ABSTRACT
There are many causes for the gridlock and hostility that surround national politics. Among them is a crisis in listening and comprehending. During both the 2008 and 2016 elections, individuals from all ideological corners claimed that politicians were not listening to them. This chapter investigates this phenomenon through the auditory metaphors of being deafened and dumbstruck. The noise of politics is deafening, leading both voters and politicians to close their ears, to only pay attention to certain voices, or for only the extremes to be heard and the middle to be ignored (a common symptom of noise exposure). Attendant to this is the striking dumb of many individuals and communities – through various political actions, populations are rendered voiceless and their utterances go unheard and uncomprehended in the halls of power. The excessive noise of politics combined with people and communities being struck dumb results in a miscarriage of democracy, an incompetent, oligarchic state, and the tyranny of the minority.
