A WEEKEND WITH THE RIGHT.

Photo by Ryan Stone on Unsplash

American politics has become the core of a vast amount of identities in America. I spent my entire weekend observing how such a polarizing concept (politics) could become the driving force of a person’s identity, personality, and existence. Turning Point USA held its student action summit in Tampa, Florida from July 22–24; which presented renowned guest speakers like former United States President Donald J. Trump, former and iconic neurosurgeon Ben Carson, and current US Senator Ted Cruz. At this summit, I heard about cancel culture, conservative-republican culture, religious culture, western culture, and even MAGA culture. I concluded that the culture of extreme cognitive dissonance was one of the cultures that weren't acknowledged (sarcasm); the one that relates to the actual theme and structure of the summit.

Charlie Kirk, the founder of TPUSA, said that SAS 2022 was a summit for patriots who love their country. He constantly emphasized the importance of freedom and liberty, while simultaneously presenting hypocritical views. For example, he presented a story where he explained the conversations he had with republican politicians about the Chinese Communist Party owning farmland in America. He stated that the Republicans were more worried about having a free market than favoring American citizens. And according to Kirk, after the conversations, all of the Republican politicians responded with an “I’ll have to get back to you on that.” And he ended his story by saying “if you elevate corporate profits over America then get the heck out of the Republican party.

Oh No! It’s almost as if Kirk himself has unknowingly rejected the central structure of capitalism; an unregulated market meant to provide maximum methods of expansion for capital gain…aka FREE MARKET CAPITALISM!

I’m no Republican, but why must Republicans get kicked out of the Republican party for participating in capitalism? Them being capitalistic, amongst other things is what got them elected to office in the first place. When a capitalist sees a financial opportunity, you better bet they will take it at the very chance they get; it’s literally the intrinsic nature of humans who participate in this version of economy.

Kirk’s rhetoric compared to his belief system is contradictory because they never seem to correlate with each other, he spews…