So Jimmy Kimmel returns, quickly enough for there to be still people who did not know he had left.
Alleluia? Praise in ABC? Freedom of expression triumphs?
It all depends on Tuesday evening, when we see if Kimmel is undoubtedly returning, or if it has been moderate. Of all the consecutive, crazy and frightening events that have taken place in recent days, the return of Kimmel should be a moment that we are all looking at – a look in real time and late in the night on the success of our president to force us to censor us with fear.
Please, Jimmy, don’t back down.
If Kimmel is hanging up on his comedy now, pumps his punches on the power engine, he sends the message that we all should be afraid, that we should all bend. Maybe he did not register for that, but here it is – a person in a position of influence being forced to make a risky choice between security and the country.
It seems terribly dramatic, I know, but self -censorship is the heart of authoritarianism. When people who can be too afraid to make a joke, what does that mean for the average person?
If Kimmel, with his celebrity, his influence and his wealth, cannot resist this president, what chance we have the rest of us?
Patriotism was a simple thing. A little apple pie, a flag on July 4, perhaps even a pinch of pride when the national anthem plays and all the words come to your mind even if you do not find your car keys or do not remember what day it is.
It’s just something there, running in the background-a tacit recognition that being American is a pretty great thing.
Now, of course, patriotism is the most loaded with words. It was chewed and crossed by the Maga movement in a specific porridge – a white dogma and centered on the West which requires that close and angry Christianity dominates civic life.
There has been a deluge of examples of this subversion in recent days. The Pentagon threatens to punish journalists who report information that it does not provide explicitly. The president used social media to demand Atty. General Pam Bondi goes after his perceived enemies.
The one who put a knot in my stomach was Stephen Miller’s speech, Trump’s immigration tsar, speaking, without humor, to the Memorial of Charlie Kirk.
“We are the storm,” said Miller, referring to a theory of the Qanon conspiracy on a violent reorganization of society.
It is disturbing, but in fact sweet in relation to what he said then, a Christian nationalist diatribe now familiar.
“Our line and our heritage returns to Athens, Rome, Philadelphia, Monticello,” said Miller. “Our ancestors have built the cities they produced, the art and architecture they built. Industry. ”
Who will tell him about Sally Hemings? But he continued with an attack on the “yous” who do not agree with this vision of the world, the “you”, like Kimmel, one presume (although the name of Kimmel did not come) which opposed this cruel version of America.
“You are wicked, you are jealousy, you want, you are hatred, you are nothing,” said Miller. “You can’t build anything. You can’t produce anything. You can’t create anything.”
Humor, of course, is nothing, which is why this administration cannot bear it.
Humor builds camaraderie. It produces dopamine and serotonin, glue of human bond. He exhausts fear and creates hope.
This is why the autocrats always go after the actors early early. It’s not thin skin, although Trump seems to have that. It is effective management of dissent.
Nazi Propaganda Minister Joseph Goebbels knew this. In 1939, after his party created a culture chamber which forced all the artists to join certain rules, he prohibited five German actors – Werner Finck, Peter Sachse, Helmuth Buth, Wilhelm Meissner and Manfred Dlugi – for having made political jokes that did not support the regime. He essentially put an end to their career for daring to satiate the Nazi leaders, saying that people had not found it funny.
“(I) their public appearances, they demonstrated a lack of positive attitude towards National Socialism and therefore caused a serious annoyance in public and in particular to the comrades of the New York Times reported the German government affirming at the time.
It seems familiar.
Kimmel, of course, is not the only actor to speak. Jon Stewart retaliated on “The Daily Show”, pretending to be frightened in the submission, perhaps a tip in the hat in Finck, who joked: “I say nothing. And even that I do not say. “
Stephen Colbert roasted Disney with a very funny parody video. Political cartoonists spend a day on the ground.
And there are many others repulsive. Governor Gavin Newsom has brought refutations to all caps. Illinois Governor JB Pritzker, whom Trump called “nothing”, is also vocal in his opposition, in particular national guard troops in Chicago.
The collective power of powerful is not a joke. It means something.
But all sober discussions in the world cannot compete with a excavation for sure when it comes to kicking the potential dictators. Mark Twain said it best: against the assault on laughter, nothing can stand. This is what makes Kimmel so relevant at the moment.
Can he come back by laughing-prove that we have nothing to fear than to fear himself-or are we seriously in difficulty?
