Click here to read the previous post for prior conversations.
(John and Candice are from South Carolina, Norah is from Saudi Arabia. Talib lives in Yemen. David Hogg was a student at Parkland High School and Pam was a student at Columbine.)
John feels disturbed and angered by what David Hogg has just said:
You think our president is badly influencing our country when he criticizes people. Well, I think he’s having a great effect. I don’t care if he makes fun of people or threatens Hillary Clinton. I hate Hillary Clinton. I hate most Democrats. The president is trying to show us all who they really are.
Barack Obama:
What do you hate about Democrats, John?
John:
They are mobs of violent people. They want to take my rights away and keep me from having my religious freedoms. They want to force me to get along with those homosexuals and transsexuals, who are evil and you can read the bible to prove that. And they want to take my guns away. They also want to take my money to take care of people who want a handout. I’ve already told you a lot of reasons I hate these people. And I include you.
Candice:
Democrats are violent and evil mobs… and the media, except for Fox News, is the enemy of the people. Our president has helped us see that.
Biden:
How has he helped you see that? Did he show you videos?
John jumps in:
No, he told us about how violent and evil they all are.
David Hogg interrupts:
John, the reason he doesn’t show you videos is that there are none. There are no violent mobs of Democrats. However, if you pay attention, you can see that when the president has his rallies, he incites the crowd in to mob behavior when they shout ‘lock her up’ or ‘CNN sucks’ or ‘go home’ or even worse – ‘kill her’, or ‘trump that bitch’, or ‘build a wall-kill them all’. He tells the people at the rallies it is ok to act violently toward others, like when he told his people that if they hurt someone else, that he would back them up… or if they body slam a reporter, that this is cool. Even though, if they did this, they could be arrested and convicted of a crime.
John:
Well, the Democrats, the media, and the immigrants probably deserve what they are shouting.
Barack Obama:
Do you want to hurt them, John? Do you want to hurt Michelle and me?
John:
No, but maybe if someone hurt some Democrats, it wouldn’t be so bad.
Candice:
Do you really mean that John?
John:
I don’t really want anyone hurt. But I don’t trust them. I am afraid that the communist/socialists will take over my country, and then they will take our guns and then take all our rights away because we won’t have any guns to protect ourselves. Then they will take away our property as Castro did to the Cubans. They will just slowly slice our rights away and they will become dictators that run our lives.
Norah:
Like us, John? We have a dictator Prince who ordered a journalist to be murdered and chopped to pieces and your president colluded with him. He tried to work out an excuse with the Prince… that a rogue killing had happened. They both changed their stories over and over. The only reason their attempt to manipulate people into believing it was a rogue killing didn’t work… is that Erdogan had recordings of the murder as it was happening. No one expected that. And still, your president is trying to absolve our Prince or at least get people to forget what he did. He has no more morals than our Prince who will murder and torture us when he can get by with it… if we don’t act in a manner he approves.
Joe Biden:
John, I hear your concern about Castro. And I agree that Castro was a communist, and he took the rights away from citizens and seized their land and Cuba is 50 years behind times now. It is in terrible shape and so many people went through horror as he confiscated their land and threatened their lives.
The difference is that when we had a democratic president, President Obama, who is here, we had more freedoms than we have now. He never tried to keep the press from telling the American people the truth, even when it made him look bad.
Most Democrats want only to ban semi-automatic weapons that are used in combat solely to murder people. We want to keep guns for people who hunt or want a pistol for protection.
And Obama also helped people hold on to their properties by preventing the banks from taking their properties after the banks had deceived them. He has protected citizens from those with more power who would try to take advantage of them.
John, your president now couldn’t care less about your rights. He protects the rights and taxes of his billionaire friends. They pay next to nothing, while you pay a sizable percentage and at any moment, your grandmother or maybe your mother could lose her social security or her Medicare… because the Republicans want to phase this out.
They have done everything they could to knock out protection for pre-existing conditions. The Affordable Care Act is the only reason they haven’t been able to end pre-existing coverage. And the president makes up rash and crazy things like now he will protect your insurance and give you a real middle-class tax break, even though he has made his billionaires richer while the money you have left over after you eat and pay bills, will drop because of all the tariffs he forces on other countries who used to be our allies… And this is just one reason you will be less well off. All the while he shouts lies at you to make you look the other way so you don’t see what he is really doing to human lives, including yours.
He tells you lie after lie. Why can’t you see this, John? What is keeping you from realizing this?
Barack Obama:
John, I have a feeling that you are so frightened that this keeps you from paying attention to the details. Could that be true? Sometimes when I get frightened, I am inconsolable and I want no one to reason with me, I feel worse when they do that and I want them to shut up and go away.
I know you are afraid that you will lose this president because you feel he is the only one who will care about your rights and your freedom. He tells you this and tries to terrify you so you will turn against everyone else except him and the people who follow his agenda.
But it might help to think about how your president went on and on about how he would end all the corruption when he became president. And John, he has hired more corrupt people to fill his staff along with government posts and positions… than any other president in the history of our country…His people have been indicted so many times, you could field a football team. No one in my administration got indicted. So how is it that this president has cleaned things up?
He promised to drain the swamp, and that was his attempt to manipulate you to believe he was a wonderful person who would help your government take care of you. But he has created swamps everywhere. Our democracy is at risk unless enough people wake up and realize what he is doing.
Yet, I know you have concerns that need to be heard, John. You need to feel that your country represents you too. Our government has represented the lobbyists and the wealthy for far too long.
Einstein walks into the middle of their circle:
I want to add something to your conversation. I know I have not joined you yet. I am Albert Einstein and I am in my afterlife… Mostly I want to tell you I have news about your country. You may not have this information yet even though you are now operating in two places at the same time. You are in your world living your lives. And you are in this ‘Between’ place talking with one another – all at the same time. You came here through your dream state but part of you woke up and went on about your activities.
What I want you to know is that a man, Cesar Sayoc, has recently been charged with sending explosive bomb packages to prominent figures in politics, such as the Obamas, Hillary Clinton, the former Director of National Intelligence, James Capper… and to the media – CNN… and these are just a few who received these bombs. Trump has bad mouthed everyone of the people who were targeted.The windows of Cesar Sayoc’s van were full of photos of Trump and political memes, including Hillary Clinton with a target over her face. Luckily no one was killed. The bombs were real, but they discovered and confiscated the packages before anyone tried to open them.
But this is not all I have to tell you.A Jewish synagogue meeting for their Sabbath was just violently attacked by a gunman, Robert Bowers, identified as a far-right white supremacist, who shouted, “all jews must die.” Eleven people are now dead and more were injured.
John and Candice, this is where hate leads. Robert Bowers was a member of Gab, a social media group which considers itself to be the far right’s alternative to Twitter. He wrote on Gab – “HIAS likes to bring invaders in that kill our people.” HAIS is a Jewish organization that helps refugees. And then later he said, “I can’t sit by and watch my people get slaughtered. Screw your optics, I’m going in.” Robert Bowers said this right before he mass murdered 11 people with his assault rifle and semi-automatic handguns.
When you turn against other humans who have different opinions than you do and make them ‘evil’,you inspire hate and violence which prevents anyone from hearing what really matters to anyone else. It doesn’t work. And the heartbreaking damage it does is agonizing…
Michelle Obama:
Our democracy is in crisis and we are at risk of losing our freedom. When a president tells you it’s ok to be violent and then vilifies whoever might keep him from getting what he wants, he is attacking our democracy. He has inspired these far-right white supremacists to commit terrorist acts.
David Hogg:
Doesn’t this make him a closet terrorist?
Pam:
I have said little, but I want to say something now. That man who claims to be president is inciting terrorists who will continue to mass murder people if they can. Instead of having a president who inspires hope… who tries to help people believe all personal lives matter… we have a president who inspires hate, violence, and alienation.
What is happening to humanity…? I feel in despair. I have witnessed what can happen to a person who joins a neo-nazi/white supremacist group. Everyone deserves to have a place where they feel they belong. And everyone needs to realize that all people deserve this. I’m at a loss for words.
Tarib:
We are used to this kind of life. Terrorists attack us night and day. And most of us have lost hope. Half of our country is dying of famine. Please don’t go this direction. We need you to elect a new leader so we can have hope that there is somewhere we can lean to help us find our way out of this horror… and also so we can have hope that something better than this is possible. Other wise we are dying as a people.
Norah:
Don’t you ‘see’, John and Candice? Don’t you see where your president is leading you. You are underwater, close to drowning and you haven’t yet realized this. He is a nightmare in progress… and you… as well as people like you… need to wake yourselves up so that this nightmare can end.
If I can’t help you understand how your president supports the cover-up of our Prince ordering the violent murder and dismemberment of a journalist dissident, can I help you see this?
Candice:
I am so confused. So much horror is happening in our country. I haven’t realized how my president incites violence in others. I can see what you mean about how many of the people he hired to work for him, have been indicted… And I have been silent about my feelings of how he treats women. It bothers me so much. John would never treat me in those ways.
John:
No, I wouldn’t, Candice. I don’t want to hurt people. And I don’t want them to hurt me. Maybe neither of us wants to hurt the other. I’m not sure.
Candice:
This is not really who we are as Americans, is it? If only we could sit down and talk together. Maybe we could help each other see different ways of looking at things. We don‘t need to agree. But maybe we could try to see things from each other’s perspective. Maybe we could give each other more credit. If I know that I am a trustworthy person why don’t I give them the benefit of the doubt? If we all just mistrust each other, how will we ever live together? Somebody has to take that chance, don’t they?
copyright © 2013-2018, Lyn Marsh, Ph.D. all rights reserved. You may not reproduce materials without permission from Lyn Marsh, Ph.D.
References:
LAZARIS.COM
https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/obama-trump-pipe-bombs-wisconsin\_us\_5bd38e4ce4b0a8f17ef7a48f?ncid=APPLENEWS00001
https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/wireStory/latest-obama-character-us-ballot-58782965
https://www.haaretz.com/us-news/man-reportedly-opens-fire-near-a-pittsburgh-synagoue-1.6595493
https://www.vox.com/2018/10/27/18032284/pittsburgh-synagogue-mass-shooting-gun-violence
https://www.nytimes.com/2016/08/04/us/politics/donald-trump-supporters.html
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/10/25/us/politics/trump-attacks-media-bombs.html
https://www.nytimes.com/2016/08/04/us/politics/donald-trump-supporters.html
https://www.cnn.com/videos/politics/2018/10/26/barack-obama-indicted-comment-trump-administration-sot-vpx.cnn
https://www.bbc.com/news/av/world-middle-east-45998946/yemen-crisis-the-sick-children-trapped-by-the-war