Did this headline enrage you? Did it make you scoff and angrily click the link to this article, longing to see what exact kind of idiotic or heartless argument could hold that position? Did something stir in you, calling you to respond in some way, whether it be in the form of a comment or by sharing the article itself on Facebook and Twitter while adding a rant on how far this country has fallen that someone like Donald Trump could have seemingly so much support?
If any of your answers to those questions were “yes,” then I offer you congratulations. You were just, and most likely have been, responding to Donald Trump in exactly the way he wants you to.
We can characterize Donald Trump as many reprehensible things, among them: a bigot, inordinately crass, incredibly greedy, and unflinchingly unapologetic for racist and homophobic positions. However, can we say that any of these things have held him back from media attention and popularity? Of course not. There is some story, seemingly every day and probably more often that, of some brash and controversial thing that Trump has said or done. He is easily the most visible presidential candidate in the race and it’s not particularly close. While Bernie and Hilary have been in the news as well, I somehow doubt that an average American could name any particular view or issue that they stand on, never mind a particular soundbite, or even many other Republican candidates.
One could conclude that, because of Trump’s ubiquitous presence in all forms of media, a large portion of Americans really believe in what Trump supposedly stands for--most notably that Muslims should be barred from the United States. But, as often as I’ve felt my faith in humanity extremely lacking, I don’t think that this conclusion holds much water in reality. According to Nate Silver, more people support Sanders (and thereby, Clinton) than Trump, yet Trump receives 23 times the network news coverage. Additionally, a majority of Americans are against Trump’s proposed ban on Muslims. While, of course, the Trump campaign would not have lasted so long if he did not have significant support, I would argue that his popularity has much, much more to do with his manipulation of the media.
While I am loathe to directly quote from the man himself, I think that this excerpt from his book "The Art of the Deal" is necessary and telling, even though it was published long before his most recent campaign for the nation’s highest office.
“One thing I’ve learned about the press is that they’re always hungry for a good story, and the more sensational, the better…The point is that if you are a little different, or a little outrageous, or if you do things that are bold or controversial, the press is going to write about you…From a pure business point of view, the benefits of being written about have far outweighed the drawbacks.”
What is Trump, if not a businessman? We can take the moral high ground against Trump as much as we want. A lot of us could probably do that against many politicians. It is nothing short of naïve to believe that his approach of being controversial to the point of absurdity is not working and, equally so, to believe that we, as consumers of news and users of social media, do not play a large role in it. It’s the age old adage of “any publicity is good publicity” amped up to 11. We can publicly condemn Trump for making fun of a disabled person all we want, publicly share our outrage against his antics all we want, but as long as we continue to do it publicly we are not hurting Trump, we are helping him and hurting his opposition.
Think about it, what does America at large know about Bernie Sanders and Hillary Clinton? They know that Sanders is a “socialist” who wants to provide handouts for everything and that Clinton was the one behind the Benghazi failure and subject to email scandals. In fact, the most recent media articles that I’ve seen about them have both been in regards to Trump: Sanders condemning Trump for his reaction to the Paris attack and Clinton calling Trump “not funny anymore.” Never mind the other Republican candidates, none of them have the incredible media clout that Trump does. If they have had some time in the sun then it is due to controversy rather than their own merits or views (see: Ben Carson and Carly Fiorina).
So when the next article or video comes out, and it will, showing Trump’s latest controversial or offensive comment, we need to think and not immediately react. Whenever my younger brother was doing something to annoy or torment me, my mother would always tell me to ignore him because attention was what he really wanted. We need to do this with Trump. He is much more menacing and manipulative than the average kid brother and he has the power to influence something so much more meaningful.
But that is not the only thing that we need to do. Another factor in Trump saturating the media with his presence is that we exist in a climate in which, frankly, not many Americans pay close attention to politics or do much research on the candidates and voter apathy runs rampant. So, please don’t just be against Trump. Be actively for someone. Whether it is Bernie or Hilary, Cruz or Paul, if outrage against Trump is turned into informed and passionate support for someone else then we will be less likely to care about what he says and he will become less likely to even have a chance of running the country. Trump’s candidacy is a dangerous lesson in how easily we can be manipulated if we don’t pay attention and it is one that we need to learn from quickly.
