How the average American organizes politically is incredibly silly.
It seems as though the laziest methods are becoming the most effective. A reality revealed through the pulling of and return of ABC’s late-night show, “Jimmy Kimmel Live,” for stations and programming outside of Sinclair Broadcasting and Nexstar.
The saga began on Sept. 15 when the host made remarks in his opening monologue about President Trump and his followers’ reactions to the murder of Charlie Kirk.
Kimmel said that the President didn’t truly care about the conservative commentator’s death because of his demeanor in an interview days after. He added that his followers—who Kimmel referred to as the “MAGA gang”—were trying to use the assassination for political points, acting as though the “kid who murdered Charlie Kirk [wasn’t] anything other than one of them.”
The average watcher of Kimmel would recognize that the bit was fairly generic.
But as the Trump administration has exemplified through their detention of figures like Mahmoud Khalil, and the interrogations that have taken place at international airports, open criticism of the president is becoming increasingly less tolerable.
This is why, following two days of conservative outrage on the internet, Federal Communications Commission (FCC) Chair Brendan Carr, suggested that the show should be suspended and threatened to take action against ABC. Just two hours later, Disney capitulated and suspended the show indefinitely.
Fascism can only thrive when the media is completely captured by the interests of the regime, and the corporation’s move was yet another instance of this unfolding in real time.
Until it wasn’t.
Little did Disney know, millions of Americans who disagree with Trump, but have otherwise been absent from open protest, realized that at least in this instance, they had a method of retaliation at their fingertips.
According to estimates, the corporation’s stock price plummeted by at least $1 billion after a sea of boycotting efforts, inincluding Disney+ un-subscriptions, refusing to watch the ABC network channel and refusing to buy other Disney products.
This was the reason why on Sept. 22, the corporation announced the return of the show the next night. If there’s one thing that stands above all forms of governmental influence, it’s profit margins.
The average consumer did an objectively positive thing, one that hopefully will be repeated once the next free speech crackdown inevitably happens.
Nonetheless, you can’t help but ask where everybody has been for the last 8 months.
Protests have been very prevalent across the country, but the unique outrage and quick resolution of this incident have not been replicated for similar or even more egregious measures the administration has taken.
Even if taking to the streets isn’t feasible due to one’s schedule or valid fears of police brutality, why haven’t the 92% of Democratic voters who don’t view Israel favorably engaged in the Boycotts, Divestments and Sanctions (BDS) against the companies aiding its genocide?
This implies a haunting reality about how Americans, myself included, choose to engage with political action and which methods tend to be most effective.
Online consumer boycotts might be the best option critics of the Trump administration have right now. The more authoritarian the executive branch becomes, the less of a receptor the government as a whole has to public pressure.
But it also can’t be denied that we as Americans don’t like doing the hard work of true grassroots political organizing.
The false idea of meritocracy has convinced us that the only force preventing one from improving their life is themselves.
Despite recent studies which have shown that factors such as one’s birth zip code are among the greatest predictors of one’s life success, the wealthy have successfully planted this notion into our public consciousness so that we won’t take action against those who exploit and benefit from this system.
Even in cases where one recognizes that their material conditions won’t improve, the endless amount of relatively cheap commodities Americans have grown accustomed to has served as a distraction to fixable systemic problems.
This is why, despite the active genocide our government is funding, despite the constant black-bagging of migrants without due process and despite the numerous attacks on free speech —outside of Jimmy Kimmel—the average American has been asleep at the wheel.
The late show’s return is a positive overall, but the fact that this form of activism has proven to be the most successful spells a dark future.
But things don’t have to be this way; politics impact all of us in ways we do and don’t realize, yet we can still change our circumstances in ways never imagined.
Think back to the civil rights movement, the early 20th-century labor movements and other instances in history where ordinary people helped improve the lives of millions.
Whichever side you’re on, you can do the same. It may take effort, but it can get done.
