPLORABLES, WHEN YOU PUT YOURSELF IN THE FUCKING HIGH THRONE,
TAKING YOUR OPINION FOR THE ONLY RELEVANT ONE, YOU ARE L I T E R A L L Y RESPONSIBLE FOR DONALD TRUMP. YOU
ARE DONALD TRUMP. I AM POINTING TO YOU!
this is the only rational consequence. literally. let that sink in. that fucked up feeling. let it flow through you.
now that i pissed you off a bit, we are getting closer to the point.
everything i described until now is pretty much what has been going on in my head up until the whole trump phenomenon happened in
the first place, since quite a long time.
now, what does donald trump have to do with all of that tho in the bigger picture?
here is the thing, i can pretty much understand why you loathe donald trump and why you are still asking yourself why a person like him
could influnce empathy out of all things in a positive direction. the reason is, this was the very first election on such a huge scale that
was almost exclusively a cultural one. a first time in history in fact. it involved a division literally through all aspects that we define as
culture in a society. one of the main things involved being journalism.

GETTING TO KNOW THE DONALD

2016 - the year hackers became journalists and journalists became hacks - pepe the frog
see, to form a different opinion about donald trump other than misogynic, sexist, racist, dividing, trolling asshole (i am not going to
debunk the trolling part, in fact i deeply cherish the art of trolling for the good cause, to get a desired reaction you would otherwise never
achieve), you actually actively had to:
a)

b)
c)

d)

decide that you want to form a different opinion about this guy for no reason in the first place, even tho everyone around you, every
tv station, every established media and culture outlet told you that its not necessary because the facts are clear. why would you do
that? he said all those things himself. you heard his voice saying these terrible things. yes, i can totally understand that point of
view, if i put myself in that point of view.
realize that even just the internet on its surface is presenting you what you already been bombarded with in the first place so its
even harder to find material you might not even want to look for in the first place since the facts seem so clear
realize that you have to resort to fringy conspiracy or alt-right platforms, the ones you usually wouldnt identify with in pretty much all
the aspects they stand for, in order to find simply full versions of the soundbites presented in the mainstream, or, saving your time,
finding correctives of wrong narratives, not with excuses or maybes and hearsay, but actual logical evidence, like in the following
disabled reporter example
spend your time watching all that stuff.

now, i did all that. while i dont want to be the trump apologist posterboy (cant say anything defensive about the pussy-tape), i just want
to show one example out of many that made me feel that something in the main media narrative was shady. the all famous TRUMP
MOCKS THE DISABLED REPORTER meme. i watched this video of some catholics for trump (one of the mentioned places id
personally avoid) dude recapturing the whole story and putting it into perspective: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ueCdV_wCVrc
now this is a string of arguments that seems perfectly reasonable to me, as opposed to the narrative that a man who travels the world
for his businesses and is a cultural icon since decades would suddenly mock a person he doesn't even know for his disability, just for
the lulz, while running for president of the us under the eyes of the whole world. regie hamm nicely put that into words on his Facebook
blog:
What I DONT believe is that were about to turn into Nazi Germany (and Ive read some posts from
people who actually
believe that). I dont think were going to roll back to the 1950s in our social order.
If Donald Trump is anything, hes as immersed
in current pop culture as Miley Cyrus. A man who was a regular guest on Howard Stern isnt going to be interested in a puritanical
revival of any kind. Hes
not coming after the gays or the transgendered. To the contrary, when Caitlyn Jenner (formally the
aforementioned Bruce) asked him where she could use the restroom in his hotel, his answer was use which ever one you feel
comfortable in.
The point is, we might be projecting some of our own irrational fears onto a man who is definitely
flawed but
probably not evil incarnate.
when it comes to the subject and fear of his stands on foreigners and immigration, we have to keep in mind that we are currently living
in a world that consists of different nations. as long as we haven't transcended into a new form of resource-based, border-free, society
(which i am ultimately looking forward to in the long run), we have to work with what we have. in order to successfully run a country, it is
important to purely regulate immigration. notice that i am saying this rationally, without wanting to have my country for myself, wanting
to keep my bloodline clean or all this bullshit that some backwards-thinking lunatics probably really want. immigration and the
possibility to try your luck wherever you want in the world is a good that needs to be upheld in any case. giving people fleeing their

country a safe refuge is a must and shouldn't even be discussed. in a world dominated by the initially mentioned common sense, i
wouldn't even have to give out this disclaimer. since we are not there yet unfortunately, it is still needed to explain yourself in a broader
way when talking about issues like nations and heritage, in order to reach the people you want to reach, the ones that are not on your
page already.
whenever trump talks about them mexicans, i could never find a single instance that confirms what ive been told all the time. he
doesn't hate mexicans. he doesn't hate people because they are mexican. dude, he got a third of the mexicans voting for him. the fact
is, you are caught in your filter bubble, and you are being triggered heavily. what trump in fact wants is to make sure the process of
entering the country is regulated. not regulated in a way that ONLY WHITES CAN GET IN (triggered brain is assuming things again), no,
regulated by common sense. since the southern border doesn't seem to be as secured as it should be (and i trust his expertise more
than mine there, since he actually went there, talked to the border police, and had a genuine look at the situation and the people
involved), he wants to change that by actually building a physical border. because if it indeed is the case that people are short-cutting
the regulated immigration process by literally sneaking into the country overnight, this issue should be adressed. if immigration is
regulated so that you have the possibility to enter the country legally if you have legitimate interest to do so, there is no need to sneak
in, unless you are not one of the decent people, as he puts it. this is all he means. now to be able to have a legitimate discussion about
something like that, which we need in order to disagree with it in the first place, we need to stop being triggered so easily. when you
want to make a point about people coming from the country you happen to share a border with into your country, who don't have the
best interests in mind, we cannot afford to be triggered by buzzwords, hysterically shouting that he said something about mexicans and
drug dealers, the border, a wall, omg that means he says mexicans are all drug dealers, omg that means he is racist, omg and a wall,
east germany had a wall, walls keep people away, but people are all equal and nice, he must be a dictator!!! we need to learn to listen
sincerely again, and actually genuinely want to understand what he means, in order to have a discussion in the first place. it became so
easy to fire off the reactions to certain buzzwords that we learned and internalized, especially when we are so convinced of being on the
right side of history. but hey, let me ask you a question: do you like dogs?
you do?
holy shit. you know who liked dogs? hitler. you fucking nazi scum!
thats how easy it is to shut you up. fucking racist dog lover.
over time i really found it hard to find any legitimate proof for the claims that this guy wants to deport people of different heritage
because of their heritage, fight against black-, women-, lgbtrans- or any other rights that a citizen should enjoy in a free society. i might
missed some trump soundbites, i am not perfect. if you still find some of these talking points that you cant wrap your head around, we
can check them together if you like and get to the bottom of the specific issue and try to evaluate what he actually means, since that is
seriously quite an effort in a swamp of fucking- yes, im saying it - dishonest media!

BUT I AM NOT SEEING WHAT YOU SEE

your opinion might start to shift at this point, at least you might be inclined to think more about it, but still there is this weird feeling of not
being right, of going down the completely wrong road, thinking things you shouldn't be thinking. but here is the thing: as long as you're
genuinely evaluating things for yourself, there is no wrong road. we should be able to think what we want. in fact, if we just followed the
number one rule: BE NICE, we can do and think much more than we think we do (mindfuck!). as long as you don't want to put yourself
above someone else, an individual or a group of people, for the sake of being superior, for any sake actually, everything should be
possible. heck, if a gay, disabled person of color is bullshitting me, i should have any right to call him out on his bullshit without being
labeled a racist homophobe without any empathy. because i don't care if he is black or disabled. i just care about the fact that he is
bullshitting me in the first place. in sociology there is the theory that a society always uses its common core values as a corrective. if you
are not following the basic values of any given society you are part of, there are internalized routines to correct you that happen
automatically. you get confronted over and over, at some point even being labeled an outcast to the society. now this works perfectly in a
society dominated by common sense. in a society where people of all colors, sexual preferences and whatsoever live peacefully
together, the corrective of society instantly brands people as idiots who go against these values and spread unjustified hate against one
of the groups living in this society. it works pretty well, you can see that in the outrage against trump actually. if the things that have been
communicated about him were pure facts, this would be a perfectly legitimate outrage justified by our common values as a society. this
corrective needs to work in all ways tho. in the very moment the balance shifts, the whole society starts to get out of balance. as long as
people post things like this on twitter and get applauded for it (and there are actually legit articles in the new york times, washington post
et.al. with literally similar titles) by important moral instances of society, the balance is in fact shifting:

now, before we get into the discussion of whose rights we should value more, a discussion similar to the one being held around the
naming of black lives matter (why not all lives matter? because when black lives matter, all lives matter) - this is a whole different
discussion and not the point i am trying to make here. the point is: take a look at where you stand, how and by what you judge the
opposing side - and then try to empathize. you are pissed off about the naming of black lives matter? try to understand the reason
behind it and to put yourself in the shoes of the people affected by the issue, instead of forcing your naive viewpoint on them. listen, and
genuinely try to understand. you are pissed off about racist donald trump wanting to deport all mexicans and wonder how half of the
country you live in, including your family living in texas, can be just as racist? try to understand the reason behind it and to put yourself
in the shoes of the people affected by the issue, instead of forcing your naive viewpoint on them.
now this is an approach that sounds so naive and simple in theory, but is a hard feat to achieve in reality, as shown by the division in
society. it is possible tho, as shown by a lone honest cnn journalist / hillary supporter, who genuinely wanted to understand unfortunately i forgot his name as well as the name of the series he made for cnn, maybe someone can help me out with that as i would
love to see the other episodes, but it aired on cnn right in the election night. a liberal man of color, journalist, employed by CNN, went
into the deep countryside of the US to visit trump supporters to have a honest discussion, genuinely trying to understand. what didn't
happen was that he got chased away with torches because he doesn't belong in this country and is a liberal sissy who can kiss their
ass. what happened was the following: i cannot get the image of the female trump supporter mom out of my head, who sat with him in
her kitchen, actually crying. i cannot forget what she said to him. she said you really hurt me with your points of view and i cannot agree
with you, but i love you so much for it, and i can not believe i am being listened to and taken seriously by the opposing side. i am
shivering again just as i write this. those were not tears of hurt, those were tears of genuine happyness, of being overwhelmed with
humanity, something she didn't expect anymore after being constantly bashed for her genuine fears and views over the whole period of
the campaigns.
this is the whole point. they want to be taken serious. all the bashing and hate and so-called racism from their side that piled up over the
years comes down to simple resignation and frustration. of course this is a cycle, a spiral that needs to be broken down, which is not
easy in the beginning, because we literally have to listen to and put ourselves into the shoes of people we learned to hate. we have to
disarm each other. and we are not disarming each other by slapping our viewpoint in the faces of the opposing side, branding it as the
only legit one, branding everyone disagreeing as a lunatic. in fact, if we continue doing this we are providing tons and tons of
ammunition to the other side that will end up in our faces ultimately. remember, YOU CREATED DONALD TRUMP then.

FALL AND RISE OF REAL JOURNALISM

now that we can hopefully agree on that everybody who doesn't want to harm people deserves to be heard, that every opinion, also the
less popular ones deserve to be discussed and evaluated, we can probably also agree on the fact that this definitely didn't happen in the
election period 2016.
you see, the shift of balance also applies to the relationship of citizens versus media/news/moral instances.
the values of a democracy i learned when i was young were quite simple: the government is the employee of the people, serving its
people in the first place. the people are the boss. the press is the controlling instance, also being employed by and serving the people
by independently controlling the government to make sure they keep on doing their job of serving the people, while the actual people
are too busy with their jobs and chores to do that themselves - a normal thing in a highly specialized society like ours.
enter the world of corporate media.
i am quite sure that most of you, even the majority of trump opposers, have developed a genuine hate for corporate media. this kind of
blurry, conspiracy-ish consent that there are corporate/hidden interests at work behind the news and features we are being served on
corporate media, that entered the mainstream years ago. not far fetched given the fact that all the outlets that give us the news are
owned by 5 companies. but when suddenly the same shady entities tell you that the one person that tells you he is standing up for you,
is in fact not standing up for you but doing the opposite, and they know exactly who you should vote instead - you don't doubt it? you
take their word and vote for their candidate? that is a form of cognitive dissonance, but i cannot blame you - the correctives in society i
mentioned earlier are bigger than all of us and apply their force on us, no matter if the values they go by are enforced by actual consent
in society or a manipulated consent in society achieved by constant repeating of so called facts. the result is the same. people being
outcast for apparently thinking the wrong things, being on the wrong side.
lucky for us we live in the year 2016 and have a tool on our hands that has the ability to actually transcend society as a whole to the
next level in the evolution of our collective minds. the internet.
suddenly, things stopped being conspiracy theories. suddenly we all could read with our own eyes whats going on behind the curtains,
being able to browse through hundreds of thousands of emails that show the communication of the DNC and hillary campaign during
the campaign period. actual proof of rigging against bernie sanders, actual memos of talking points to be communicated being sent out
to corporate media. proof of a whole closed system of backdoor politicians and journalists, working together to get their agenda going.
if i go after the basic democratic values i have been taught earlier in my life, wikileaks was the press. they were the corrective, exposing
actual wrong-doings behind the curtain, giving us the people the possibility to judge for ourselves how we want our society to progress
and if we want these people to continue serving us. this is the medias job! not more not less.

if we cannot judge properly, we cannot discuss, because we don't have facts to begin with. the whole democratic process from the
beginning to the end gets screwed up and becomes ultimately unnecessary and a waste of time. the corrective of society still works, but
its variables have been manipulated.

THE ELEPHANT IN THE PORCELAIN STORE

now one might say, we don't need an asshole like donald trump to get this process going. bernie sanders wanted all of that and more,
and he communicated it in a humble, reasonable and respectful way. a true leader and moral instance!
and you are right. if we would have gone through the process i outlined, if we already were this society, a guy like bernie would be the
perfect candidate. unfortunately he was working against a system that formed over decades, that did his very best to prevent him from
actually running. something that made some bernie supporters actually switch to the trump camp after bernie got cheated out. the other
problem: he was just too nice and reasonable for the very situation we are at right now.
see, the process of impossible communication, of filter bubbles and meaningless accusations progressed so far already, that huge
chunks of the population already completely switched off. donald got them back into the game. the thing is, election campaign became
war, and he understood that. the media reduced campaigning to buzzwords and triggering, and he used that to his advantage. he, and
no-one else realized how to get these people on board rethorically. now if the press used its job as a corrective, they would analyze
what he is saying, breaking it down for the people to REDUCE their legit fears. the very thing that i am trying to do right now. what they
did instead is inflicting even more hate and fear, by willingly reducing and transforming the statements he actually made to buzzwords
and headlines, fabricated to inflict as much hate, fear and division as possible, intentionally. all with the agenda to keep themselves alive
feeding off their slowly decaying host, which is the very nature of a parasite. keeping the system going without being questioned,
pushing the candidate through that will help keeping that whole system running.
you have to understand, the transformation that i would like to see and i am describing here, is going exclusively against those interests.
the society people actually deserve doesn't contain corporate media. they would literally kill themselves off by doing their job at this
point, exposing themselves. that would never ever happen. we are at a point where we cannot just go on with the candidate that causes
us the least pain with the things he/she says, while continuing to do all the things we actually don't want and keep on criticizing while not
even expecting them to change anymore. things like inflicting a proxy war with russia in syria by enforcing a no-fly zone.
the situation is, we got to a point where we actually have to break some shit down in order to build it back up again. donald trump is the
wrecking ball.
he said all the things that got the people on board who resigned already and shut themselves off from the political discourse. heck, he
actually did the campaign i have been secretly thinking of since years whenever i played scenarios through in my mind of how, if you
have a vision of bringing people together again, you should campaign in order to break the current cycle, to get the attention you need
at first, to yell through the constant yelling that is already going on and ultimately be heard, to actually use the means of the system you
want to destroy against themselves.
if what i hope for is true, and it looks like it when you look at the public person donald trump before his presidential campaign, and if you
listen to his acceptance speech right after the election (a honest, humble speech i personally hoped for right before the election, but
then in hindsight realized it was necessary to keep the act up right up until the end) - this might have been an agenda all along. and its
not that the donald just woke up and realized in his narcissistic mind that he should be the president next year. i genuinely believe in his
motivations when i watch this compilation of his statements regarding this issue OF THE LAST THREE DECADES: https://
www.youtube.com/watch?v=mxf1XmVZ9qY
of course i don't know his agenda. all i know is tho, people are afraid of him pulling a hitler. not realizing that hitlers are being pulled all
the time right at this moment, in a much smarter way than hitler did it. today we don't shout fuck your country im going in and invade.
today we bring democracy, today we are deeply concerned about what this middle eastern leader is doing do his people and bomb him
away. this IS ALREADY HAPPENING. hitler is in the building!
what i also know and saw with my own eyes is the spirit inside the trump community. having spend lots of time on both reddits, hillarys
and donalds, in order to stay informed, i must say i was surprised and blown away by the positive spirit on the trump reddit, one of the
main forces behind his campaign. this is a community who welcomes everyone with open arms, welcoming white straight guys, mexican
lesbian girls, black disabled people. not because they were good mascot foreigners they could use to prove a point. it was genuine
happiness for another person sharing the same viewpoint, the background didn't even matter (maybe in a positive way as every protrump mexican showed the community that not all is lost and that more and more people saw through the false narrative). all with a nice
portion of good old troll irony:

CONCLUSION
did you watch CNN the day after the election? it was literally stated, across all the channels, that putin congratulated trump on his
victory and hopes for a constructive dialog, something that might be possible again now with trump on the wheel. sounds good? fuck
no!! this was seriously mentioned as a NEGATIVE point for trump. fucking evil villain putin endorses trump and wants to talk to him? he
is so bad!! trump must be bad too!! how can you?????
let me ask a question.. do you have a dog? :)
do you really want to live in a world where the screen that we watch for hours every day tells us that the leader of the other superpower
being happy about the president that you elected, wanting a dialogue instead of ice cold silence and war threats, IS A BAD THING?
where you are told that saying hey maybe i should talk to his guy, we might have more of that than of the constant bullying is a
NEGATIVE TRAIT IN YOUR NEW PRESIDENT??
where the same news anchors then sit there in a room with the campaign manager of the trump campaign, asking why THEY
INFLICTED SO MUCH HATE THROUGHOUT THE CAMPAIGN, all while keeping a straight face, looking into the flabbergasted eyes of
the campaign manager who doesn't even know where to begin?
i do not want that.
and while it is so damn easy to say i don't want a president who doesn't like mexicans and hates women before you go on with your
day, being inspired by the first president with a vagina, while telling yourself, yeah, somewhere down the road we might have to do
something against all the wars and corruption its not the road i want to choose. i don't wanna take the easy road.
every society gets the president they deserve. and we will have a great, inspiring president when we evolved into a society where
genuine discussion is possible, where we can overcome inequality by respecting each other, by

- helping oppressed minorities overcome the oppression by giving them the rights they deserve as human beings, the rights our
forefathers denied them, even tho we became comfy with our privilege and our generation has nothing to do with the suppression
they experienced. this is our duty! but also by

- showing empathy for the people who might not understand your cause in the first place and, in an understanding and empathic way,
leading them through the thought process that is necessary. that means not yelling racist at a 16 year old white guy who genuinely
and with all his heart wants all lives to matter, but instead explaining patiently why this narrative hurts you and why you
communicate the things the way you do.
but right now our society is broken. it is a burned down house that is in danger of collapsing. right now we don't deserve a great inspiring
president, because a big chunk of the people would think he is in bed with the establishment, others would mock him as too intellectual,
and he would get yelled down by the press as well for actually standing up against them.
right now we only deserve a wrecking ball. tear the whole shit down. and after that, lets rebuild a beautiful society. a healthy
independent media system not based on profit. a respectful discussion culture based on ideas being freely exchanged to come to a
healthy consent, but that can also take a dumb joke without being triggered and telling people how to think and talk even tho there was
no bad intent in the first place. 4chan trolling culture is real and to a certain degree its healthy. giving every person the feeling that they
are genuinely heard, so they will open up aswell, feeling respected, which makes them hear you in the consequence.
a society with a corrective working the right way. where actual bullshit gets called out. bullshit from actual racists. and also bullshit from
manipulators who try to suppress ideas that deserve to be heard, just because they don't fit their agenda.
i am happy that donald won. the statements on TV the day after were already unprecedented. CNN hosts who say with shocked
expression that they maybe failed to hear big parts of the population and that they maybe should respect other opinions more. NO SHIT
SHERLOCK!!!!!
i know the process feels weird. when i started to mention to my friends that i might think he is the lesser evil, all the corrections took
place. i doubted. even when i already fully realized my opinion, i still doubted whenever i turned on the tv. it is very hard to overcome the
stronghold that a opinion majority has over us. a strong character and strong belief in your values can help you overcome the doubts.
what also helps are honest discussions with friends of the same and the opposing opinion. and if you disagree with all my ramblings
now, lets talk about it!
in my opinion, we have a president that just wants everyone to succeed. lets give this guy a chance until he actually proves me wrong. if
he does, lets get out the torches. until then, why don't we all come together and
MAKE THE WORLD GREAT AGAIN :)
sincerely,
a fellow centipede