Confrontation, not just 'civility'

In light of White House spokesperson Sarah Huckabee Sanders’ recently being asked to leave a Virginia restaurant because she works for president Donald Trump, calls for “civility” on the part of Trump supporters, while sounding high-minded on the surface, come across as extremely hypocritical.

The reason is because his base loves him precisely because he isn’t civil and doesn’t want him to be. It simply has no respect for not only differing views but also the people who hold them — and it’s been that way since the 1980s.

As Robert Jeffress, the pastor of the First Baptist Church in Dallas and an early Trump supporter, was quoted in The Atlantic magazine, “I couldn’t care less about a leader’s temperament or his tone of his vocabulary. Frankly, I want the meanest, toughest son of a gun I can find. And I think that’s the feeling of a lot of evangelicals. They don’t want Caspar Milquetoast as the leader of the free world.”

What’s needed is not simply “civility” but confrontation. I actually practice this regularly, always being respectful of people who may disagree with me but not tolerating their bad behavior, including flat-out lying, for a second.

This is also the real issue surrounding conservative speakers being “shouted down” or otherwise abused on “liberal” college campuses. It’s not what they believe; it’s how they say it, insulting targets and refusing to be held responsible for any reaction.

One of my favorite movies is “Cry Freedom,” based on a true story of the friendship between newspaper editor Donald Woods and banned activist Stephen Biko. Biko, testifying during a trial of other activists, was told by a white judge, “But your own words call for direct confrontation!”

“That’s right,” he said. “We demand confrontation.”

“Isn’t that a demand for violence?”

“Well, you and I are now in confrontation, but I see no violence.” The judge backed down.

See, sometimes "love" really does mean getting in people’s faces and telling them the truth about themselves. That isn’t pleasant but is often needed, and you really can’t have “civility” without it.