Unlike many other people on the left, I have never been anti-American. Anglo-Saxon culture, and more particularly American culture, has always been a good thing for me through literature, music, sports, film and television. I have many American heroes. Not only because of individual talent and creativity. Also because of the entrepreneurial spirit, the ability to unite art with industry, creative freedom, and vital optimism. For the same reason, between the US and China, I have always been clear about which side I was on. Between the US and Iran, of course. I am a convinced Westerner.
But now it turns out that between the US and Russia (where I also had clear preferences) there is no longer any need to choose: Trump and Putin are on the same side of History. The side of the satraps, the intolerant, the warmongers and the deniers. The side of the cynics and the snails who do not suspect that they are – that is, the stupid ones. When Vice President Vance stood before the European leaders and exclaimed that "there is a new sheriff in Washington", he managed to provoke in me a bitter triplet of sensations: indignation, shame and bazaar. Trump, it seems, has set a standard. He is no longer a solitary madman, but the visible head of a flock of enthusiasts ready to conquer "cultural" hegemony. The United States is a nuclear power in the hands of a group of cowboys snobs and illiterates. It's a poor quality television dystopia.
It is not the first time that I get angry With the USA. As a young boy, it happened to me with Ronald Reagan, whom I found reckless and a B-movie actor, and later with George Bush Jr., who irritated me with his feigned solemnity, always belied by his bovine gaze. Both were militaristic presidents, who exported death and destruction, and promoted, in stages, the revolution. neocon which, in some strange way, has ended up generating the monster of Trumpism. However, for whatever reason, he used to try to separate the work from the artist, as they say now. Bush's America was still also that of Woody Allen, the Cohens, Kubrick, REM, Nirvana, Prince, Paul Auster and The Simpsons. Above all, that ofThe SimpsonsBecause when I was laughing my head off watching an episode ofThe SimpsonsI always thought: "Right now, in Wisconsin, there's a guy laughing at the same episode as you. And he's probably a nutcase who voted for Bush. So, an invisible thread unites us beyond cultural and political differences."
As I have grown older, I no longer think the same way. I no longer find that invisible thread; and, in fact, I do not want to find it. Things have changed. After all, Reagan had to deal with the USSR, and Bush with Bin Laden and the trauma of 9/11. Trump is another story. The US is not under threat, but has become a global threat. It is not that Americans voted for Trump despite his defects and the dangers he foresees; they voted for him precisely because of his defects (which have suddenly become virtues) and the dangers he foresees (which he presents to us as opportunities). Trump's victory, and his growing hegemony, is built on his money, his cynicism, his adolescent logic, his cartoonish staging. It would all be simply ridiculous if the White House did not have the power it has and if the policies that come out of the Trump-Musk duo could not dramatically affect our lives.
Hopefully something good will come out of it, such as a determined policy of the European countries towards unity of action, to make the European Union a safe and democratic space, a fortress of freedom and individual rights in a world increasingly imprisoned by the authoritarian testosterone that springs from the West and the East. And hopefully Catalonia, despite its disappointments and exhaustion, will be able to resist the pincers of indigenous neo-Carlism, imported Falangism andalt-right global.
I must admit that I am not going to give up everything that is good and fun about American culture and that, therefore, I will continue to watch The SimpsonsBut I have to tell you, dear crooked Wisconsinite who is watching the same episode as me: I don't care if we laugh at the same thing. As long as you vote for Trump, we have nothing to share. As Bellingham would say: fuck off.
