It is the year 2021. But Republicans and the right-wing movement are trying to pull the American people back to the past.
Their ultimate destination? It could be Jim Crow white supremacist America of the 1950s. It could be the end of Reconstruction in 1876 – or even a time before that.
In that sense, the Republican Party and its allies and followers are time-breakers, not content with harmless nostalgia and happy-pill lies about the past. Their goal? To radically remake society in their own grotesque vision where white, right-wing “Christians” — men, by definition — rule America unopposed and for all time.
Such a world would be a utopia for them and a dystopia for everyone else.
On Monday, philosopher Jason Stanley described America on the precipice of such as horrible moment in a Twitter post:
I find it chilling this odd moment of calm while Dems are in power and state after state is introducing bills that, if passed, will ensure permanent minority party rule and the end of US democracy. We have so little time. Watching history unfold.
Because they cannot win a war of ideas and their policies are wildly unpopular with the American people, Republicans and their allies are attempting to restrict the right to vote all over the country.
Zachary Roth of the Brennan Center for Justice describes this racialized “legislative anti-democracy” and what it entails:
It’s upon us: a wave of legislation, in states across the country, aimed at making voting harder. The Brennan Center has tallied over 250 bills in 43 states this year that would restrict access to the ballot. Many would reverse the expansion of vote by mail, which helped lead to the soaring turnout of 2020, or would tighten ID requirements.
But the latest assault on voting shouldn’t be seen in isolation. Some of the same Republican state lawmakers behind these measures are also taking steps to suppress any form of democracy that threatens them — afraid, it seems, that the more say voters have in any form, the worse their side will fare. …
It’s hard to ignore that this explosion of what we might call “legislative anti-democracy” is coming from some of the same people who helped stoke an even more troubling effort to overturn the will of the people. At least 14 Republican state lawmakers attended the January 6 “Stop the Steal” rally that led to the Capitol insurrection, and they continue to serve. At least one, State Sen. Doug Mastriano of Pennsylvania, has been a leader in his state’s effort to pass restrictive voting laws.
https://www.salon.com/2021/03/17/gop-dreams-of-a-return-to-jim-crow–and-not-just-through-racist-voting-laws/