Donald Trump’s cui bono moment
In February, 24-year-old Kenyan runner Kelvin Kiptum died tragically in a single car accident. Kiptum recently broke fellow countryman and two time Olympic gold medalist Eliud Kipchoge’s world record for the marathon. He was tipped for the gold medal in the Paris Olympics this summer. He was a remarkably gifted young runner and his death shocked and saddened the world of athletics.
Few were sadder for the loss than Kipchoge himself. Little did he know that an insidious conspiracy theory would take hold on social media, the conspiracy theory that Kipchoge had somehow engineered Kiptum’s death. The theorists, stupid and lazy by nature and completely without evidence, asked the question that is the hallmark of conspiracy theory fools everywhere: who benefits? After all, Kiptum’s death paved the way for an improved chance for a third Olympic gold medal for Kipchoge, did it not? Some of the theorists thought themselves particularly clever because they asked the question in Latin: Cui bono?
You can guess the rest. Kipchoge has received a barrage of hateful messages together with multiple death threats. Some of those death threats were aimed at his wife and children. The tragedy of Kiptum’s death has been multiplied by stupid people who watch too much television and have too much time on their hands. In the run up to his most recent marathon, Kipchoge, already racked by grief and worry, was unable to sleep for 3 days. Unsurprisingly it was a marathon he lost.
No thought is given to the truth by Kipchoge’s accusers. To them Kiptum’s death meant they must have someone to blame. For such people I can only hope for the ultimate justice, that one day the same sort of thing happens to them. On that day you can expect a peevish, indignant reaction, entirely devoid of conscious awareness of that much-deserved poetic irony.
Fewer people abuse the “cui bono” question more than Donald Trump. The man who admires dictators and criminals, from Vladimir Putin and Kim Jong Un to Al Capone and the fictional Hannibal Lecter, insists that he is being criminally prosecuted because it benefits Joe Biden and the Democratic Party. Plenty of stupid people believe him. After all, one need only ask the immortal question “who benefits?” in order to find the likeliest suspect. No additional thought is ever required. Again, points are awarded for asking the question in Latin.
This is the world we now live in, where morons can casually destroy the lives of other people with evidence-free and unjust accusations of horrible deeds. Social media is exploited to leverage and encourage this illogical mob mentality. Not only is evidence not required in that world, the suggestion that it’s needed is met with outrage. “We don’t need no stinkin’ evidence.” Besides, they maintain, the conclusion is “obvious.”
But the “cui bono” question isn’t altogether without its uses. When we look at what the world has become, where evidence-free conjecture quickly solidifies into solid fact, the question of who benefits from such a state of affairs is easily and immediately answerable. The forces of chaos benefit, MAGA Republicans who want to distract voters with irrelevancies benefit, evil people like Donald Trump and his circle benefit. The beneficiaries of loose conjecture, unscientific leaps, conspiracy theories and other nonsense are the deniers — global warming deniers, Holocaust deniers, election deniers, vaccine deniers. The forces that are gathering to destroy our precious democracy and our precious planet always benefit from human ignorance. And, as ever, ladies and gentlemen, brothers and sisters, comrades and friends, stay safe.
Robert Harrington is an American expat living in Britain. He is a portrait painter.