Communication scholars John Waite Bowers and Donovan Ochs explain that a flag issue is not important in itself. Instead, radical speakers use flag issues to represent something that people care about. Similarly, people refuse to wear masks to show that they defy authority. Maskless gatherings have become symbols of partisan loyalty. Oddly, of course, Trump is head of the government and yet tells people not to wear masks. It’s not the mask that matters; it’s the defiance. People have trouble getting angry about abstract concepts, statistics, and health trends. But masks are a simple, slightly uncomfortable thing that people can understand. It’s hard to protest the pandemic. It’s easy to protest a mask.
Earlier Post: Donald Trump Made Ilhan Omar a Flag Individual
Let’s look at what Trump said in his Dubuque, Iowa rally speech yesterday. He spotted Iowa Governor Kim Reynolds, a loyal supporter, in the crowd wearing a mask, and promptly mocked her:
“Donald Trump: Yep, by the way, you do have a great governor, you know that right? I don’t even know. I don’t even know if she’s here. Is she here? There she is. I can’t see her under all that stuff.
“Audience: (laughs).
“Donald Trump: Well, she’s definitely wearing a mask, I will say that.”
That, remember, is what he said about his friend. What about his opponents? Later in the long speech, Trump ridiculed masks:
“I see people that come in, they’re wrapped up in masks and, how you doing? Don’t touch. Don’t get close. Seriously, think of what China has done to the world. I had a group of people, not so long ago at a place, nice place. And they said, ‘President, President, could we say hello?’ They’re wrapped in masks and it’s terrible. And they said, you couldn’t hear him because the mask. One person had the world’s thickest mask I’ve ever seen. I mean, and then the scientists were there. That one’s no good. That one’s okay.” [italics added]
Look at what’s going on in that passage, and we can see how clever Trump’s persuasive methods really are. Of course public health measures are inconvenient and irritating: as Trump said, “Don’t touch. Don’t get close.” But it was China’s fault, Trump said, and therefore not his, that people need to deal with these public health mandates: “Seriously, think of what China has done to the world.” China put us in masks! Horrors!
Some Americans are indeed wearing masks. Let’s look at Trump’s complaint: “They’re wrapped up in masks and it’s terrible.” The masks, he said, were “terrible.” Not just inconvenient or uncomfortable, but terrible. He never said that the deaths were terrible, just the masks. Why, Trump complained, people at his meeting couldn’t even communicate because they were wearing masks: “And they said, you couldn’t hear him because the mask.” (Notice how Trump diverted responsibility: he himself wasn’t saying that the mask muffled people’s speech; no, “they said” that you couldn’t hear people talk.)
Trump’s comments were ridiculous – people can communicate perfectly well wearing a cloth mask – but he was pushing the buttons that he needed to push. He appealed to the defiant attitudes of people who don’t like being told what to do.
Many years ago, one of my children’s friends decided to dye her hair bright, fire-engine red. It looked awful, of course, but the hair showed that she was defying her parents. Her mother promptly took her to the beauty parlor to have the hair dyed any other color than red. The best the stylist could do was deep black. The child was defiant; the parent was defiant right back. I hope that Republican voters are more mature than a 15-year-old.
So, it’s not that the mask itself bothers Trump voters. Of course people can wear masks. Masks are not a big problem. Physicians, nurses, welders, and metalworkers wear masks all day. Many of them are Republicans. None of that mask-wearing causes a problem. A mask only becomes a problem when it becomes a flag issue – when to wear a mask symbolizes that you are submitting to authority. And so, going out in public, breathing, sneezing, and coughing on innocent people becomes a way to defy authority.
We live in a symbolic world. We salute the flag as a symbol of our country. My wedding ring is a symbol of my marriage. My neighbor’s Barefoot Nation flag symbolizes his nonconformist attitudes. Going maskless symbolizes defiance and willfulness.
Speaking as a citizen, not as a communication specialist, I do wish that conservatives could have latched onto a flag issue that didn’t have such deadly consequences. Some of my neighbors wave Trump flags that have curse words on them. That’s irritating, but it doesn’t hurt anything. Going around without a mask spreads disease. And people die.
Research note:
Bowers and Ochs’ important book, The Rhetoric of Agitation and Control, has been continuously revised and is still in print. It’s a good read, and anyone who thinks that Trump is not a radical should read this book. Trump uses almost every method of radical rhetoric that Bowers and Ochs describe. Radical organizer Saul Alinsky discusses similar persuasive methods in his book Rules for Radicals.
Image: Donald Trump, White House photo
