Fox News is burning
You’d think it was the end of the white, privileged universe. Yes, ladies and gentlemen, the world of ugly, garish holiday sweaters will never be the same. Nothing says agony like a fake, decorative tree on fire. The Fox News Christmas tree hath burnethed down, verily.
For the past 72 hours and counting, every white person on Fox News from Sean Hannity to Laura Ingraham to the Trump-adoring drooling cretins of Fox and Friends have bewailed the immolation of its symbol of Christian Republicanism. The war on Christmas has reached new depths. It’s a good thing that, in the midst of attacking the Capitol, murdering and beating some police officers and other people and threatening to hang the Vice President, nobody thought to burn down a fake plastic Christmas tree. Now that would be insurrection.
Grievance politics, Fox style, is at it again. Nobody can flog a stupid symbol to death like Fox. MAGA-hatted morons across America are crying tears of real anguish because a homeless man set fire to a giant piece of plastic crap in New York City.
Not everyone in Fox Land missed the ironic point, however. Political analyst Richard Goodstein got it, and Fox was unfortunate enough to ask him to opine on the subject. “If Fox would put as much energy into decrying the anti-vaxxers,” Goldstein said, “we have 800,000 people dead and one tree destroyed.” He then added, “I think that’s where the energy should go.”
Of course, that is the tragedy behind all these Fox holiday hijinks. There is a monstrous evil in back of their pearl-clutching, indignant, counterfeit sanctimony. Fox has overseen the dissemination of a deadly lie. They have given wings to the despicable, dangerous conspiracy theory that there might be something sinister behind the coronavirus vaccine. There is not one single solitary piece of evidence behind their irresponsible assertion, of course, but Fox never lets truth get in their way.
It isn’t Fox News that should be outraged at the loss of their stupid tree. When you consider what Fox is doing to our lives and our planet, all the outrage belongs to us for the deadly peril their lies put us in. Thanks to Fox and other organs of hate, we live in a measurably, significantly less safe world than we might otherwise. People have died thanks to Fox.
It’s not just the MAGA-hatted morons who are dying either. It’s people we know, people we love. Even if you haven’t been unfortunate enough to suffer the loss of a friend or loved one through Covid, your life and their lives are made significantly less safe thanks to those supercilious bastards at Fox. I therefore want to take this moment as usual, and in the true spirit of Christmas, to hope for you the exact opposite of what Fox wants, and that is why I say, 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.