What If Trump Calls for a Civil War?

Let's do a "black sky" exercise.

From somewhere here.

Cassidy Steele Dale forecasts and contextualizes the present to equip us to make a better, kinder future…

… and one of those ways to give you Part Six of why we’re not going to have another Civil War.

So behind the scenes here at Think Future Central I’ve gotten some hard pushback from some readers on my We’re-Not-Going-to-Have-Another-Civil-War series. So I need to make one more point before I leave this topic.

The nature of the pushback has gone like this:

Multiple Readers: Yeah, I hear you on that there’s no states-gonna-fight-states and the rest of it and bladdy-blah-blah but what if Trump TELLS his people to have a civil war. Because they WILL do it.

Me: Yeah, everyone in America knows at least ONE person who says they’ll get out there and kill liberals if he says so. We’ve gotten lucky on that so far. I don’t think he’ll ever make that explicit a call, though. I doubt he’d go that far.

Multiple Readers: But EVERY line everybody thought he’d never cross he’s blown right past and EVERYTHING everybody thought he’d NEVER say he’s gone and said it — with gusto. He’s done what no one in the world thought he’d ever do, he’s done it again and again, and we got the Capitol Riot out of it.

Me: Yeah, that’s true.

Multiple Readers (including several clergy like Bob B. and J.T.): So if you think we should consider alllllllll the big plausible futures and allllll their ramifications, don’t you think we should talk about that one — if only because some of my parishioners in rural Pennsyltucky are saying they’ll go Full Jihad if Trump says to, including against me because I keep saying we should love our neighbor. What if Trump calls for a nationwide Capitol Riot?

Me: OK…

So. I am shamed and chagrined and convinced to give this some consideration.

• Now, if you’re new here — and even if you’re not — this goes against my grain. The entire point of this endeavor is to talk about the futures we could have and how to forecast the future. It’s also about hope and optimism — even though having those is a cardinal sin in this day and age — because right now we’re down in the valley of the shadow of death but the better has already begun and nobody can quite see the light coming yet. This is why I sometimes say I’m a futurist which means I say things it’s too early to believe.

But OK… let’s go dark. Really dark. Let’s do a black sky futures wheel.

(Professional futurists who are reading this now just collectively crapped their pants, covered their ears, dove under the table, and started muttering Oh, noooooooooooooo nononononono.)

Because a black sky futures wheel is how you come up with the Worst. Future. Possible.

A futures wheel is a technique professional futurists use to simply ask What could happen after what happens next? A black sky exercise is when you posit that the absolute worst thing possible happens and nobody can stop its bad ramifications for a while. Put them together into a black sky futures wheel exercise and you get a horror show.

An ordinary, non-doom futures wheel looks like this: You place the starter event or trend at the center, then ask what the immediate ramifications of that might be (in red) then ask what all the follow-on ramifications of those first-order ramifications might be (in green) and you spin it out further and further and further still. I’ve done futures wheels that cover walls. Every futurist has.

Illustration from the Wikipedia page on futures wheels.

So let’s do a simple, small, very short one — but via prose rather than via a diagram.

• Now, a few days ago I did an actual black sky futures wheel on a large sheet of graph paper that I won’t scan-and-post here because my handwriting is only legible to me and the Archangel Gabriel. (He read it, said Woof, and stamped it EIGHTH SEAL.)

• I pie-wedged the wheel to look at first, second, and third-order ramifications in eight domains: education, law enforcement, social-cultural, business, military, and political… but I didn’t get all the way over into media or legal.

What’s our center hub for this futures wheel?

That Trump, for whatever reason — because he’s won the election but later his base starts to turn on him or because he’s lost the election and he can’t overturn it and he’s panicking because he has to report to prison in the morning — blurts out something as a last resort like REAL AMERICANS EVERYWHERE, TAKE YOUR COUNTRY BACK! KILL ALL THE LIBERALS BEFORE IT’S TOO LATE! SAVE ME FROM GOING TO PRISON SO I CAN LEAD AND PROTECT YOU! TODAY IS THE FIRST DAY OF THE SECOND AMERICAN REVOLUTION! GO FIRE THE NEW SHOT HEARD ‘ROUND THE WORLD! (ie. he basically repeats his January 6, 2021 speech but for a nationwide audience and nationwide action.)

And let’s spin this out only 24-48 hours.

What would happen next?

First, the entire country would freeze in its tracks — for about 8 seconds.

Then the entire United States would go batshit crazy.

But not how you think.

There’s 3,200+ counties or county-like units in the United States and every one of them probably has one Trump supporter who would immediately grab his favorite gun, run out to his vehicle, throw it in gear, get to the end of his driveway, and then not know where the hell to go. Where the fuck are the liberals at 10am on a Tuesday? Five seconds later it’s going to hit him: the school. It’s open right now and teachers are woke. The school boards are woke but the school board isn’t meeting today and the country needs to be taken back right now.

By the time he hits his turn signal, every principal and university president in the country would already have figured-his-dumb-ass-out and will hit The Big Red Button to put the school into lockdown — except for those who think I can’t lock up all the gunman’s targets in here: the building will become a death trap and will order the school evacuated immediately. Not like Line up the buses and kids, get your backpacks it would be DROP EVERYTHING AND GO RIGHT NOW and teachers would cram their cars with kids fuller-than-clown-cars and peel out of the parking lot. From the air every school would look like a starburst: cars out everywhere at full speed and kids running out into the woods in every direction because they’ll all know a shooter is coming. And because they’re live-connected-to-each-other-and-the-world-over they’ll know that who’s probably coming is a Trump shooter. Which, liberal or conservative, will make them cry and run faster. Because they all know that Trump fans have guns. And because no one has ever heard of a Biden shooter.

And six minutes later when the school is empty, the principal, the vice principal for discipline, and the janitor who’s-been-there-30-years-and-who-won’t-give-up-the-keys are gonna be standing in the front lobby and the principal is going to order the vice principal to leave for continuity of operations. And the vice principal is going to be saying Continuity of operations?? We. are. an. elementary school. And the principal is going to say Go anyway. And the vice principal is going to sigh, decide to follow orders, and pull The Paddle of Doom from where he’s hidden it above a ceiling tile and say My Vice Principal Granddaddy gave this to my Vice Principal Daddy who gave it to me and now I’m giving it to you. If some fucker gets in here thinking he’s going to hurt babies or teachers you beat him DOWN in the name of Jesus and the Johnson County Public School System. And then the vice principal is going to drive away rage-crying in his wood-paneled minivan past the School Resource Officer who won’t see because he’ll be calling on the radio to say he’s blocked one of the school’s four entrances with his car and if the guy gets past him that he’ll be to the door in thirty seconds and the janitor is going to be unscrewing his mop handle from the base and saying No hurry, man. Run slow.

Every dad-with-a-gun in the county will head to defend the school until he finds out his kid is in the woods or at a teacher’s house and the school is empty and he’ll divert to pick them up at Maple and Elm and they’ll be crying and scratched-up from branches.

Every cop in the country is going to be in every cop car in the country — cussing — and every police captain is going to say over the radio. Keep your eyes open. Follow every hunch. Pull over every crazy-eyed person and we’ll deal with the fallout later.

Then every police chief and sheriff in the country is going to call every radio station to issue a basic reminder to the public that murder and attempted murder remain, you know, extremely illegal and that anyone who attempts to commit murder will be met with deadly force and/or arrest, whichever comes first.

Cell towers will be jammed because half the country will be calling the police because they think their one Trump supporting relative is about to do something awful and because the other half the country will be calling that relative and screaming DON’T DO SOMETHING STUPID BECAUSE YOU LOVE HIM AND HE TOLD YOU TO.

But by then — in maybe only a dozen or two or three or four of those 3,200 counties — a Trump shooter will be walking away from some teachers whose heads he shot in half, split right down the middle, and away from the bodies of some kids who looked gay or woke and the bodies of the Republican kids who were protecting them only to find himself confronted by police who Wait, why are they shooting at me? I’m the good guy who’s saving America from liberals. Why aren’t they on MY side? will be his last thought before he pitches forward onto the ground from holes in him wrought by lawman pistols chambered for 9mm actual civil defense.

In the meantime — and for two hours after — the roads will be jammed because many businesses and workplaces will close and everyone will be driving home or to emergency-pick-up their kids from wherever they fled or are locked down or are dead on the ground with their friends.

But before that every workplace in the country will freeze for those eight seconds and then turn to their die-hard Trump supporter colleagues to sincerely ask Are you going to kill me?

• In some offices some people will just put their face in their hands and wait to hear whether half the shop tries to kill the other.

And some employers won’t even wait for an answer: they’ll fire the Trump supporters, throw them out of the building, and lock the door behind them to protect their employees from them.

• And the Trump supporters ejected out in the parking lots will all suddenly be deeply, profoundly confused (more than they’ll be angry) because up until that very moment they’d only thought of themselves as noble, patriotic heroes and then realized that some people around them thought of them instead as bad, dumb, nitroglycerin-unstable, dangerous people. And most of them will just drive slowly home. But a few will get their guns from their cars and try to go back inside only to find their bad-guy asses defeated by one good door. And by Mark and Brendan from HR who were ready for them with a fire extinguisher and a stick.

Every cop outside every county office, state office, and every federal building will stop any car that even slows down while driving by out front. And they’ll catch nine guys with guns and malevolent intent while doing so.

Every gun store will close-then-open-then-close out of indecision and then close and the employees will set up a perimeter. They’ll say they’re doing it out of fear of an attack by an Antifa-Horde-That-Doesn’t-Actually-Exist but their real terror will be that some aspiring mass shooters might come in to buy some bigger guns and a lot of ammunition from them and they won’t recognize good customers from bad. So better to be on the safe side. Even though some good patriots might be banging on the door wanting to resupply NOW.

The line at Walmart will be terrifying because no one will know whether the guy two people back in line is about to shoot them in the back of the head for not looking sufficiently MAGA enough from behind. And the lines will be long and slow because most of the employees will have fled already to take care of their fleeing kids. And those Walmart customers in line will want nothing more than to go home with their eggs and never go outside again.

No one will want to be in a crowd anywhere at all. Not for a long time. Everyone will stay home. Brunch out will go extinct. Online sales will boom. Again. Every other American retailer will suffer. Employers will tell as many as possible to work from home as much as they can for as long as they can until the country can settle back down. Whenever that can happen. Someday.

Two hours later most streets will be empty. Everyone will be home with their loved ones — watching the news. For danger. In some houses family members will be arguing and trying to take the weapons out of their Trump supporting’s relatives’ hands — and out of their minds.

The boards of some large employers will say Yep, thaaaaaat’s one of the red lines we laid down for ourselves: we’re relocating to a blue state now. We can’t harden our facilities against unending attacks on our workforces by an unending stream of Trump shooters — we have women and non-white employees. Only Klan Industries and Klan churches will be safe in this red state now.

GOP officials in every county will scream at them WE’RE NOT KLAN. And those businesses will scream back WE CAN’T TELL THE DIFFERENCE ANY MORE. WE’RE LEAVING BECAUSE WE LIKE OUR PEOPLE AND WE DO NOT WANT YOU TO KILL THEM. OR OUR KIDS.

Every GOP spokesperson and elected official will get on every media outlet everywhere to attempt to do damage control by saying We oppose and strongly condemn the mass murder of our own constituencies in our home districts by our own supporters in our own home districts despite what our standard-bearer and the Greatest-Heroic-American-Leader-Ever-whom-we-yet-still-stand-fully-behind-out-of-fear has called for today. So please stop shooting or at least dial in your gunsights such that you only accidentally also kill a politically dismiss-able number of innocent Americans and/or family members of your own. Thank you and God Bless America.

Every company and nation in the world will watch to see whether American democracy implodes and American suppliers and markets burn to the ground. Some with watch with terror and some will watch with glee. Just like they did during the Capitol Riot. After all, an American implosion means global doom for some and global opportunity for others.

Every military command is going to debate whether to activate everyone — to keep them on base — and/or to simply inform every service member that Trump has not issued a lawful order and only lawful orders relayed from their commanding officers can be obeyed. They may also say You swore an oath to protect Americans NOT TO KILL THEM. Breaking your oath will earn you your dishonor, the wrath of the Uniformed Code of Military Justice, my disapproving visage, and bad military prison food. For the rest of your life.

Every Democratic Party office in the country will say Welp… it is a day ending in “y.” Somebody go jam the big rubber doorstops under the front door and let’s keep going. This is just more of the Same Threat of Death as Always. But tell Gladys to watch the parking lot. Tell her I’m breaking out the emergency stash of Doublemint gum for her. Tell her to call Gerald to say she’ll be home late because we’ve got some democracy to do. Send Intern Brian up to the lobby with two fire extinguishers and make sure he reads the instructions on how to pull the pins and use those things in case the only thing between us and doom is him and Gladys and a well-placed chemical fog. Somebody give them the heavy staplers to throw.

Every living President and every remaining living statesman in this country will stand athwart history — and Buckley’s and Ronald Reagan’s graves — and say NO.

In Washington, every GOP elected official and the entire GOP industry is going to have two thoughts: Where is my family? and He just electorally killed us forever. And they’re going to throw themselves at every camera (right after they’ve called to tell their families to lock the doors) to say to the cameras — and to conservative media — NO.

• Mitch McConnell — dead or alive by then — will order a few aides to trick a few GOP firebrands into closets by telling them the closets are broadcast booths and once inside they’re going to lock the doors behind them and throw away the keys.

It won’t make much difference regardless. (1) Conservative media doesn’t work for the GOP; the GOP works for conservative media, it seems to be. (2) Half of conservative media won’t need to be convinced because they’ll be picking up their kids from the corner of Maple and Elm and their kids will be crying and saying I thought you said Trump was The Good Guy but why did he send someone to try to kill Mr. Wheatley and Ms. Davis?? And they will call their conservative media radio/YouTube channel/Fox News bosses and say I can’t come to work tomorrow — or ever again — because That Man frightened my children and sent a gunman to their school.

And they’ll think what 80% of the country will think by the end of the day, no matter whether they’re Democrats, Republican, or MAGA:

He didn’t do this to liberals; he did it to me. And to my children.

• The Capitol Riot didn’t galvanize most Republicans against Trump for long because the Capitol isn’t where they live. The Capitol is in Washington, DC and that’s there and something that happens there only hurts people there. It’s abstract. If Trump calls for an uprising across the country that means he called for violence here. In my town. To hurt MY neighbors who I disagree with but still love. And Trump’s call will backfire because parents still love their children. And kids and parents still love their public school teachers. And cops still, despite everything, see themselves as officers of the peace rather than officers of the crazy.

By nightfall that first day everyone will be scared and hunkered down in the dark and holding their loved ones tightly.

By dawn everyone… will… hate… him...

By the night after everyone will look at the GOP — those who enabled and protected every single thing he did — and they will seethe at them.

While the coroners are still picking bodies up off the floor. Sometimes a piece at a time. And gloved-hand-scooping brains into plastic bags a few swipes at a time.

No one will make political hay. No one will have to.

And quite a few, a night or two later, as secretly as they can, way after dark, will throw their red MAGA hats and Trump flags onto their back yard grills and set them alight. So no one blames them tomorrow. Or fires them tomorrow. Or hates them tomorrow. Or shames them tomorrow for everything and all the rest. For all their years of gleeful support of him. For the murders that everyone should have foreseen all along because of course it was coming. Because of course he’d call for it someday. And because some of his biggest fans would do it. And — hats and flags on the grill — they’ll spray more and more fuel on the fire as fast as they can. While crouched down low. Hoping no one sees them.

And hoping no one sees the light in the dark.

But.

This is just a black sky futures wheel after all. Yes, it’s dark. And it’s just a short one that lets us off easy.

What can we learn from this exercise?

First, yeah, this is kinda hyperbolic and probably unrealistic and a lot of other things could happen instead. I actually doubt — for all the reasons I’ve laid out across this series — that hardly any of even the real whackadoodles would get their guns, get in their cars, and go shoot up a bunch of places like schools on Trump’s say-so… or for far-Right reasons… even though the former gave us the Capitol Riot and the latter has happened a bunch of times before already.

But I think a lot of the secondary reactions to a Trump call for nationwide violence would absolutely happen whether any bodies actually hit the ground or not.

So the real result of a Trump call wouldn’t be another civil war; it would be that the GOP would be electorally dead by the end of the week.