Do Americans Hate Each Other Like the Media Says?
Part of Me Thinks That Idea is Overblown and Exaggerated
It’s been just over two months since Donald Trump and Elon Musk grabbed power in the White House. January 20th isn’t a day that most were happy to experience, and it’s only gone downhill since. Seeing a wannabe dictator grabbing America by the hoo-haw with his little orange baby hands is a travesty of justice.
Unless you’re on the far right. You know, the enemy of decency, equality, and freedom.
Wait, what? You don’t believe that to be true? You fashion yourself to be a good person who just wants what’s best for your country, family, and friends? That’s hard for those of us on the liberal side to believe.
We view your support of Elonald Trusk to be ridiculous. How could you support billionaires who have done nothing to help a diverse America? Everything they propose seems ass-backwards. It completely favors the wealthy, entitled elite.
You know, white people.
Well, a small, minute fraction of them, anyway. Though I identify as Italian/Irish more than “white”, I realize that I’d pass for someone who might just be a MAGA Trump supporter. Though my half-Vietnamese Bride, mixed-race children, and gay daughter could provide clues that there’s no way on God’s green Earth that I’d support a political party bent on taking rights away from women and other marginalized citizens.
Still, MAGA voters probably think of me as their enemy. With a large following here on Substack and on social media, I use my above-average reach to call out racism, bigotry, sexism, and homophobia. I attempt to affect change by writing about the bullshit hypocrisy of the far-right, Christofascist, GOP agenda.
Surely we could never co-exist in a peaceful, live-and-let-live setting here in America, right? Well, that’s what they want us to think. Who’s “They?” Well, let me tell you.
The wealthy elite and mainstream media, that’s who.
It doesn’t make much effort to find vitriol and hate online. One only has to peruse the comment sections of any political or religious article on news sites or social media platforms. It’s easy to see the worst displays of human behavior against other Americans everywhere.
Anger. Insults. Racism. Bigotry. That bullshit is all there.
But how do we know that some or even many of these comments aren’t being propagated by companies, corporations, or even foreign governments? A divided America is a weaker America. Imagine what we could accomplish if we quit arguing about Jabba the Trump and actually came together to make our country better.
That’s a much easier plan to “Make America Great Again” than listening to billionaires’ bullshit and allowing them to further divide us. Lately, it feels as though they’re running diversion to distract us from the greedy, illegal fuckery they’re committing behind the scenes. Believe me, it’s in their best interests to keep us focused on hating each other rather than on the shady crap they’re doing.
Personal enrichment doesn’t just happen on its own.
Think about the things Trump has talked about these first two months. He said we need to acquire Greenland, to which Greenland promptly responded, “Get fucked, Trump, we’re not for sale.” Then he mentioned how we should have control of the Panama Canal since we sink tons of money into it and receive few benefits from it. He also mentioned that we only recognize two genders here in the US.
Bullshit, not this fella. Nothing like pissing off some 13 million members of the LGBTQ community in one fell swoop.
These ridiculous statements seem to be deflecting the negative attention Trump has been receiving since taking office. He made all of these statements a short time after admitting that he may not deliver on his campaign promise of bringing the price of groceries down. Perhaps he’s realizing that the cost of fuel isn’t under the control of the president of the United States.
Spoiler alert: He hasn’t done shit for the economy, other than make it worse.
MAGA should have taken a basic economics course before voting last November. Education matters. It’s important to realize how the real world works before supporting a man who does not have your best financial interests in mind. Your attempts to “Own a liberal” and vote against the rights of your mothers, daughters, aunts, and marginalized friends and family play right into Trump’s little baby hands.
Still, I’m not convinced that every right-leaning person voted purposely to hurt women, minorities, immigrants, and LGBTQ folks. I’ve spent time over the holidays with two sets of family members who I suspect still support Trump and the GOP. Nobody treated me or my family with anything other than kindness, love, and respect.
Still, their voting choices are something I cannot overlook. I worry about those who vote against the best interests of my Bride and children. Some would say I should immediately cut them out of our lives and never speak to them again. That they’d betray us in a heartbeat if President Musk and Vice-President Trump demanded that supporters turn against left-leaning liberals.
I don’t buy that. Call me naive, but I don’t believe that most people want to inflict harm or death on their loved ones with differing political beliefs.
I haven’t personally observed far-right people being rude or ugly toward diverse people here in the very red state I live in. I noticed that the people in line at the grocery store were friendly and kind toward a transgender checker who works there, which made me happy to see. Last night, I asked my Asian daughter if she’d had anyone say anything rude or racist toward her before.
She mentioned kids in grade school making slanted eyes toward her once. But nothing has happened in the past 10 years that Trump has been in politics.
I realize that racism and bigotry still abound here in 2025 America. I’m not putting on rose-tinted glasses and declaring that all of our problems don’t exist. But I am starting to question how much of this divisive, hateful bullshit we see online is legitimate versus manufactured by the powers that be.
Until I start observing everyday Americans being rude, racist, and bigoted to others face-to-face in public, I’m not buying into the idea that everyone hates each other. While too large a segment of society probably does have an unjustifiable bias against people who vote and worship differently than they do, I feel that it’s overblown.
Know your enemy. It’s much more likely to be the douchebag, law-breaking billionaires in the White House than the friendly, polite trans lady working at your grocery store. Let’s continue to be kind and generous toward each other face-to-face. Perhaps that will help us move toward that direction in our online interactions.
© 2025 The Mouthy Renegade Writer. All rights reserved.
Divide and conquer, oldest trick in the book
Yes. Hating Nazis and heartless cruel republicans seems like a healthy response. They hate POC, women, veterans, seniors, liberals. Look at the racist deportations. That’s just one of many reasons to hate them.