The AP Discovers the ‘Code’ Behind ‘Let’s Go Brandon’ Cheer
The AP Discovers the 'Code' Behind 'Let's Go Brandon' Cheer
In a magnificent piece of investigative reporting, the Associated Press has discovered that the viral phrase “Let’s Go Brandon” is actually “code” for a far more vulgar insult of our beloved president Joe Biden.
The AP “wire service” — a misnomer in a wireless age — took great pains to explain where “Let’s Go Brandon” originated and the shocking truth about the people shouting it: They don’t like Joe Biden very much.
But how did Republicans settle on the Brandon phrase as a G-rated substitute for its more vulgar three-word cousin?
It started at an Oct. 2 NASCAR race at the Talladega Superspeedway in Alabama. Brandon Brown, a 28-year-old driver, had won his first Xfinity Series and was being interviewed by an NBC Sports reporter. The crowd behind him was chanting something at first difficult to make out. The reporter suggested they were chanting “Let’s go, Brandon” to cheer the driver. But it became increasingly clear they were saying: “F—- Joe Biden.”
Well, it was no mystery what the crowd was chanting — especially to the poor NBC reporter who didn’t quite know how to cover up the obscene chant.
This sort of thing just isn’t done, is it? I mean, using a vulgar expletive in any connection with a beloved president like Joe Biden is beyond redemption. It’s unprecedented. It’s dangerous.
Except when the same exact insult is applied to Donald Trump.
On Sunday, June 14, the Echo Park-based creative production studio and art gallery iam8bit launched fu**trump.art, a hybrid virtual exhibition and protest where all of the works read “F**k Trump” and are available to download for free as web and print resolution files so that anyone can share the message online or IRL.
The date of the launch was significant—it was Donald Trump’s birthday and Flag Day, as well as a day often used to celebrate LGBTQ+ Pride—and the message was strong. Jon M. Gibson and Amanda White, co-founders of iam8bit, describe it as a “primal scream.”
There are “F” Trump stickers, “F” Trump coffee mugs — a veritable Dollar Store of “F” Trump merchandise.
But while the AP report mentions a past history of insults to presidents, it somehow gets fact and fiction mixed together.
A portion of the U.S. was already angry before the Brandon moment, believing the 2020 presidential election was rigged despite a mountain of evidence to the contrary, which has stood the test of recounts and court cases. But now it’s more than that to die-hard Trump supporters, said Stanley Renshon, a political scientist and psychoanalyst at the City University of New York.
He cited the Afghanistan withdrawal, the southern border situation and rancorous school board debates as situations in which Biden critics feel that “how American institutions are telling the American public what they clearly see and understand to be true, is in fact not true.”
There’s absolutely nothing shocking about using the phrase “F” Joe Biden. Liberals have been “speaking truth to power” for so long, shocking us with their vulgarities and obscenities about America and its government, that the “F” word has lost its power to startle us.
It’s like how the word “racist” is so overused that it’s lost its power to injure or even destroy. Now, being called a “racist” in many quarters is a badge of honor. Perhaps it shouldn’t be. But who’s fault is that?
There’s an old comedy record album by the late, brilliant comedian George Carlin, “7 Words You Can’t Say on TV.” Today, that number might be four — and even those words are allowed on over-the-air TV or “family” cable channels if the broadcaster posts a disclaimer warning viewers of “strong language.”
When barriers to protect decency and good taste are knocked down for no other reason than that they exist, a small slice of what makes our civilization good and decent falls by the wayside. There are always consequences for this kind of mindless destruction. And we’re paying that price today in the ugly vulgarity of our politics.
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