Stemming the Tide of Political Violence
On Saturday, July 13, 2024, there was an attempted assassination on former president Donald Trump while he was speaking at a campaign rally just a few days before the Republican National Convention. Fortunately, the former president’s face, bloodied from a bullet grazing his ear, was not seriously injured as he was rushed off the stage. A few hours later President Joe Biden forcefully condemned political violence and appealed to a nation reeling from the assassination attempt. In a primetime address Biden said, “Americans must strive for national unity,” warning that the political rhetoric has become “too heated.”
“There is no place in America for this kind of violence—for any violence. Ever. Period. No exception. We can’t allow this violence to be normalized.” Biden spoke of the rising tide of political violence, saying “We cannot, we must not go down this road in America.” Even blusterous Trump said that he is re-writing his nomination speech to bring “the whole country, even the whole world, together, adding that the reality of what had happened was “just setting in.”
In these times where many people feel so hopeless that it feels like we are falling into an abyss, that nothing can be done to stop this downward spiral of discontent, the work of political forgiveness can bring us hope. It is not always easy to go beyond our anxieties, our fears and our feelings of outrage at what is taking place in our country. The question is, have we lost sight of who we are as Americans?
We do not realize that as citizens we have the power and the ability to repair our nation, that we cannot give up on our democracy, despite our frustration. We have entered a time in our country where it seems OK to dehumanize each other, where challenges create more polarization and leadership of both parties has so much contempt for one another they can’t come together to work out common problems.
Yet, this doesn’t have to be the whole story — but it does requires all of us to participate, and it requires all of us to sit down with one another, have a willingness to be civil with one another and to do the necessary healing within oneself so we can be present with one another. If we are willing to come together in a healing capacity, which is what a political forgiveness framework can provide, we can become part of the solution to turn this country around. And we must become part of the solution if we want to stop this political violence.
If we allow ourselves to become more vulnerable with each other and learn how to be safe with one another through a political forgiveness process we can gain a better understanding of what went wrong and begin to think in a clearer way how we can come together as a community, as a nation. We simply cannot afford to blame one another, to believe that our country is beyond repair and that our corrupt leaders and institutions can take away our power. Together we can heal this fractured county.
It doesn’t matter what side of the aisle you are on because, like it or not, we are all in a search for a more perfect union which can only be done together. Political forgiveness can elevate rather than harden our politics—politics which should be a means for solving problems and finding justice. We are living through critical times, and if we want to stop this downward spiral it will require all of us to participate in a way where we abandon our contempt for politics and for each other. Political forgiveness allows for a more civil and productive way of interacting with one another and a political forgiveness process can serve as an inspiration to become more involved in this American experiment we call democracy.
