Praktisk demagogi

I don't have to tell you things are bad. Everybody knows things are bad. It's a depression. Everybody's out of work or scared of losing their job. The dollar buys a nickel's worth, banks are going bust, shopkeepers keep a gun under the counter. Punks are running wild in the street and there's nobody anywhere who seems to know what to do, and there's no end to it. We know the air is unfit to breathe and our food is unfit to eat, and we sit watching our TV's while some local newscaster tells us that today we had fifteen homicides and sixty-three violent crimes, as if that's the way it's supposed to be.

We know things are bad - worse than bad. They're crazy. It's like everything everywhere is going crazy, so we don't go out anymore. We sit in the house, and slowly the world we are living in is getting smaller, and all we say is, 'Please, at least leave us alone in our living rooms. Let me have my toaster and my TV and my steel-belted radials and I won't say anything. Just leave us alone.' Well, I'm not gonna leave you alone. I want you to get mad! I don't want you to protest. I don't want you to riot - I don't want you to write to your congressman because I wouldn't know what to tell you to write. I don't know what to do about the depression and the inflation and the Russians and the crime in the street. All I know is that first you've got to get mad.

You've got to say, 'I'm a HUMAN BEING, Goddamnit! My life has VALUE!'

So I want you to get up now. I want all of you to get up out of your chairs. I want you to get up right now and go to the window. Open it, and stick your head out, and yell:

'I'M AS MAD AS HELL, AND I'M NOT GOING TO TAKE THIS ANYMORE!'

I want you to get up right now, sit up, go to your windows, open them and stick your head out and yell - 'I'm as mad as hell and I'm not going to take this anymore!' Things have got to change. But first, you've gotta get mad!... You've got to say, 'I'm as mad as hell, and I'm not going to take this anymore!' Then we'll figure out what to do about the depression and the inflation and the oil crisis. But first get up out of your chairs, open the window, stick your head out, and yell, and say it: 

"I'M AS MAD AS HELL, AND I'M NOT GOING TO TAKE THIS ANYMORE!"



Detta, govänner, är demagogi. Och för varje ny övervakningslag, för varje nytt integritetskränkande moment i vardagen, för varje extra uns förtryck, för varje liten bit social misär, för varje ny desperat arbetslös, för varje ny arg, ung och outbildad ensamvarg, för varje nytt hurrarop för fler hårdare tag, för varje obegriplig utförsäkring, för varje orättvisa som på något vis placerar den vanlige medborgaren inom räckhåll för den batongliberala brutalitetens räckhåll - ges mer och mer retoriskt råmaterial för demagogen att arbeta med.

Det var ingen överraskning att Sverigedemokraterna kom in i riksdagen.

Och det kommer att bli ännu mindre av en förvåning när deras väljare inser att effekten av deras intåg i den lagstiftande församlingen är väldigt mycket ihåligare än deras retorik.

Allra minst kommer förvåningen att vara när revolter och upplopp blir vardagsmat även för den allt mindre grupp människor som inte upplever sig ha anledning att sticka ut huvudet genom fönstret och vråla ut sin berättigade ilska.

Mata inte trollen. Mata demokratin i stället.