One thing I am seeing more and more of during these turbulent and crazy times is the pronouncement – mostly by liberal friends – that Donald Trump is the new Hitler. Or at least is on his way.
Whatever misgivings I may have about Donald Trump, I am disgusted by such pronouncements. Here’s a few reasons why.
He’s not
Donald Trump seems to be a lot of things. Arrogant. Impulsive. And even then, there are many who will disagree with me there. Nevertheless, there is no doubt he is not Hitler. Not even close.
True story. 6 million Jews murdered, and about another 5 million non-Jewish victims. That’s 11 million people murdered as a result of Hitler’s extermination program.
Donald Trump has murdered approximately 0 people that we know of. Oh, and wait, he does not have an extermination program.
I can’t believe I have to point this out. What the hell is wrong with you?
Not only that, but Trump does not seem motivated by ideas of racial purity or superiority. Take his now infamous ban on travelers from designated Muslim countries, I may not agree with the implementation of this – which at least to me seems haphazard and not well thought out – but I do believe he is responding to the very real threat of Islamic terrorism.
Hitler? Just hated Jews and other undesirables. There was no plague of global Jewish terrorism when Hitler came to power. Still isn’t.
When you make the comparison, you trivialize the Holocaust
Every time you compare Trump to Hitler, the Holocaust loses its shock value. As James Marshall Crotty put it so well:
When we apply a Nazi comparison to someone or something that does not fit that comparison, then Nazism and the Holocaust lose their power to shock us. And they must never lose that power. If they do, which is quickly happening right now, when something diabolical does come along again in this world, we have no way to identify it, let alone stop it, because we’ve cried Nazi wolf so often that the comparison has lost its power to persuade.
When you make the comparison, you not only excuse vile behavior, but you make it an imperative
Imagine if you Hitler was alive. And you had the means to stop him. What would you do? This is a bit of no-brainer – most of us would take him out, and I don’t mean to dinner.
By comparing Trump to Hitler, you are just begging for someone to assassinate him.
Shame on you.
When you make the comparison, you paint everyone who does not agree with you as evil
I mean, if you don’t oppose Hitler, then you are evil. Pretty simple. There is no nuance there whatsoever. You end the debate, and demonize your opponent who does not agree with you as an evil bystander.
Heck, you might even justify assassinating them as well.
By doing so, you may get what you wish for
As Scott Adams of Dilbert fame opined:
When millions of Americans want the same thing, and they want it badly, the odds of it happening go way up. You can call it the power of positive thinking. It is also the principle behind affirmations. When humans focus on a desired future, events start to conspire to make it happen.
I’m not talking about any new-age magic. I’m talking about ordinary people doing ordinary things to turn Trump into an actual Hitler. For example, if protesters start getting violent, you could expect forceful reactions eventually. And that makes Trump look more like Hitler. I can think of dozens of ways the protesters could cause the thing they are trying to prevent. In other words, they can wish it into reality even though it is the very thing they are protesting.
