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10:00:00 |
Start |
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00:05 |
Commentary Welcome to Trump’s America.
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00:12 O-Ton Paula |
Paula Green Peace activist and
conflict mediator The country feels so divided, so angry in other
parts of it, so full of stereotypes and prejudice toward people living in
other regions of the country. It feels as if it's the worst time we've ever
had. |
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00:30 |
Opener Commentary What has happened to this country, where society appears so
irreparably divided? |
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Ab 00:37 O-Töne Diverse David, Thomas,Jeremy, Brit 00:58 Titel: Die gespaltene Seele Amerikas O-Töne Diverse
Jeremy, Danna,Mark, Thomas |
Opener O-Töne David Cay Johnston Investigative Journalist and Author So what is America now? Thomas Frank Political Analyst and
Historian Populism is the American way of talking about social
class. Jeremy Peters Political Reporter
for The New York Times Trump punches. Brit Bennett Author I don`t think racism ever really went away. Jeremy Peters Political Reporter
for The New York Times And so what is America if we are not optimistic. Danna Singer Photographer I do think that a lot of people feel trapped. Mark Lilla Historian at Columbia
University New York One out of every five Americans is an evangelical. Thomas Frank Political Analyst and Historian What is America ? Who are we as the people? |
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01:34 Ein Film von Jörg Daniel Hissen 01:36 |
Opener Commentary A culture war is raging over the future direction of the nation – and party
politics has turned into an ideological battle. |
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01:48 O-Ton David |
David Cay Johnston Investigative Journalist and Author The rise of fascism in Europe came when people felt
they lost control of their economic destinies and in America 90 percent have
lost control of their economic destiny. So they're desperately looking around
for a savior and Donald Trump steps forward and says: I am your savior. Well
he's the exact opposite. He is the devil incarnate for them. But if he tells
them he is their savior and nobody else says that, they're going to turn to
him and they have. |
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02:16 |
Commentary Right-wing populists have driven a wedge into the
heart of American society, which could leave its mark for decades to come. |
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02:23 O-Ton Paula |
Paula Green Peace activist and
conflict mediator I think the divisions in our country have been very
large for a long time. But I think now when you have a president himself who
uses racist, sexist, homophobic, islamophobic language people in the
community feel: If the president can say that, I can say it too. If the
president can behave this way, I can behave this way too. So I think what was
latent and hidden, is now out in the open and being expressed and encouraged.
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02:53 |
Commentary Right-wing
activists are increasingly visible, marching through the streets, buoyed by
the election of Donald Trump. |
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03:06 O-Ton David |
David Cay Johnston Investigative Journalist and Author America is a country that is I think in very deep
trouble. And it is possible not likely but possible that with Donald Trump we
are seeing the beginning of the end of America as we have known it. |
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03:17 |
Commentary The election of Donald Trump as president of the
United States of America has posed one of the biggest challenges in the
history of the republic. |
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03:24 O-Ton Trump |
Donald Trump US President Ours was not a campaign but rather an incredible and
great movement made up of millions of hard working men and women who love
their country. |
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03:38 O-Ton Thomas |
Thomas Frank Political Analyst and Historian I call this the backlash, the great backlash and
it's been running since 1968 is when I would say that it really got going.
And it's a backlash against liberalism. Donald Trump is not new. Donald Trump
is a continuation of something that's been going on for a long time. |
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03:58 O-Ton Thomas |
Thomas Frank Political Analyst and Historian You know Trump has really achieved what the
Republican party set out to do 50 years ago which is he has won over the by
in large you know a huge part of the white working class in this country to
the Republican Party. |
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04:16 |
Commentary Paula Green belongs to a growing group of Americans
no longer willing to stand by idly as Trump pursues his policies. A peace
activist, she lives in the liberal north-east of the country, in the town of
Leverett, Massachusets. Paula founded the internationally renowned Karuna
Center for Peacebuilding and has successfully mediated between warring
factions in places such as Rwanda, Bosnia and the Middle East. |
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04:49 Off-Ton Paula |
Paula Green Peace activist and
conflict mediator I feel there are other ways that we can resolve our
conflicts and our greed and our neediness besides going to war. And we can
resolve our fear of each other by getting to know each other instead of
fighting each other. We can resolve our dominance issues by communication. And I learned how people can build trust with each
other and overcome even the war that the families of one side have waged on
the families of the other side. |
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05:23 O-Ton Paula |
Paula Green Peace activist and
conflict mediator After the 2016 election I wanted to take everything
I had learned and apply it to our own country because the divides here I
thought were just as toxic as they've been any place in a war zone overseas. |
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05:36 |
Commentary Paula has launched an initiative aimed at
conservative voters in other states. She hopes that opening up a dialogue
will help overcome some of the barriers. |
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05:49 Off-Ton Paula |
Paula Green Peace activist and
conflict mediator We didn't understand what had happened to our
country and the impulse to bring the little town of Leverett together to talk
about this, was with this puzzle. What has happened to you and how did this
happen? Why did it happen and what do we do about it? And I thought one of
the things that we should do is see if we can try to understand who the
people are who voted for Trump and what happened that made it possible. |
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06:14 |
Commentary Donald Trump, the great divider, bringing democratic America back
together again. |
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06:19 O-Ton Woman |
Woman Our community is a bubble of liberal thinking. And I
was stunned by the elections, by the election results and really wanted to
know what I had missed. How did I get that so very wrong. |
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06:32 O-Ton Man |
Man I'm still angry because I have failed to come up
with an understanding of how anyone can support a man of extraordinary
cruelty and inhumanity and corruption. |
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06:52 O-Ton Woman |
Woman My son married into a very conservative family. And
as I got to know his in-laws I realized that they were very strong Trump
supporters and they were very staunch Republicans. And I didn't understand
it. How could they vote for Donald Trump raised the beautiful daughter that
they did who married my son. |
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07:20 O-Ton Woman |
Woman For me I kept thinking that it was the media and the
politicians in our country that had vested interests in keeping us divided
and if we could meet face to face with what we've all along called the other,
that we would find much more in common than we all had been thinking. |
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07:45 |
Commentary The “other” she is referring to includes people
living in the south-western state of Kentucky, once the greatest coal mining region
in the whole country. Now, falling demand for coal has led to the closure of
almost all of the mines. |
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08:00 O-Ton Bill |
Robert Meade Former Coal Miner You're actually looking at one of the larger
operations that was in Letcher County right here. It's very sad when I see a
load out that is not running coal. I'd like to see that coal coming to you
folks. We were raised on coal. |
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08:16 |
Commentary Robert was one of those who lost his job in the mine. |
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08:24 O-Ton Bill |
Robert
Meade Former
Coal Miner This is Trump
territory. They want someone in office who will stand up for
the ordinary person. Don't be in the political realm like it's always been in
Washington. |
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08:44 O-Ton Bill |
Robert Meade Former Coal Miner I just hope we never have another president like
Obama. |
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08:47 O-Ton Bill |
Robert Meade Former Coal Miner I vote for Trump. I was a Trump man and I voted for
him because he appeared to me like he would be the guy that would actually
relieve us of a truckload of regulations that was strangling our country. And
he's doing it and he's the kind of guy whether you agree with him or not
he'll speak his mind. I like a man who speaks his mind. |
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09:15 |
Commentary Miners all over the country have put their trust in
a president who claims that coal has a future, and that climate change is a
myth. |
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09:25 |
Commentary Robert pays his friend Gary a visit at another
nearby mine. This mine was closed down under president Obama, but is set to re-open
soon. |
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09:41 |
Commentary Gary is in charge of operations overground. He, too,
is a fervent supporter of Trump, like almost everybody here whose livelihood
depends on coal mining. |
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09:53 |
Commentary But can Trump turn back the clock on the energy industry? |
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10:07 O-Ton Gary |
Gary Actually it is picking up. And Trump helped with
that a lot. |
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10:12 O- Ton Robert |
Robert Meade Former Coal Miner If they would just lay off of him just a little bit.
You would see mining come back about a third faster. |
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10:22 |
Commentary Outside of Kentucky, very few people believe that
coal mining has a future. But do the liberal coastal elites have any
alternatives to offer to the people in the American hinterland who fear for
their way of life? |
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10:32 |
Commentary For Bill, coal is a God-given resource. |
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10:38 O- Ton Robert |
Robert Meade Former Coal Miner I'm an old regular Baptist. I believe that the good
lord made it strictly for us to use and we need to use it because if he
hadn`t want us to use it wouldn`t have made it. And that's the way I believe
and I always will believe that. We're all... in this area right here, you're
actually in part of the Bible Belt in the United States. We believe that
Bible. Word for word. Sentence for sentence. Letter by letter. |
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11:05 O- Ton Mark |
Mark Lilla Historian at Columbia
University New York We are undergoing two revolutions simultaneously in
the United States. One is a political populist revolution from below. That's
driven by class anxiety and kind of tribal feeling. On the other hand we are
experiencing a cultural revolution having to do with representation and
diversity that is being driven by cultural elites. And so what happens is
that there is a conflict between these two projects. And the more that
American liberals pursue and continue this cultural revolution the more it
leads to a tribal reaction from below. And so populism is a combination of
tribal resentment plus economic disenfranchisement. |
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12:00 |
Commentary The Statue of Liberty in New York – a symbol of freedom and democracy.
But the deep divisions in Trump’s America are threatening that very
democracy. The mutual suspicion, hatred and lies form a dangerous mixture that
could explode at any time. |
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12:34 |
Commentary The febrile atmosphere and the dangers of right-wing populism have
animated the art scene in New York. |
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12:42 |
Commentary New York-based artist Molly Crabapple was one of those who took part
in the Occupy Wall Street movement. She shares a studio with her boyfriend,
the cartoonist Fred Harper. |
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12:55 |
Commentary It’s hard to pigeon-hole Molly – she is a journalist who draws, an
artist who writes and a political activist. |
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13:03 O-Ton Molly |
Molly Crabapple Artist and Author You have white Americans who both are suffering
declining economic fortunes because of globalization because of automation
because of an increasingly rapacious and inhuman capitalism but who also are
feeling their position of supremacy slipping and they are incredibly
threatened by the idea of equality. |
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13:29 |
Commentary Molly often illustrates and writes for the news website “The Daily
Beast”. Ahead of the 2016 election, she was assigned to report on the
Republican Convention. She witnessed the chants aimed at Democratic candidate
Hillary Clinton, calling for her to be locked up. |
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13:42 O-Ton Molly |
Molly Crabapple Artist and Author Originally I was there for the Daily Beast. This is
an image of inside the pit. You can see the media people being separated from
all the delegates in all of their many fancy hats. But I was also drawing the
circus outside of it. Like this man in a rubber Hillary mask with an infidel
T-shirt and his Trump versus Tramp. There is this air of just violent
misogyny like, lock her up lock her up. Also this intense fear. I mean people
they literally thought that like Black Lives Matter protesters were going to murder
them you saw these guys and women with pistols strapped to their legs
outside. |
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14:27 O- Ton Thomas |
Thomas Frank Political Analyst and Historian Populism is the American way of talking about social
class. And it's always this idea of the average, people working class people
against what they call the elite. |
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14:42 O-Ton Molly |
Molly Crabapple Artist and Author This is my portrait of what I call The Boar Of
Babylon which is Trump as the biblical sign of the apocalypse riding his beast.
I wanted to show that it wasn't just Trump. I wanted to show that it's all
this deeply enmeshed corrupt system that's fueled on wealth that's very often
fueled on ultra conservative Christian evangelicalism that's fueled on white
supremacy. There's a whole much larger enemy than just Trump himself not just
one man. And this is all members of his cabinet. But I wanted to show that
you can't just cut one of the heads off. |
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15:20 |
Commentary In the 1980s, the conservative president and avowed Christian, Ronald
Reagan, left a lasting legacy in the United States with his policies of
deregulation. |
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15:33 O-Ton Mark |
Mark Lilla Historian at Columbia
University New York Ronald
Reagan came along with an anti political vision of America where there would
be less government, fewer social programs, a focus on the economy. For 35
years Reagan's vision dominated America and American Democrats and liberals
those on the left, rather than offering a competing political vision of what
we are as a country, got distracted by identity and cultural politics, seeing
the country's different groups with competing aims. And so we were not in the
fight with Reaganism and so populism developed without our trying to combat
it. And with the collapse of Reaganism and no competing vision from us you
get Donald Trump. |
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16:28 |
Commentary Together,
the apparently inexorable march of the populists and the failure of the
Democrats to combat them pose a threat to American society. The country is at
a fork in the road and so far there is no telling which way it will go. |
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16:39 O-Ton David |
David Cay Johnston Investigative Journalist and Author If we don't get that real change than I believe that
America will over time slip into being a fascist country. A country which
will have a ruler not a president. And
to a lot of people, you know this is a lot of hard work: I don`t understand
this stuff or politics is dirty and don't want anything to do with it.
Imagine someone who comes along who has all of Donald Trump's charisma and
marketing skills. But none of his deficits. Somebody who actually knows how
to manage, somebody who actually understands world history, somebody who has
real ideas but who also was a power monger and a kleptocrat. Well. That turns
a society into something very very different. |
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17:20 |
Commentary In August 2017, the culture wars escalated to heights not yet seen. In
one of America’s oldest university towns, Charlottesville Virginia, thousands
of people from various right-wing groups gathered to march in the name of "White
Supremacy". |
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17:51 |
Photos Commentary The "Unite the Right" rally involved self-identified members
of the far right, alt-right and White Supremacy movement. Many of the
marchers were heavily armed and chanted racist or anti-semitic slogans at
minority groups as they walked past. |
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18:20 O-Ton Brit |
Brit Bennett Author I don't think racism ever really went away. I think,
you know there is maybe a resurgence in the way we talk about it or the way
it's framed. But you know I think that Trump and sort of what has happened is actually
pretty distinctly American. There's definitely a division by race I think you
know America is a very tribal country. |
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18:46 |
Commentary The march was held in response to a city order to remove a statue of
the civil-war General Robert Lee, an advocate for slavery. For many people
on the political right in the US, Confederate generals remain heroes. |
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19:06 O-Ton David |
David Cay Johnston Investigative Journalist and Author The rise of rightwing populism in America is deeply
connected to the issue of race. Ever since Richard Nixon republican
politicians have realized they can exploit race to get ahead. And it's much
easier to say it's that black guy, it is that guy from Mexico. That's why
you're not doing better, than to look at government policies, spending taxes,
investments or lack thereof, health care. |
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19:31 |
Photos Commentary Facing the right-wing mob in Charlottesville were just as many
counter-protestors. |
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19:54 |
Photos Commentary There were riots and violent clashes. In the end,
one person lay dead and several more injured. |
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20:02 |
Trumpsequenz (Zitatrecht) Commentary Trump defended the right-wing demonstrators and
refused to condemn the violence: a basic political taboo had been broken. |
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20:07 O-Ton Trump |
Donald Trump US President And nobody wants to say that but I'll say it right
now. You had a group you had a group on the other side that came charging in
without a permit and they were very very violent. |
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20:17 O-Ton Paula |
Paula Green Peace activist and
conflict mediator Unfortunately it was not stopped by the president.
In fact he never really reined them in. He said well they were good and bad
people on both sides and well of course there are good and bad people
everywhere. This needed a much stronger condemnation than it got. So it was
an indication of what's now permissible. |
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20:38 |
Commentary The cultural divisions in America are exacerbated to unprecedented levels
by network television. The conservative Fox News and its liberal counterpart
CNN reflect the ideological fault lines running through the US. |
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20: 53 O-Ton Jeremy |
Jeremy Peters Political Reporter
for The New York Times I think that what the right wing media does that is
different especially under this president and you see this with Fox News and
Sean Hannity's close relationship with President Trump. They call each other
all the time they're constantly in contact and that's different. That's more
that's more of a media partnership that shouldn't exist a propaganda even
between a government and a news source that claims it's objective when in
fact we have all the evidence we need every night from 8 to 11p.m. that it's
not objective at all. |
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21:36 |
Commentary Cartoonist Fred Harper designs the cover of the political magazine
“The Week”. President Trump, with his frequent scandals and outbursts provides
him with an almost bottomless reservoir of material. While Fred uses comedy
and satire to poke fun at the president, he takes the shift to the right in
American society very seriously. |
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22:03
O-Ton Fred |
Fred Harper Cartoonist I think the country's becoming more populist. And
it's been tapping into something that has been like a lump of clay that
hasn't been shaped and these radical people that have been shouting all this
time but ignored, they have always been in the fringes are now getting their
chance you know to be in the spotlight and it's really scary now. |
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22:35 |
Commentary American society seems to have lost its ability to form a consensus.
The lines being drawn according to region, political allegiance, skin color
and religious faith are ever-starker. |
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22:47 O-Ton Mark |
Mark Lilla Historian at Columbia
University New York I ran across an advertisement on the Internet for a real
estate company in Texas and they're running a national campaign in which
their advertisements say “Are you tired of living in a blue state with all
those liberals who don't respect you and your family? Come to Texas. We'll
find you a house. We'll find you a church. We'll find you a school and you
can live among your friends.” And Americans are moving by themselves to
places where there were random people who agree with them ideologically and
care about the same things. It's unprecedented really. |
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23:30 O-Ton David |
David Cay Johnston Investigative Journalist and Author Dividing people by race is much easier to do when
people are in economic stress and they're desperately looking around and
saying why are things worse. How can it be that after 50 years of working I
have gotten nowhere. And this divide is at the core of what's happening to
America. Some people are doing fabulously well. But 90 percent of people are
treading water. |
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24:02 |
Commentary New Jersey, on the east coast. Here, the American dream seems to be unattainable for the majority.
Throughout the region are signs of dying industry and a white lower middle
class that has been left behind. |
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24:23 |
Commentary One person for whom the American dream has come true
is the photographer Danna Singer. But she has not forgotten her roots, which
are often reflected in her work. |
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24:36 O-Ton Danna |
Danna Singer Photographer I grew up in a working class neighborhood and a
working class family. My mother was a house cleaner and my dad was a
bartender. Education wasn't really encouraged. It was. You know you were
meant to like find a trade and you go out and you have a family. That was
basically what everyone in my family did. |
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25:01 |
Commentary Danna spent many
years traveling through and documenting this forgotten America. |
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25:06 O-Ton Danna |
Danna Singer Photographer It is a portrait of a community, a working class
community. My interpretation of that
community. The community where I grew
up. A lot of poverty and a lot of drugs. You know a lot of teen pregnancy a
lot of drug addiction and so like there's this cycle of you know with lack of
money comes lack of education and lack of health care. So my work looks at
that a lot. It looks at really the
struggles of a working class community. What does that look like. |
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25:44 O-Ton Danna |
Danna Singer Photographer I do think that a lot of people feel trapped. I mean
I certainly felt trapped. I think there is an undercurrent of anger in these
communities. In America the Have and Have Nots that is defenitely present in
almost every conversation that there is an element of anger and a sense of
things being unfair, not equivalent in terms of class. |
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26:09 |
Commentary The average income of a US household has dropped drastically in the
last decade. |
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26:16 O-Ton Danna |
Danna Singer Photographer It's the rich and the poor. I think the middle class
is basically gone. Who is middle class? I mean, even, I have an education but
I haven't jumped class. Jumping class is very difficult. Your station in life
is I think nearly impossible to escape
from. Right. Or it takes so long that it seems impossible. |
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26:42 |
Commentary Today, more and more citizens are asking themselves whether the
American dream was ever more than an illusion. |
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27:01 O-Ton Jeremy |
Jeremy Peters Political Reporter
for The New York Times That's why the country is at a real crisis point
right now because they say that things are not going in the right direction
and that they fear America will not be a better place for their children as
it was for them. |
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27:24 O-Ton Danna |
Danna Singer Photographer Even though I was working in these communities I
just really overlooked how alienated they felt in their voice being heard. I
do think that the working class folks really felt undervalued and ignored. |
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27:38 O-Ton Danna |
Danna Singer Photographer Hey guys. Can I interrupt for one second. So I'm
taking I'm taking pictures of basically Seaside Heights and Photographerg you
know the community and the town. I love all of the American flags stuff that
I see here. Can I. Is there any way that I can take a picture of
all of you guys who have American flag stuff. Yeah just like that. |
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28:04 |
Commentary One major contributor to the divisions in society is the notion of
American Neoliberalism, which worships the free market and sees competition
as the only legitimate way to organise society. |
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28:17 |
Commentary In Washington, the lobbyists for influential think tanks such as the
libertarian Cato Institute beat the drum for laisser-faire capitalism and reject the role of the state
involvement in tackling social issues. |
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28:31 O-Ton David Boaz |
David Boaz Executive vice
president of the Cato Institute Well I think libertarianism is the basic original
philosophy of the United States. I want much lower taxes, much less
government spending, much less regulation. I don't think we should focus on
inequality. And I don't think wealth created in a free market is taken from
the poor or the middle class. Maybe we've lost our spirit of mobility we've
lost our spirit of enterprise that people are not as quick to move to where
the opportunities are as they used to be. |
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29:04 |
Commentary Republican economic orthodoxy places all responsibility on the
individual for their own successes or failures. Intervention by the State is unthinkable.
The result is a new class of forgotten people. Right-wing populists have
succeeded in channeling their fears, which manifests itself as anger directed
at cultural elites. |
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29:31 O-Ton Danna |
Danna Singer Photographer Things have changed. There's a huge divide in this
country. I think there's no way you can escape it If you're living in America
you are living in this culture of intense stress. |
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29:45 |
Photos Freistehend |
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30:08 O-Ton Jeremy |
Jeremy Peters Political Reporter
for The New York Times The country is changing faster than you are able to
control it. That your vision of America and that's really the heart of it
because there is no singular American vision or ideal or culture that when
you feel that yours is slipping away you are going to try through the
political process to stop that. And that's why Donald Trump's appeal was so
powerful because he told those people. I will make America great again and
again that's the most crucial word in that slogan harken back to for a lot of
people the days when America was not as diverse when they didn't walk around
on the street and hear seven different languages being spoken. |
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30:59 |
Commentary Trump promised to “Make America great again”. To some, this was read
as “Make America white again”. The art museum in the east coast city of Baltimore aims to illustrate
social issues, injustices and discrimination. |
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31:27 O-Ton Chris |
Chris Bedford Director of the Baltimore Museum of Modern
Art We know that we are in a black majority city. 68
percent African-American. It is a segregated city. It's a city that is
afflicted with poverty, gang violence, issues with education. It's a Womanght
circumstance. And so the question is: How do you make a museum necessary? How
do you make it useful? How do you make it a resource in the gathering place
for a new future in a city like this? So that means, yes the exhibitions we
choose are, not entirely, but largely by black Americans who happen to be
producing the most relevant work made in the world today in my view. |
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32:01 |
Commentary One of
these artists, according to the museum director, is Meleko Mokgosi, whose
exhibition addresses the notion of Resistance. |
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32:11 O- Ton Chris |
Chris Bedford Director of the Baltimore Museum of Modern
Art So I think we're asking why art matters. Why it's
necessary. But I think what we're really asking is how can we change society
and how can we how can art be instrumental in doing that. That's the real question. |
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32:23 |
Commentary Bedford seeks to give a bigger platform to works produced by non-white
artists. |
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32:33 |
Commentary African-American artists reflect how much of their own history has
gone into creating modern America. |
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32:42 O-Ton Stephen |
Stephen Towns Artist I realize that some things that I experience as a
person doesn't have to do with me. It has to do with history. It has to do
with the culture of America. So if somebody sees me and they hate me or they
feel like I don't deserve to shop in a store or they feel like I don't
deserve to stay in their hotel it has nothing to do with me. It has to do
with the culture. American culture,
that they were brought up in. |
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33:14 O-Ton Brit |
Brit Bennett Author When
I think about racism I try to think about mostly is not even necessarily the
interpersonal interactions that everyone likes to focus on but the ways in
which these sort of institutions are set up in America in a way in ways in
which there are these sort of structures of racism. I think the idea of sort
of we often frame racism as one person being mean to another person and
that's kind of where the conversation stops. But to me it's more the
structures. |
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33:42 |
Commentary So far no president, not even Barack Obama, has
succeeded in overcoming America’s deeply ingrained racial divisions. |
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33:50 O-Ton Stephen |
Stephen Towns Artist So this is the first piece that I worked on. It's
called Birth Of A Nation. And it was inspired by my reading this book:
Incidents of a life of a slave girl.
And it really talked about the experience of black women here in
America. These women were having moments of leisure. And there was this woman
who literally had to leave her own children to feed her master's babies. And
this just talks about the level of respect and veneration we should give
black women. |
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34:21 O-Ton Stephen |
Stephen Towns Artist So I feel like we're sort of at a kindling point. I don't think we'll
be in another civil war but there is a war of ideas and of thoughts and a war
of people wanting to hold on to an old way of life that at some point is
going to disappear away whether by force or whether by some happening by
things have to change here in America. And I feel like Trump is just, he is a
way of showing us who we were all along. And now we see the ugliness of who
we are and we're trying to reckon with that.
We want to change it. We know that we have to change it at some point. |
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35:08 |
Commentary The
Baltimore Museum of Art regularly organizes panel discussions with well-known
artists and writers. It hopes to help shape a new society and organize
resistance to injustices. The public response has been overwhelming. |
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35:30 O-Ton Chris |
Chris Bedford Director of the Baltimore Museum of Modern
Art We believe that we can talk about art and politics
simultaneously. We want to be a place that's known for that. So I think
that's the postulation and I think it works. |
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35:42 O-Ton Mark |
Mark Lilla Historian at Columbia
University New York In the United States right now we are experiencing a
crisis of tribal identities. What is lacking is a vision of a political
identity that we would share. Right now we think in terms of racial groups
and gender groups and regional groups people in the south against other
people, religious people. But in part that's because we've lost our identity
as a nation and as a society that we share. |
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36:25 |
Commentary Can civil society find ways to rebuild where political elites have
failed? |
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36:38 O-Ton Paula |
Paula Green Peace activist and
conflict mediator I feel what`s incumbent upon all of us is to work as
hard as we can to make sure that this country doesn't fall further than it
already has. The country is so large and so powerful and it has the
possibility of taking too much of the world with it both in terms of the
environment and in terms of the politics. So I would say we're in the biggest
trouble big trouble that we never could have imagined much bigger than any of
us could have predict. |
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37:01 |
Commentary Paula and her husband Jim, along with other concerned citizens, have built
links with a community in the red state of Kentucky. They hope to engage with
each other and offer a forum for views that go beyond the usual cultural fault
lines. |
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37:17 O-Ton Paula |
Paula Green Peace activist and
conflict mediator We spent a long time trying to find a community that
be our partners and we found a wonderful group of people in eastern Kentucky
in the coal country. I live in a town that voted 90 percent for Hillary
Clinton. And they live in a region that voted 90 percent for Trump so we were
a match made in heaven and we've thought about a name for quite a while and
we both live in hilly areas in the countryside and we were reaching out to
each other so we called it “Hands across the hills” . |
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37:54 O-Ton Paula |
Paula Green Peace activist and conflict mediator Oh look. There is the sign. Coming into Kentucky. We did it.
We are here. We're back. |
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38:04 |
Commentary Paula has already
met up with people from Kentucky twice in recent months. After a 17-hour drive, Paula and her fellow campaigner arrive in
Kentucky, 1,300 km from their home in Massachusetts. |
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38:19 O-Ton Paula |
Paula Green Peace activist and
conflict mediator Wow this is beautiful. Look at this place. Just wonderful. What
a beautiful place. |
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38:29 O-Ton Paula |
Paula Green Peace activist and
conflict mediator This is another part of America. When you travel
from place to place in the US, there are distinct kinds of popular culture
and distinct kinds of historical memory and very different politics and
that's playing out now on a grand stage in this country with the divisiveness
between different regions. And it's almost ungovernable. It's almost
impossible to hold it together. The only thing in common was we all killed
the Indians. That's a sad thing that happend to everybody and in all parts of
the country. |
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39:06 |
Commentary Kentucky is one of the poorest states in the US. Unemployment has been
running high since most of the coal mines were shut down. |
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39 :15 |
Commentary People’s discontent is fueled by the conservative Fox News, America’s
most watched TV network. It makes frequent use of apocalyptic imagery to
evoke threats to American freedom and the God-given order of Christian
supremacy. |
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39 :34 O-Ton Paula |
Paula Green Peace activist and
conflict mediator I can see three screens from where I'm sitting and
they all have Fox News on and we would never see Fox News in our region of
the country nobody would watch it. And I think it's the only media available
to most people here. And sometimes I wish that I could tell my Kentucky
friends what I read in The New York Times or heard on public radio. And what
they hear and see is very different. So we have two completely different
interpretations of the news. It's sharply divided newswise. And everything
that they believe they've heard on Fox News. |
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40 :19 |
Commentary In Kentucky, more
than 80% of the population is white, conservative and protestant. Evangelical
Christians are among the most loyal supporters of Donald Trump. Every fifth American identifies as evangelical. |
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40 :45 O-Ton Mark |
Mark Lilla Historian at Columbia
University New York When is the last time you have seen an American
movie with an evangelical character. You haven't. Because there are not any. They aren't
represented on television. One out of every four Americans lives in the south.
If you look at television in movies the only time you see Southern characters
is if they're racist or they're ignorant. And so there's this whole middle of
America that doesn't see itself in the image the culture industry gives of
the nation. Instead they see things that look to be not only contempt for
them but also they feel lectured to. |
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41:45 |
Commentary The artist Jeff Chapman-Crane was born and raised in
Kentucky. His paintings capture the essence of his home state and its people.
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42:08 O-Ton Jeff |
Jeff Chapman-Crane Visual Artist There's a lot of frustration I think about kind of
being left behind and forgotten. This area has been in some ways sacrificed
for the rest of the country. Coal in the past has provided over 50 percent of
the energy in this country. But it has come at a pretty high cost to this
area. So I don't think the coal industry is ever going to provide the kind of
economic support for this region that it has in the past. |
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42:40 |
Commentary Jeff is one of a small minority in Kentucky who have consistently
spoken out against coal-mining for environmental reasons. |
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42:49 O-Ton Jeff |
Jeff Chapman-Crane Visual Artist So let me tell you about this piece. I wanted to
create a piece that expressed how I believe the Earth feels. I believe the
Earth is a living thing that feels what we're doing. And the devastation of
strip mining and mountaintop removal. It's just I wanted to make a statement
about that. And so I created this sculpture. It shows, it depicts mother
earth whose body is actually the mountain that's being strip mined. |
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43:23 Off-Ton |
Jeff Chapman-Crane Visual Artist So many people around us have different points of
view. They pretty well know where we stand on things. It makes it difficult. |
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43:36 O-Ton Jeff |
Jeff Chapman-Crane Visual Artist I think what is new is in the last decade or so
we've gotten to the point where we really can't have a dialogue about things.
People don't seem to respect each other's point of view. It's much more of an
adversarial attitude towards our differences. If you don`t completely agree
with me then you are completely wrong. |
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44:06 O-Ton David |
David Cay Johnston Investigative Journalist and Author America is a country that was founded on this
unbounded optimism, this idea in the 18th century that we could govern
ourselves and that if we ennobled the human spirit to see how it could
flourish we could produce great things. Unfortunately America now is in a
state where it has to decide whether we're going into decline or we're going
to recover that optimism. |
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44:28 |
Commentary In Kentucky,
optimism has given way to anger and desperation. Gwen Johnson is from a family of coal miners and lives with her mother
in their childhood home. |
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44:52 O-Ton Gwen |
Gwen Johnson We've suffered from what we believe is a war on coal.
And that was our only industry so we were hard hit by that and we are mad.
And we are in despair. And so when Mr. Trump came along with his
forthrightness and his willingness to offend if he felt the person deserved
to be offended, it's kind of what we were feeling anyway. And I think that
spoke to the people because there is some, somewhat of a brawling warrior
population anyway. |
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45:42 O-Ton Boaz |
David Boaz Executive vice
president of the Cato Institute There is some anger directed in inequality but I
think it's misplaced. In Kentucky there's a sort of dying industry. Coal in
the eastern part of the state and people there want to know what are you
going to do to bring coal back. Well the honest answer is economies change. Coal
is no longer the economically most competitive way to heat our homes. |
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46:08 |
Commentary America has always
maintained that anyone who puts their mind to it can get to the top, but for
many, the American Dream is just that – a dream. |
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46:30 O-Ton Mark |
Mark Lilla Historian at Columbia
University New York Americans need vision. We're that kind of country.
America is a project. But right now we're in this period where we have no
vision. We live in a vision free society and when that happens in America all
the dark things come out from below. What's missing. Is a vision of the
country that would speak to everyone that would get people to look beyond
their particular tribe and recognize the fact that we're a country we share a
destiny together that decisions are being made and we have to think of a
common good as well and both sides the Democrats, the left on the one hand
and conservatives on the right feel that they can play this tribal game and
can win. |
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47:19 |
Commentary America – an
incurably divided nation. Paula and Sharon
are hoping to use personal dialogue to hear and understand the other side of
America in Kentucky. They want to find out what, if anything, people of the
United States of America have in common. |
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48:03 O-Ton Paula |
Paula Green Peace activist and conflict mediator Wonderful. Well it's just so terrific to be here and be back in
Hemphill where I never thought I'd be in my life. |
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48:11 O-Ton Paula |
Paula Green Peace activist and
conflict mediator So one of the questions that we can ask ourselves
is: How deep are these divisions in the country? How do you experience
them? How do you think about them?
What are your concerns about them? |
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48:24 O-Ton
Woman |
Gwen I wound up voting
for Trump. Because Hillary Clinton said she was going to put the coal miners
out of business. If we continue to be divided than we fall prey to
those who want to keep us divided in order to control us. And if there's one
thing I've learned by going to Leverett was that a conversation can bring up
the common ground. |
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48:55 O-Ton Man |
Man The story is not red America versus blue America.
The story is these divisions in every community. The fact is we have been
divided by those who benefit from us being divided. And that's a lot of what
Sharon and Gwen were talking about. And the fact is that when we are divided
we are conquerable and that is what is going on. |
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49:21
O-Ton Woman |
Woman I do feel there is a divisiveness in the country and
I think that it's felt almost all the time and I feel that it shows up in
daily living. And I think that there are people who are afraid to express
their opinions. It's even showing up in churches. The conversation is always
on the pro side of what's happening now. Those who are of a different opinion
wouldn't dare open their mouth because they feel they would be shut down. |
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49:55 O-Ton Woman |
Woman The kind of divisiveness that we've mostly been
talking about today is really flamed by politicians and the media, that
people aren't as divided as it would seem by the politicians and the media.
And the real, real divide in this country is between the rich and the not
rich and that all of this is kind of a persiflage to mask that. |
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50:31 O-Ton
Paula |
Paula Green Peace activist and
conflict mediator In our group dialogue it sounded like just about
everybody is very aware of the extent of the divisions and the harmfulness of
the divisions. And I certainly am I feel like there are more profound than
they've been any time in my life and that they are extremely dangerous. Those are not going to get overcome by these little
dialogues because 300 million people in the United States and we're 25
people. But what I want to do is to try to set something in motion that gets
other communities across the various political economic social cultural
divides racial divides in this country to start talking to each other and the
more that talk the more we humanize the more the divisions go down and the
compassion goes up. And in my ideal world we have a politics based on
compassion not a politics based on competition and hatred. That's my hope for
our country. |
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51:26 |
Commentary President Abraham
Lincoln devoted his efforts to healing the divisions in the United States and
re-establishing the Union after the bloody civil war. Today, Amnerica faces
much the same task: rebuilding a divided society and developing ideas for a
shared way forward. What is at stake is no less than the future of democracy
and freedom. |
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52:10 |
Credits |
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52:30 Filmende |
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