As a person who spends a lot of time searching for ways to create spaces for healing light to reside, I have thought about many ways in which the media world can contribute to creating a counter-narrative to the Trump regime’s narrative of fear and violence.
It is clear that the work of the presidency has to be reported to the public, but there are ways to do that which would not help to support the vast amount of negative energy the Trump team has generated and continues to fuel each day. There are far too many examples to name all of them, but I want to show a few examples to help clarify the argument.
Catherine Meeks
From time to time, Trump throws out the notion that he will run for a third term. All of us know that is not going to happen, and he knows it also. But it is disturbing to hear and when it is repeated for a news cycle or more as if it is something that we all need to consider, it becomes empowered in a way it does not deserve.
This type of comment should not be repeated to the point many folks who do not pay much attention to the Constitution could be misled to believe a third term is possible and perhaps he has a right to such.
Along with this are the daily doses of vitriol regarding Trump’s comments to journalists who asked him questions he dislikes, especially females. The repetitious reporting of these events hardly serves any positive purpose. The ugly comments to journalists, threats regarding the war, tariffs, the constant negative refrain about opposing political leaders about any number of issues that dominate the daily reports across the major networks and many smaller independent media outlets that spend all their airtime on Trump and his regime’s negativity narratives.
Energy generates energy, and when there is a continuous flow of negative energy being expended around a set of ideas and behaviors, those ideas and behaviors become stronger and help generate additional power to keep them alive. Thus, a shift in the way these negative-energy sources are handled could help shift their power and impact upon the general public.
What if we could develop a strategy that helped create a counter-narrative that would interrupt the effects of the Trump machine‘s negative energy-generation ability?
“A shift in the way these negative-energy sources are handled could help shift their power and impact upon the general public.”
Here is an example of the way this might be possible. Let’s take the midterm elections. The constant talk about the threats and the way that Trump is planning to undermine the election is not helpful at all. While it is important to tell the truth, to report the facts and to make sure the public is informed, the media overkill is not helpful.
Reports on the concrete remedies to Trump’s threats and the proper preparation from those folks who are responsible for the elections in each state being done in a fair and free environment would be helpful. There needs to be far more talk about that preparation, the safeguards and the plans for resistance to all the Trump plans to undermine the midterms than what he is doing.
It is not helpful to talk about the ways he is trying to create fear and to keep people away from the polls. It would be far more helpful to hear why people do not need to be frightened and the efforts that are being made to ensure all voters will be safe. The counter-narrative needs to be made with more repetition than the negative one.
In this case, it is not too early for media, political leaders and all other people who love democracy and freedom to begin to wage a serious resistance campaign to the negative narratives coming from Trump and his team. The reports of their losses in court around their efforts to undermine the elections and all other information that will help the general public to feel more secure should be the major focus of media.
All media have a responsibility to help promote what is best for the collective community. There is a great need for serious truth-telling tto thwart the fear campaign.
Let’s be more than a half shade braver.
Catherine Meeks was given the President Joseph R. Biden Lifetime Achievement and Service Award in August 2022; was listed by Georgia Trend Magazine as one of the 500 women to watch in Georgia in 2022; retired as the Clara Carter Acree Distinguished Professor of Socio-Cultural Studies at Mercer University; is a community and wellness activist and midwife to the soul; and the author of The Night Is Long, But Light Comes In The Morning, Meditations on Racial Healing, She previously served as founding executive director of Absalom Jones Episcopal Center for Racial Healing and currently serves as founder and executive director of the Turquoise and Lavender Institute for Transformation and Healing. She lives in Atlanta.