One frustrating thing about Limbaugh (and Jones and Hannity, et al) is that they made Being Angry a Right Wing Thing.
Extremely frustrating when you see a genocide in Gaza or global temperatures spiking or some cop shoot up a subway over a $3 fare, express anger, and have someone respond “You just sound like Rush Limbaugh”.
There are real reasons to feel righteous anger and to use that as motivation to act. But guys like Rush just fill the airways with this white nationalist noise. They make the idea of being angry this exclusive Right Wing attitude to have.
The problem is that you can be angry all day and it won’t accomplish anything without coordinated, planned, collective action. And collective action is made more difficult with angry people.
Anger motivates you to act Right Now, which is why it’s good for reactionaries. They want you either impotently angry so you can’t think clearly to make those long term, organized plans; or they want you mad enough to go do a little stochastic terrorism.
Progressives have a lot of trouble hitting the slow-burn simmer of anger in a way that’s motivational and doesn’t slip into despair when you get tired from all that rage that you can’t turn into immediate results.
One frustrating thing about Limbaugh (and Jones and Hannity, et al) is that they made Being Angry a Right Wing Thing.
Extremely frustrating when you see a genocide in Gaza or global temperatures spiking or some cop shoot up a subway over a $3 fare, express anger, and have someone respond “You just sound like Rush Limbaugh”.
There are real reasons to feel righteous anger and to use that as motivation to act. But guys like Rush just fill the airways with this white nationalist noise. They make the idea of being angry this exclusive Right Wing attitude to have.
The problem is that you can be angry all day and it won’t accomplish anything without coordinated, planned, collective action. And collective action is made more difficult with angry people.
Anger motivates you to act Right Now, which is why it’s good for reactionaries. They want you either impotently angry so you can’t think clearly to make those long term, organized plans; or they want you mad enough to go do a little stochastic terrorism.
Progressives have a lot of trouble hitting the slow-burn simmer of anger in a way that’s motivational and doesn’t slip into despair when you get tired from all that rage that you can’t turn into immediate results.