In a state filled with manipulation through fear, action is the best response
The thing about using fear as a weapon is that it often works, at least for a while. Fox has been the most-watched cable network for years. Reynolds is governor and getting her priorities passed.
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Fear is a powerful motivator.
Healthy fear, fear of a specific thing in a specific moment, can propel us to do astonishing things, like the mother who lifted a car off her son or the national space race putting men on the moon.
But fear can be damaging, especially when it is deliberately and persistently provoked. In people, it can cause chronic stress, leading to a range of physical and mental health problems and hurting our ability to think clearly or work well. In management, it creates toxic workplaces that chronically underperform. In politics and the media, it creates an ineffective and toxic public sphere.
And we are, unfortunately, in the midst of a terribly toxic public sphere.
Take America’s most-watched news network, Fox News. Through a combination of misdirection and lying, the network has spent years whipping up its viewers with fear of cities, fear of Black people, fear of liberals forcing… health care? ... on them. But when the reality that Joe Biden had won the 2020 election broke the network’s fear-stoked narrative, it found itself deeply afraid of losing its viewers to networks more willing to lie. So, Fox apparently made the questionable, and likely very expensive, decision to lie about election results and voting machines.
Speaking of, even though it didn’t win him re-election, ex-President Donald Trump rode into office on waves of fear in 2016: fear of immigration, fear of job loss, fear of economic souring with “rusted out factories scattered like tombstones across the landscape of our nation.” Then he governed through fear and wrath.
We’re seeing the same kinds of manipulation today in Iowa. “Moms for Liberty” preaches fear about children’s social development and that they might read books their parents don’t like or learn things their parents don’t understand, from “new math” to “common core” to “how bodies work.” Gov. Kim Reynolds threatens legislative Republicans with being primaried if they don’t support her priorities and now can put agency heads throughout the Iowa government in fear of losing their jobs if they displease her. Legislative Republicans have threatened to scuttle the state’s bond rating and federal funding in order to sandbag Auditor Rob Sand. They threatened to undercut the attorney general’s office when Tom Miller was in it. They bullied the Board of Regents into a secretive review of all three state universities’ DEI (Diversity, Equity, Inclusion) programs using a bill to ban nearly all such programs, threatening federal funding, compliance with settlement agreements, and scholarship distribution.
The thing about using fear as a weapon is that it often works, at least for a while. Fox has been the most-watched cable network for years. Trump was president and could be again. Reynolds is governor and getting most of her priorities passed. Republicans control both legislative chambers.
But Fox is reaping the whirlwind in the form of a $1.6 billion lawsuit by Dominion Voting Systems that is set to go to trial. Trump is facing indictment. Iowa is, they say, five years behind the rest of the country, so we’ll have to see what happens with our state government.
However those things come out, all of this fear is corrosive to our public discourse. President Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s famous words, “The only thing we have to fear is fear itself!” were delivered in a different context, but they are no less true today. Positive leadership like Roosevelt’s empowers; fear-based leadership causes panic, paralyzes, and keeps us from doing what we know is right.
So what do we do about it? Action. Action is the antidote to anxiety. We don’t give in to fear, and we focus on making Iowa a better place for all of us. Volunteer, bring food to your neighbors in need, help each other clean up after storms, run for office, and keep being a beacon for those who are ready to step away from chronic stress and toxicity.
Kelcey Patrick-Ferree and Shannon Patrick live in Iowa.
Originally published in the Iowa City Press-Citizen on April 6, 2023.