Reporter: “So why did you fail the country by not paying attention to this virus earlier?”
Trump: “Why are you asking me such a nasty question?”
Cuomo: “Why do you think you’re a king?”
While those aren’t the exact words, they represent how I felt when listening to them. Reporter asking a question to Trump implying that we’re in this situation because Trump failed. Trump responding to the accusation of being a failure by accusing the reporter of being a failure. Cuomo responding to Trump’s statement of total power by attacking Trump’s perceived grandiosity.
And we sit, we watch, and many of us cheer…for “our” side. It almost feels as if I’m watching a boxing match and I can hear the ooooohs and aaaaahs as each side lands a blow. He lands a quick jab. He responds with a left hook. Oh no, here comes the haymaker!
I joke about this but deep down I’m feeling quite sad about it all. In a time when so many people are dying, so many people are struggling, and so many people are afraid, it hurts to see us cheer actions that push us further apart.
I wish we would see this as a moment for unity. As a moment to stop the fight, open up our arms, and bring each other in for a hug (metaphorically, because, ya know, corona). I worry that our zeal for zero-sum fights comes from a place of unresolved pain—he punched me so I want to see someone punch him. I think, yes, that’s one way to resolve pain—for us to share in pain and it dissipates if we both share the same feeling.
I think another way to resolve it is for us to heal our own pain so that we don’t have to drag the other one down. The reality is that they may have caused us pain because they were feeling pain. So if we feel pain and cause them pain, we may get stuck in this cycle until someone decides to stop the fight.
I wonder how the interaction could go differently…
Reporter: “These are troubling times and yes, we’ve had our differences in the past, but I believe we need to unite in this fight. How can we, the news corps, help you bring this country together?”
Trump: “Yes, I take part of the blame for this happening, but in this moment, I think we need to work together to talk about focusing on the moment and how we can help each other now, not what happened in the past.”
Cuomo: “We have our differences and yet the state of New York cannot do this without the help of the federal government and the support of President Trump.”
How different it could be.