A Year On from Jan 6
By: Nhan Phan
One year past the January 6, 2021 insurrection, America is still reeling from potentially the greatest danger to its democratic process ever. Senator Mitt Romney put it best in his speech the night after the insurrection calmed down: “We gather here due to a selfish man’s injured pride,” he said.
A year on from the insurrection, the January 6th Committee continues its yearlong investigation into the details of that fateful day in American history. A year on from the insurrection, Americans find themselves entangled in a hostile, ever-shifting political landscape that may forever split the nation. Such a vast divide fosters more radical thought on either side, the very factor from which the Capitol insurrection was spawned. This grim anniversary implores us to rethink that day in American history, and ask ourselves: how far has America come a year after?
As an international student who moved onto campus in February 2021 (just a month after the insurrection), I wrote in my first Exonian opinion on how unsafe I felt, how unsafe international students like me felt by stepping into a bitter and politically separated America. I remarked that America was no longer the country I first knew, a country that embraced globalism, kindness, and civil dialogue as some of its core societal values.
A year on from the storming of the Capitol, hardly anything has changed. Sure, there have been no more insurrections on that scale anywhere in the country, but the legacy the day left behind cemented itself as the day the nation drew a line between what it meant to be patriotic versus nationalist, the day politics took precedence over unity. I am sure that Democrats and Republicans are both patriotic. What terrifies me is the fact that both sides alike have become so politically entangled, fueled by their hatred of the other, that they are neglecting what politics is essentially about: finding common ground. This means finding common ground in terms of policy as well.
At their core, I personally don’t think it’s hard to say that both parties are well-meaning people who want the best for their country but just have different beliefs in how to do so. John McCain defended Barack Obama during the 2008 Presidential Debates when he was accused of being an Arab by saying, “No, ma’am. He is a decent family man, citizen, that I just happen to have disagreements with.” God forbid that level of ambivalence should appear in today’s torn political landscape.
If we were to apply the same analogy to the political landscape here on our campus, I would say the same thing. The insurrection has spotlighted the struggle of having decent, civil political discussions on campus. This, on top of the 2020 elections, has made politics even more of a taboo topic than it already was at Exeter. People who identify as Republicans might not want to publicly identify themselves as such because it has gotten to the point where labeling an individual as Republican is considered an insult. “Republican,” on campus, is seemingly synonymous with the image of the “American First” Trump supporter.
Yet, it is important to distinguish being a “Republican” vs. “a supporter of the insurrection.” Though a part of the insurrectionists were loyal Trump supporters, we cannot attribute the Republican party with Trumpism or with the fact that “all” Republicans supported the insurrection because that is not at all true. Many conservatives understand that the insurrection was in direct violation of their American values. There were Trump supporters who opposed the insurrection. There are decent-minded, common-sensical Republicans with whom Democrats “just happen to have disagreements with,” to quote McCain. We must abolish the stigma of all Republicans being insurrection supporters, for such unfounded claims harms coherent political discourse.
I am not the best person when it comes to the policy-belief-specifics of either side, but it doesn’t take much effort to notice how much of a stigma is placed on Republican-identifying students here on campus. On a national scale, it may take years and decades of civil conversations between people of the two groups in order to restore a civil and decent political system where the humanity of either group is not insulted by the other.
But on a more local scale, when we are able to have open political conversations with our friends free of this stigma of being a “Republican,” we are one step forward in creating a healthy political environment on campus. An environment where policies do not divide us further, but bring us closer. One where we engage in constant conversation on how to develop our community and the country, and subsequently where mistrust and misinformation are eradicated. Only in such a community can ideas, and more importantly Exonians, properly thrive without leading to a gaping community divide, akin to the American political climate that fostered the Capitol attack in the first place.
