Fear of Government

I have been engaged in some really interesting exchanges with a person I respect and count as a friend.  He is very conservative.  I am not.  He reflects what I have heard from many others, including family members.  They fear “the government”.  They fear losing control.  They fear losing their rights.  They fear losing their freedom.  They fear the government will take over everything.  They fear the government is breeding dependent citizens.  They are sincere.  But I believe they are seriously misguided.

Who and what is this “government” they fear?  It is not the local school board, the local city council, the local county government, maybe not even the state government.  It is the federal government they fear.  And if we break that down, it is not so much the FBI, the CIA, the NSA, the EPA, the armed services, ICE, the DEA, or any of the federal law enforcement branches.  It does not include the Justice Department, the Office of Homeland Security, the Department of Education, the Treasury, Department of Commerce, the Department of Agriculture, the Department of Defense, the Department of Veteran Affairs, the Department of Health and Human Services, the Department of Housing and Urban Development, the Department of Energy, the Department of State, the Department of Labor, the Department of Transportation, etc.  In other words, they do not fear the departments and agencies in the Executive Branch.  They do not fear the Legislative branch, though they express frustration about that branch.  They do not fear the Judicial branch because they have little dealings with that branch even though it is important in safeguarding the rights of Americans.  So what do they fear?

They fear the nebulous, ubiquitous, undefined “government.”  As best as I can tell after pushing and prodding, what they are really afraid of is taxation, and having those taxes support people they see as misfit co-dependents, and they fear somebody somewhere is going to show up at their door and take away their property, or worse, their guns.  When asked about the “swamp” they refer globally to all those government officials that are running their lives as they see it.  But pressed on that they have few if any specifics. 

They are just afraid.  Afraid of losing something.  Afraid of paying taxes so that others can get what they have or worse, get something they do not have.  Afraid of recognizing people of color, women, people with different religious beliefs, people with different sexual orientations, people who are not white conservative males.  It appears they have a mental model of the US that harkens back to a day when minorities were suppressed, women knew their place, and “deviants” were beat up if they did not stay in the closet.  They are willing to do the most un-American things to return to those days because they see those days as “great.”

They are wrong.  They fear a boogeyman.  In fact, their fears are the reverse of what they should be.  I believe they should fear any step by the government to allow discrimination against any identifiable group of humans.  If the government can discriminate against gay folks, transgender folks, Black, Hispanic, female, disabled then we are all at risk.  Human rights, civil rights, must be protected for all or they will not be available to any.  The current direction of the nation and the courts is in fact scary.  We are moving back in time.  Back to an era that complies with the mental model of the fearful.  We cannot allow that to happen.

In what I see as a strange twist of logic, those who have fear of government syndrome are promoting a government that merits fearing.  We simply cannot allow ourselves to say that some people just have to live under the bridge, go hungry, go without health care, go without education because they do not fit our mental model of who Americans are or should be.  Those in need are Americans.  The only moral thing to do is to provide them the necessities and protect their rights.  The really scary thing to me is the people who would hurt others and promote themselves because they have a false fear of the government.  Those people merit fear.