果冻影院

What would it take to shock you? The answer, I suspect, has changed since 2016.

On Monday, Trump听retweeted听a fake Photoshopped image of Senate Minority Leader Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.) and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) wearing traditional Islamic garb. They are standing in front of the Iranian flag. The tweet implied that Democrats support Iran鈥檚 brutal theocratic regime. That is, of course, an absurd lie. But then the White House made the situation much worse. White House press secretary Stephanie Grisham听said听that the tweet was intended to show that Democrats were 鈥渁lmost taking the side of terrorists.鈥�

The implication 鈥� complete with lazy, bigoted stereotypes 鈥� was clear. Trump was conflating Democrats with Muslims, Muslims with terrorists, and therefore Democrats with terrorists. Even from a man who has built his political brand on xenophobia and racism, this was a new low.

But did it shock anyone? Not really.

After all, Trump once proposed听banning all Muslims听from entering the United States 鈥� an attempt to deny 2 billion people access to the country solely because of their religious beliefs. He has called Democrats 鈥渦n-American鈥� and 鈥渢reasonous.鈥� Trump refers to his critics as 鈥渉uman scum.鈥� He tweeted an image depicting him听beating up the likeness of CNN听and shared a GIF showing Hillary Clinton being听violently hit with a golf ball. And Trump said four minority congresswomen 鈥� three of them American-born 鈥� should 鈥済o back鈥� to where they came听from, after he had already praised those marching alongside neo-Nazis and Ku Klux Klan members as 鈥渧ery fine people.鈥�

Any of those despicable behaviours would have shocked the American public in any other presidency. They would have unleashed endless coverage and defined the president鈥檚 term in office. Now they鈥檙e just another Monday under Trump. The horribly offensive image he spread to his millions of followers isn鈥檛 the subject of any stories on the front page of major American newspapers. What can you expect? We live in Trumpland now. The unthinkable has become routine.

There鈥檚 a serious cost to this desensitisation: the death of democratic accountability. Trump hasn鈥檛 faced any serious consequences for transforming his Twitter feed and the official mouthpiece of the White House into a megaphone for racist disinformation and lies. In fact, because the barrier for what shocks us has soared so high, Trump is able to get away with increasingly bad behaviour.

That鈥檚 a problem because of the fractured information pipeline that now defines American politics. There are three main camps of voters in the American electorate.

First, there are the members of Trump鈥檚 base. They lap up every last one of Trump鈥檚 obscene tweets with gleeful abandon. Bring on the Photoshopped bigotry! Second, there are the Democratic activists who pay close attention to Trump鈥檚 tweets, statements and scandals. They are rightly outraged by the president鈥檚 outrageous behaviour. They try to refuse to be desensitised. But even the most ardent anti-Trumpers are prone to growing numb to repetitive events.

Then there鈥檚 the third group, which is by far the largest: the voters who have a more casual interest in politics. They only glancingly pay attention to the Washington political circus, dismissing it as the Trumpian freak show it has become. And that enormous bloc of voters is crucial to understanding the dangers of normalisation in the Trump era. I鈥檓 confident that most of those voters have no idea that Trump tweeted that bigoted image of Pelosi and Schumer on Monday. How could they? In all likelihood, it didn鈥檛 register on the front pages of their hometown newspapers, it didn鈥檛 get top billing on the evening news, and it therefore wasn鈥檛 likely to be the topic of conversation around the dinner table or at the local coffee shop or bar.

Much of Trump鈥檚 undignified, childish or insulting behaviour goes the same way. It reverberates across Twitter to his adoring fans. It provokes outrage to his staunch critics. But most Americans are never exposed to it at all. That makes a crucial difference to public perceptions. To the casual observer, Trump seems a lot more normal and acceptable than he is because his constantly abnormal behaviour doesn鈥檛 break through to anyone except highly engaged voters.

The daily news is biased toward events that are surprising, unusual or shocking. But if we stop focusing on Trump鈥檚 behaviours that听should听shock us, then he won鈥檛 just get away with them. He鈥檒l also get re-elected, because less impassioned voters will get a whitewashed, normalised impression of an abnormal, bigoted president. And here鈥檚 the scariest thought of all: If we鈥檙e already losing our collective ability to be shocked by Trump now, what will it take to shock us if he wins another term? I, for one, would rather not find out.

This article was first published on听The Washington Post听on 14 January 2020.

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