This morning, I’m thinking about the story dominating the news - an ICE officer, Jonathan Ross, who shot and killed a woman, Renee Nicole Good, who was in the driver’s seat of her car in Minneapolis.
The story itself has just enough ambiguity to be controversial - if it was unambiguous, it would not have become as contentious of a story. Did the officer use excessive force? Or was she trying to run him over, or giving the impression of it, and his reaction one of valid self-defense?
It was, without a doubt, a great tragedy. A woman, a human, is dead, and a life that could’ve been, extinguished.
But the crux of the issue is not the facts of that day. Or rather, people are acting like the facts are the crux, but are talking so far over each other that I have a hard time believing them.
The event has become a symbol, and we are now in the arena of symbols, not of truth.
Each side is implicitly making some claim about a larger narrative. And this event, a symbol, is held as anecdotal evidence to back that up that claim.
The right is saying something like, ‘all over the country, people are antagonizing law enforcement officers, threatening and refusing to comply with the law.’
The left is saying something like, ‘all over the country, government representatives are abusing their power, committing unjustified violence, hurting innocent people.’
To be clear, neither side is making a straightforward case for their narrative. No one is pulling up a list of every violent incident, annotating them with clear language about whether the incident was justified or not, whether a court issued a verdict, whether there is a clear pattern in the data. And definitely no one is trying to get to the bottom of things, willing to consider that the data might prove them wrong, would ever consider that they might be wrong.
Instead, each side doggedly assumes their narrative is true, and then uses a very specific anecdote to say, ‘here is an undeniable instance of [the thing I am saying happens everywhere], and this one being true means all the others must be true, too.’
In Minneapolis, there is only one truth. Either it was an excessive use of force, or it was justified in self-defense. But neither side will ever consider the facts and objectively judge whether or not they are correct. That day has become a symbol, and as a symbol, it cannot be questioned.
Both sides believe their overarching narrative is so important, so consequential, that it would dangerous to weaken the argument for it, would be a moral failure to do so. The right is saying something like, ‘our country is at war and at risk. If we do not enforce our laws, bad things will happen to good people.’ The left is saying something like, ‘our country is at war and at risk. If we do resist those in power, bad things will happen to good people.’ In both instances, the stakes are so high, that it is considered a moral good to do anything that feels like giving ground.
Of course, in a better world, both sides could argue their broader narrative directly, and in a real way. There would be some agreed-upon path to establishing what is true, an all-encompassing look at the evidence. Specific incidents could be decoupled from the broader narratives, and one data point going one way or the other would not threaten a side’s ‘entire case.’
In that sense, debating the specifics of that day in Minneapolis seems to miss the point. What exactly happened? Was the woman really threatening the officer when she hit the gas pedal?
On the one hand, there are plenty of professionals whose entire job is to look at video footage, interview witnesses, and come to a qualified opinion. There is a system of law, which will judge all the evidence and the opinions, and make a final judgement, with real legal repercussions.
And yet, neither side cares about that, either. If a final judgement is rendered, one side will ‘claim victory’ and the other will claim ‘foul play,’ at the hands of improper political pressure. The fact that I can confidently predict that, even at this stage, is even more indication of the brokenness of this system.
Concluding:
Both sides claim they’re discussing the incident itself. But the debate is not about the event - it’s about the story the event is being forced to serve. And because the event is thus a symbol, neither side can afford to examine it honestly. There is something broken in that: that the truth doesn’t really matter, to either side. The truth of the incident doesn’t matter, because their version of the incident must be true, has a moral imperative to be true because it would be moral failure to allow the broader narrative to be weakened. But no one is really concerned with the truth of their broader narrative either: it feels so true to them, that they don’t care to go back and question whether the evidence backs it up or not.
The war is being fought through symbols, because symbols sit above the rational. We are (and to be fair, maybe humanity has always been) in an era of emotion, of vibe-based politics. We have lost track of what is true, care only for which stories we allow to define meaning.
Every tragedy, then, has the potential to become subordinate to narrative. So any tragedy is up for grabs to be turned into propaganda, and justice becomes impossible. And that is perhaps one of the more undeniable tragedies of them all.