How I feel about the Trump assassination attempt

Over the weekend there was another horrific shooting in this country, this time of a Presidential candidate. From the people that I know and choose to follow, there has been a resounding chorus condemning political violence. 

Council on Foreign Relations

At this time, we do not know the motives of the shooter, though there is infinite speculation online that has been spiking all of our cortisol levels and creating a multi-verse of conspiracy theories.  

The speed of information dissemination online has transformed how people learn about and process information. We now learn about the incident nearly instantaneously, and somehow expect journalists and politicians to have a full understanding of the facts with the immediacy of an episode of CSI Miami.

We also learn about things in the strangest of places. And by strangest of places, I mean social media. You find news of a shooting literally adjacent to a video about sourdough baking or a picture of your best friend’s cat.

This disrupts our brains in ways we definitely don’t understand yet and it makes everyone uncomfortable. 

The speed that information moves these days also makes us want instant responses and answers from everyone, everywhere all the time.

That’s not how the world works. 

Investigating a crime takes time, finding out how the shooter got the gun takes time, confirming that you have the correct name of the shooter takes time. People were texting me wanting President Biden to immediately give a speech - before he had the chance to get information.

This isn’t the West Wing (though I so wish it were). The administration needed time to gather the best information and decide on the right way to address a nation that is more divided than ever. This doesn’t happen in an instant. 

I wish we could all take a breath and let the news cycle and the information gathering cycle do what it needs to do before demanding responses. 

Many elected officials of both parties came out and condemned violence. However I follow a ton of conservative influencers and what they are doing is calling Democrats evil - not just Biden, but all Democrats. On Tiktok, where I exclusively use my FYP, there has been a lot of unhinged commentary from all sides of the spectrum, and most saliently I assume from the capitalism side. 

Debate bros immediatly monitizing the chaos

My media consumption plan was to watch the President, check out one summary article on Sunday, listen to my favorite reality-based commentator (Jamelle Bouie) and then wait for this week’s news to read the information when it has been verified. There’s a balance between putting your head in the sand (not good) and mainlining conspiracy content until it cooks your brain (also not good).

I also got a couple DM’s freaking out about how this sealed the election - I disagree.

The reality is - there is no evidence this incident changed anyone's voting plans. Perhaps it made people who were already Trump voters more enthusiastic, but as Jamelle Bouie says, enthusiasm doesn’t register at the polls. 

People keep citing Reagan, he was shot in 1981 in the first year of his first term and didn’t face re-election until 3 years later. There’s no evidence to indicate that the shooting itself was a factor in the win. 

I can tell you this, people are talking about how the photos from this event are going to be as iconic as his mugshot - I had already forgotten that photo exists.  

I am deeply concerned about both the violent rhetoric, the violent actions and the violent policy choices of this country. 

But we also need to remember that we have no idea about a motive here. John Hinckley Jr. attempted to assassinate Reagan because he thought it would impress Jodie Foster, 

This attempt is not in and of itself an indication of mass political violence ahead. What is more concerning is the months of increasing rhetoric about a stolen election, the us v. them/good v. evil dichotomy, and the strong conspiracy infrastructure already in place.

I want to back up a little bit to another news story that broke the Internet and also bred an insane number of conspiracy theories.

When Kate Middleton stepped back from the public eye and the Internet went insane with that multiverse of theories about what was happening my main argument was that this was conspiracy infrastructure building. There were all of these accounts that grew from promulgating conspiracy theories and were going to need more and more content to feed the beast.  

This is becoming an increasing problem. 

Personally, I try not to consume the content. And my advice to you is to use this as an opportunity to cultivate your news intake.  If you follow people who raised your blood pressure, who promoted conspiracy theories or who otherwise contributed in an unproductive manner to the conversation, unfollow them. 

I have said this before and I will say it again. We need to take care in the coming months. This is a marathon and not a sprint. Check in with yourself and with others and be kind to both.