Moral Equivalency

The argument is making the rounds that the folks protesting Trump’s victory and Clinton’s defeat are no different from the people who protested Obama’s election and refused to accept him as President.  This is generally understood to be not just a factual description, but rather a claim of some sort of moral equivalence.  Since it seems likely that the protests are going to go on for awhile, it seems worthwhile to examine this argument.

This sort of moral equivalency argument is not uncommon; for example, critics of US foreign policy will sometimes argue that our imprisoning and torturing and murdering and bombing and such are no better than that of our opponents.  Many people see a practical implication in this equivalence:  we should stop, lest we be simply hypocrites, or worse.  

This sort of argument can be quite persuasive.  Hypocrisy is a common, perhaps even universal political vice; for example, our last three presidents, potheads all, have seen fit to continue and even escalate the war on pot smokers.  And a central purpose of terrorism is to make people and nations behave in ways that make them no better than the terrorists.  It is not entirely implausible to argue that this strategy is working out pretty nicely for the terrorists these days. 

So, what about the moral equivalence of the protests against Obama and those against Trump?  That depends, I think, on how you view the following.  Obama and Clinton both put forth positive visions for the country, along with plans to achieve those visions.  Obama might have had secret plans to put white people in FEMA camps and take all their guns, but he didn’t campaign on this.  Clinton was certainly a corrupt politician, but she didn’t put this forward as a qualification.  (Full disclosure:  I didn’t agree with Clinton on most policy issues, and I was rather surprised that Obama apparently had no notion how actually to get anything done.)

Trump also presented a vision of the country’s future, one in which racism and sexism and religious intolerance figured prominently, and that he apparently planned to achieve by exhorting his followers to violence.  

Does this mean that the protests against Trump are (morally) different from those against Obama?  Does it mean that a vote for Clinton is not a vote for corruption, while a vote for Trump is a vote for racism, sexism, and violence?

I do not know what is in the hearts of protestors and Trump voters.  I do not know who is a racist or sexist, or who is just a sore loser.  But I do know that 50 million Americans voted for a candidate who openly and in the most vulgar manner offered his racism and sexism and religious intolerance as a reason to vote for him.  And having said that, I am not sure what else to say.