There’s really nothing wrong with being partisan. Parties give us a sense of community and a place to feel like we belong. A place to connect with like-minded others who share our same ideologies.
There’s also technically nothing wrong with being a hypocrite. I think at some point in our lives we’re all hypocrites about one thing or another. It’s best not to make a practice of it, though. It’s even better to recognize it, own it, and try to do better going forward.
And just to clarify what both a partisan and hypocrite are, I always like to define the words I’m using so there’s no confusion.
Partisan definition: 1. a strong supporter of a party, cause, or person. 2. a member of an armed group formed to fight secretly against an occupying force, in particular one operating in enemy-occupied Yugoslavia, Italy, and parts of eastern Europe in World War II.
Hypocrisy definition: the practice of claiming to have moral standards or beliefs to which one’s own behavior does not conform; pretense.
As we all know, no matter which political party we shine a light on, you’re going to find partisan hypocrisy.
But I don’t think we’ve ever seen the level of partisan hypocrisy as we have since Donald Trump entered politics.
Republicans were outraged over Bill Clinton’s sex scandal with Monica Lewinsky. Enough to the point that they found something to draw up articles of impeachment over. They were all keen to condemn him for being a filthy, disgusting, immoral womanizer.
Yet…Trump. He’s an even bigger, filthy, and more disgusting, completely immoral womanizer. He got caught on tape bragging about being able to grab pussies. Even when it was revealed he paid off Stormy Daniels, a porn star, to keep her quiet about their affair…where was the outrage from all those Republican moralists who had been so offended by Clinton’s blowjob?
Trump proposed Hillary Clinton should be locked up at one of his rallies. It became a catchy rally cry, but why? What had she done that was worthy of prosecution or jail time?
Some would say because she used a private email server for official business. Others because of what happened in 2012 in Benghazi after an Islamic militant group attacked two U.S. government buildings, the U.S. Embassy and a CIA annex, which resulted in the deaths of four Americans.
Yet, Trumps’s daughter, Ivanka, committed the same “crime” with emails that Hillary did. Where was the outrage to lock her up?
And let’s not forget how much Republicans like to accuse Black Lives Matter supporters of being “unpatriotic” when they choose to kneel during the National Anthem rather than stand. They’re not being unpatriotic. They’re making a point.
Same as they did with the Black Lives Matter rallies in the summer of 2020, some of which devolved into riots.
It’s no different than the point Trump protestors were trying to make when they participated in the Stop the Steal rally. Well, except that the election was secure and that it was in any way, shape, or form “stolen” is a lie. Black people really have died because of systemic racism and police brutality.
As far the riots at Black Lives Matter, right-wingers condemned the riots that broke out at some of those events.
Yet, they did way worse. They became terrorists in an President-incited insurrection and attack on the U.S. Capitol on January 6, 2021.
This is when it’s dangerous to be a partisan hypocrite.
It’s also how you know you are.
If you ask yourself, “How would I feel if the other side was doing this? Would I be just as outraged as they are about X, Y, and Z? Would I be as much in support of X, Y, or Z?”
Would you think it’d be okay for a Democratic president to lie that an election he lost was rigged and rile up his supporters to the point they defiled our Capitol and acted like insurgents, not patriots, too?
If not, you’re hypocrite. A partisan one.