My lecturer, who over the years, I've come to respect and admire as I've grown older said to us as undergraduates:
"I suspect you are all here thinking about how cool you are and how you've all got it sussed about how the world should be. And you all are really leftie and think the Daily Mail should be banned. Well one day you might need the Daily Mail."
He then went on to lecture us about gatekeeping and who gatekeeps the gatekeepers. Who controls censorship and why we should really consider this and what it says about power and control. Freedom can't exist with excessive censorship. It's impossible because you had power to people in order to enforce against the population. It's at odds with the essence of the public holding power to account by removing their ability to do so.
At the time, I was indeed very much 'this is right and this is wrong' and I was on an internet community forum where we didn't all get out and a bunch of my friends (who were initially internet friends but became real life friends), to my horror and frustration, would often post things I didn't like and thought were offensive. A couple of them were eventually given moderation powers by the guy who ran the site (who I was also friends with) but I never was.
At the time it annoyed me and I felt hard done by that I wasn't listened to and was overlooked for having that power.
But in hindsight my lecturer was absolutely right and I'd have been a terrible terrible mod and the power would have gone to my head.
I now sit at a point waivering between thinking that censorship should be as light and as limited as possible and only where fundamentally necessary and no censorship. Neither of these options fully satisfy me for their own obvious drawbacks.
My lecture was in 1998 and at the time the internet really was the wild west without so much as a Google search filter.
I sit and reflect on the journey I've been on with the concept of gatekeeping and really understanding what it means. My 19 year old self didn't fully appreciate it, though the lecture definitely struck a chord and I've never ever forgotten it.
I grew up. And I'm 46 now and I get it.
The Democrats still haven't got it. For all the talk of democracy and the constitution etc etc, they have forgotten the underpinning principles of freedom of speech holding power to account and in taking and trying to use censorship and control on the population they've empowered Trump to harass this and use it in his own way against the interests of the people.
My point is the democrats are full of educated, middle class mid level management who want to control their subordinates. Trump saw this and understood the grievance that it's been causing. And weaponised it because the Democrats couldn't see their own self righteous hypocrisy. And weren't being held to account in the eyes of many.
I find it hard because do not share the same beliefs and culture as so many Trump supporters - who are genuinely nice and good people and totally not Nazis. They just have different views to me. And equally I am alarmed and disturbed by the whole narrative of the Democrats to demonise, smear, censor and refuse to even consider different perspectives because they've been so wrapped up in the idea that they are right and they are good.
I truly believe that the majority of people are good. Some fuck up, but inherently they mean well and perhaps have the wrong or different priorities. But they arent 'full of hate'.
And that's really where the Democrats have messed up. With arrogance and believing we should all live a certain way. The lack of tolerance and the authoritarian censorship and lies are not exclusive to the Republican party.
And it's ordinary people who understand this in a way that so many university educated people aren't grasping.
I'm not sure I'd see what I see now but for that 2 hour session 25 years ago.
There was an understanding and balance of power over censorship until social media and since then we've seen a battleground for power over who are the gatekeepers. Elon Musk buying twitter exemplifies the entire point. He bought it because he understood the value of it wasn't in its advertising revenue. Even if it makes a loss on paper it doesn't necessarily make HIM a loss. Not now.
Why is it that the first buildings the US bombs when it takes military action against another country or enemy is it's communication hq?
Today is hard. Really hard. I've seen it coming for a good while and it doesn't remotely surprise me.
Hitler promised bread and work. He didn't get elected because the priority was to kill the Jews and an agenda of hate. They became the scapegoat and something to build power and control from. They were mined for resources. He understood the priorities of those at the bottom who brought him power are always food, work and housing first. People struggling with them always leaves a democracy vulnerable to those who make the same sort of promise and identify their priority. Their priority isn't a concept of democracy, their priority is paying the bills and feeding their family. And it always will be.
You won't win an election if you pit the fuzzy and intellectual complex concept of democracy head to head with a under educated public who are acutely aware of declining standards of living and the likelihood, are struggling to pay bills and that they will not achieve as well as their parents generation. Why? Because mathematics.
Why didn't the Democrats see this?
Biden's victory of margin was incredibly slim. Incumbent parties very very rarely increase their vote share before losing office. They were swimming uphill against the current from the word go from 2020. This is the same position Labour are in now. They'd be monumentally stupid if they don't look at this election and understand the WHY present here.
Why would someone who didn't graduate high school vote for Trump who has the vocabulary of a 9 year old over Harris who is university educated and has a huge vocabulary? Really? Is it that hard to see and understand this?