Red Hats. Republicans. Regressives.

More out of habit, or perhaps keyboard muscle memory, I clicked on the CNN webpage. I know it's fashionable for Red Hats to accuse Trump contrarians like myself of getting their information from unreliable or, gasp, FAKE, news sources, but frankly never understood the charge.

They get their news from OAN, NewsMax and Epoch Times, hardly Pulitzer-worthy institutions. And it seems noteworthy to mention that Fox News paid close to a billion dollars for disseminating outright falsehoods.

Back to CNN, where the click bait-y article above, caught my attention. I could not read the article, because I refuse to sign up for their subscription services. On this particular topic, I do not need proof of the R-word's resurgence. I see it everyday on social media.

That is, I saw it everyday, until my recent booting off Facebook. Not for nothing, but every time I reported it, the offensive language went unpunished. 

"We know this is not the outcome you wanted to see but our professionals have determined this does not violate any of our precious Community Standards. Your shit however does and your days are numbered on this treasured platform."

I'm not surprised people --and by that I mean people on the right -- are slinging pejoratives like this around. I'm convinced that was the magic behind Trump's return to the White House. He has lowered the bar on public discourse and his insanity has given permission for low information Americans to revisit their old ugly habits and their long history of "othering."

Joe Rogan, Host of America's Most Neanderthal Podcast, proudly had this to say, "The word 'retarded' is back, and it's one of the great cultural victories." 

He, like so many of his uninformed listeners/viewers are intoxicated with Male Toxicity. Compensating for their deficiencies by punching down and picking on people who are least able to defend themselves. Go ahead, pound yourself on the chest Joe, like your not-too-distant simian relatives.

Less than 20 years ago, our better halves prevailed. We elected an African American for president. We expanded healthcare for people who could not afford it. We granted full rights, including the right to get married, to gay people. We decriminalized marijuana. We advanced social progress.

It's was if we as a people recognized that we as families include people of color, people less fortunate, people of varying sexual preferences, and yes, even people of limited cognitive abilities. It's almost as if we came to understand the pain inflicted on them, was pain inflicted on us.

Well, almost. The pendulum has swung backwards.

If permission to use the R-word (and by proxy, the N-word, the C-word) represents a cultural victory, I proudly choose to align myself with the losing side.