Say His Name

Know thine enemy, say Trump’s name.

by Count Grackula

Artwork by Meep

I’m not going to use the hashtag that is used in Black Lives Matter contexts, because I actually do very much agree that it is important to remember and commemorate, publicly, the far too many Black Americans who have lost their lives — in extrajudicial killings by “public servants” in the act of “performing public service,” i.e. in the public’s name — in addition to people like Trayvon Martin and Ahmaud Arbery who were brazenly murdered, just for being Black, by “civilians” (people not acting as public servants in any defensible way at the time they committed their murders). 

Yes, say their names. Etch their names in stone.

Erect monuments to them — as individuals and as a class — beside the monuments to police killed in the line of duty and unknown soldiers and Holocaust victims and even people who died crossing the Berlin Wall or on the attacks of 09/11/2001. Never forget.

The hashtag #say[her]name dates back to the case of Sandra Bland’s death under suspicious circumstances while she was in the custody of Hempstead, TX police. For the record, I do not want to be another asshole coopting and diluting BLM messaging for his own political and rhetorical ends — and also, for the record, I want it known that I did chant “Say her name!” and “Sandra Bland,” within days of her alleged suicide over a traffic stop, on a march from their little city hall to the quaint jail building where she passed while in public custody. 

But here’s what makes me feel like I’m about to put myself at the other end of an Eric Andre meme — y’all what keep talking about “45” and “Drumph” and “tRump” — y’all need to quit. Stop it. You’re embarrassing yourselves. 

Y’all need to say his name. It’s “Donald JoJo Trump” and he currently occupies the office of The President of the United States of America. That shit is real. You can’t just wish it away. And as the stakes grow higher — for the country, for Trump and his family, for the future of diplomacy and cooperation between all humankind — he becomes more and more like a cornered animal. He becomes more dangerous and unpredictable, so please, let’s just acknowledge the facts.

Not your president? Fair enough. He doesn’t represent my interests, views, or ideals, either, but I can’t just wish away the fact that he currently occupies the office of the POTUS with the words “He’s not my president.” By that standard, my most recent president was Jimmy Carter. 

And then there’s the fact that, like it or not, Donald JoJo Trump really is, in many ways, the most perfect representative of this boorish, incurious, anti-intellectual, anti-expertise, know-nothing, childish, “I learned it all on YouTube” nation in the midst of an ongoing tantrum. If his job is to represent the people, he represents us pretty well…too well.

I will allow one, and only one, exception: I know a professor who refers to him as “the orange shitgibbon.” That’s just got a certain ring to it, which I am willing to indulge. The Orange Shitgibbon. Someone call Rihanna — I’ve got a color pitch for Fenty.

The rest of y’all…Here’s the deal…There’s a line in Mario Puzo’s novel The Godfather which didn’t make it into Coppolla’s films. I don’t recall the circumstances, but Don Corleone is talking strategy when he says, “The greatest advantage you can have in a war is for your enemy to underestimate you.” And y’all are underestimating Trump — his power to tap into fear and victimhood and scapegoating and divisiveness — the guy is really good at being bad — he does it without even trying! 

If you don’t know anything about Trump’s mentor, Roy Cohn, then please, at least go read his Wikipedia entry before you go use another impotent epithet like “Drumph.” Gutless, base, bog-scum, that one — the word “evil” is too good for Roy Cohn. And here’s another thing you need to know — the likes of Cohn and Trump — they are totally buddy-buddy with the monied “liberal” classes. They see each other at the same PTA meetings, country clubs, galas, weddings, etc, and all their “differences” fall by the wayside on that other side of the hedge.

Each time you say “45,” you are proving yourself just another jackass shaking your impotent fist at a heel at WrestleMania who is, at this moment, backstage blowing lines off the body of a child that he just brutalized alongside his alleged “opponent” in the ring. High five! 

You are that cretin who thinks that “professional wrestling” is “real,” and you’re about to pop a vein in your forehead. Take a deep breath, man. Step away from the keyboard.

Grow up. It’s because of people like you that I am inclined to agree with the existence of the alleged “Trump Derangement Syndrome.” (I’m just going to throw in a superfluous “Black Lives Matter” here. Well, not superfluous, because “Black Lives Matter” needs to be repeated until that truth is reflected in whatever institutions remain after a proper reconciliation, but it is out of context…That’s what I mean — out of context, not superfluous.) (Black Lives Matter.)

I’m pretty sure Puzo got that line from Sun Tzu — the line about using your enemy’s misunderestimating you to your own advantage. I started reading Sun Tzu’s The Art of War recently, but I got sidetracked by some Buddhist texts (go figure). I didn’t get very far — so it might have even just been an introduction or a prologue where I read that line, I can’t be sure…I haven’t quite figured out that volume yet (there seems to be a lot of prefatory material, maybe, before the reader gets to Sun Tzu’s actual primary text). Books! I just can’t keep up with technology…

Anyway, don’t be that guy. Don’t be foolhardy. That is such a cliched way to go out. “I got this.” No you don’t — sit down and shut up. If you can’t even say your opponent’s name, you are not ready to throw down. You ain’t got shit.

There is a lot at stake, people — a lot at stake. President Donald JoJo Trump may not be what W would call “brain smart,” but he is a master manipulator, and given the perfect storm of circumstances in this moment, which are, granted, amplified by his own impressive incompetence, Republicans’ short-sighted lust for power, and Democrats’ corruption cum naivety (I’m feeling charitable) as well as the United States’ baked-in systemic racism and individuals’ subconscious biases — given that perfect storm — he is not yet done fucking shit up. Trust. He will not go quietly, and here’s the rub — he is not even the real problem — he is the symptom, he’s not the disease. We’ve got a lot of work to do.

So, to paraphrase Destiny’s Child, please, just grow up and say his name: President Donald JoJo Trump of the United States of America.

And yes! Say the names of the lynched; conjure the names of those thrown overboard in the wakes of slave ships; weep for the babies ripped from their mothers’ arms before they even got a name; wail for the countless humans whose names are much more likely found in archival transfers of property than in the indices of any history books, though their sweat and blood is literally mixed in with the mortar that holds together the very institutions where their descendents’ murderers and tormentors report to duty to this day…Say their names!

But y’all bitch ass, punk, limp dick, one-pump chumps what call him “tRump,” y’all are literally the absolute worst. “tRump?” In 2020? Fucking seriously? WHAT KIND OF LAME BOOMER FUCKFACE EVEN USES THE WORD “RUMP” TO MEAN ANYTHING OTHER THAN A CUT OF MEAT IN 2020 ?!? IS THAT THE BEST THAT YOU CAN FUCKING DO ?!? IF THAT IS THE BEST THAT YOU CAN FUCKING DO — IF YOU ARE TAKING THE TIME TO CONSIDER WHERE YOU PRESS THE <SHIFT> KEY WHEN YOU SPELL OUT THE NAME T-R-U-M-P THEN PLEASE JUST GET OUT OF THE WAY YOU ARE PART OF THE PROBLEM AND YOU ARE GOING TO GET US ALL HURT…more.

Fuck, man, I think I have Trump Derangement Syndrome Derangement Syndrome. Fucking liberals…Grow up! This shit is serious! 

Do feel free to continue calling him “the orange shitgibbon,” though…

I wish Rihanna would just make a Fenti color with his name on it and send him skipping off into the sunset…Don’t you think he’d love that? Is that too much to ask? Rihanna?

Black lives matter! #acab