All ethics have been lost \u2013 when violence becomes honor. It begins with a memory, blurry yet tangible: the furious mob, the shattered windows of the Capitol, police officers being thrown to the ground, screams, tear gas, flags that no longer stand for unity but for division. It was January 6, 2021 \u2013 and one might have thought that history itself had spit itself out that day, ashamed of what had been made of it. But the real monstrosity only reveals itself in the aftermath: what was once shame is now glory. What was once a crime is now political capital. And so they are back on the stages today, those who once symbolized violence, greeted with applause, with praise, with tears of emotion. Ryan Kelley, convicted of trespassing and incitement, is now embraced in Jackson, Michigan like a long-lost son \u2013 \"your favorite J6er,\" as he calls himself. The shame hasn\u2019t disappeared, it has merely been masked as heroism. In Donald Trump's America \u2013 his second America \u2013 the moral compass isn\u2019t damaged. It has been abolished.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Trump wasted no time in his new term. Barely back in the White House, he issued collective pardons for around 1,500 participants in the January 6 insurrection. Men who beat police officers with metal rods, women who smashed windows and rifled through binders looking for names of lawmakers \u2013 they are all now rehabilitated. Or rather: sanctified. What kind of country celebrates its attackers? What kind of movement presents the destruction of democracy as an act of patriotic love? It is a country that no longer remembers \u2013 or one whose memory has been manipulated by power. It is a country that has stopped distinguishing between ethics and opportunism. A 43-year-old real estate developer from Michigan, Kelley, once failed because his participation in the storming of the Capitol became public. Now, it serves as his credential \u2013 proof of his loyalty to Trump, his ticket into the hearts of those who want to believe that January 6 was an act of resistance and not an attempted coup. In this new cult of martyrs, tears are political capital. Kelley\u2019s story about his son, who thought his father was dead, is no longer seen as a tragedy \u2013 but as proof of sacrifice. And James Grant or Ronald Colton McAbee \u2013 the latter struck a police officer while pretending to rescue another \u2013 now tell their stories not in court but at Republican fundraising galas. They are handed the microphone. Not to be silenced, but to win. What matters is not what they did \u2013 but what they did it for. The lie of election fraud is their Bible, Trump their prophet. And anyone who opposes him, they suggest, has forfeited their right to political participation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
A historian, Matt Dallek, says: \u201cThe pardoned can speak about the destructive power of the state like no one else.\u201d But that is wrong. It wasn\u2019t the state that destroyed their lives. It was the decision to take part in a violent performance that served a man \u2013 not the Constitution. These offenders were convicted not because they \u201cwanted too much democracy,\u201d but because they tried to destroy it. And yet they are now everywhere: on posters, in interviews on Newsmax, as hopefuls in gubernatorial races and at party gatherings where their names are chanted like a sect once praised its saints. Even Enrique Tarrio, former leader of the Proud Boys, now openly talks about a possible run for office \u2013 as if his conviction for sedition were a badge of honor. David Becker, a former Justice Department attorney, put it plainly: \u201cIf we lose the meaning of elections and the rule of law, if we attack our institutions, then we are on a path that ends in something far worse.\u201d And yet we have entered this path. Not only through actors like Kelley or Tarrio, but through those who listen to them, vote for them, defend them \u2013 and thereby create a new reality: one in which violence has become the language of politics. In Trump\u2019s second presidency, ethics have not merely been lost. They have been replaced \u2013 by cynicism, by a cult of personality, by the religious fervor of political fanaticism. What remains is emptiness \u2013 and applause, not for courage, but for the myth of a lie. \u201cEverything is meaningless \u2013 except the feeling that burns us.\u201d Today, many no longer burn themselves on truth. But on the lie that keeps them warm.<\/p>\n
Jegliche Ethik ist verloren gegangen \u2013 Wenn aus Gewalt Ehre wird. Es beginnt mit einer Erinnerung, verschwommen und doch greifbar: der w\u00fctende Mob, die zersplitterten Fenster des Kapitols, Polizisten, die zu Boden gerissen werden, Schreie, Tr\u00e4nengas, Flaggen, die nicht mehr f\u00fcr Einheit, sondern f\u00fcr Spaltung stehen. Es war der 6. Januar 2021 \u2013 und man […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":7295,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"iawp_total_views":1,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[45,7,41],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7294","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-documentation","category-topstory","category-trump-s-world"],"yoast_head":"\n