How to Win by Losing

 

How to Win by Losing: The U.S. Paradox of Memory and Power

In the United States, the past is not just remembered—it’s curated. Confederate army parades still march under the guise of heritage, while books that illuminate the brutal truths of slavery, systemic racism, and oppression are being pulled from shelves. This contradiction reveals a deeper truth: in America, you can win the narrative by losing the war—if your story serves power.

The Confederacy lost the Civil War, but its symbols persist. Statues stand tall, flags fly, and reenactments unfold with fanfare. These displays are defended as cultural heritage, even though they glorify a regime built on the enslavement of Black people. Meanwhile, books that challenge this sanitized version of history—books by Black authors, books about racism, books that tell the truth—are being banned in schools and libraries.

This is not just historical amnesia. It’s strategic forgetting.

Contrast this with Germany, where Nazi symbols are outlawed and Holocaust education is mandatory. Germany’s stance is clear: never again. The past is confronted, not celebrated. The pain is acknowledged, not erased.

Imagine if Germany allowed Nazi parades while banning books about the Holocaust. The world would recoil. Yet in the U.S., this paradox is reality.

How did we get here?

The answer lies in how power shapes memory. Confederate symbols persist because they serve a narrative that resists accountability. Book bans thrive because truth threatens that narrative. The result is a nation where oppression is commemorated, but resistance is censored.

This is how you win by losing: you lose the war, but you win the story. You lose the moral ground, but you win the cultural space. You lose the battle for justice, but you win the right to define what justice means.

If we are to move forward, we must reject this false victory. We must confront the full weight of our history—not just the parts that comfort us, but the parts that challenge us. Because real victory doesn’t come from forgetting. It comes from remembering—and reckoning.

About the Author

Daryl Horton is a technical and creative writer who is passionate about being creative. He has comprehensive training in business information management, information systems management, and creative and technical writing. Daryl has the knowledge and skills to help organizations optimize their performance and maximize their potential. He spent several years in a Knowledge Management PhD program at Walden University, nearly completing it, but resigned from the program during his dissertation phase to pursue his passion for creativity (http://www.abolitic.com/). Despite his love for creativity, he often finds himself participating in groups where his technical experiences add value.

You can find more information about Daryl Horton on his LinkedIn page at https://www.linkedin.com/in/darylhorton/.

 

Fractured Ballot

Framed through the combined lenses of Thomas Sowell, Noam Chomsky, and Milton Friedman, the 2025 election results reveal a critical misstep rooted not simply in frustration with established elites – as Sowell suggests – but in a profound failure to engage with consequentialist realism. Driven by a potent cocktail of emotional responses and a rejection of pragmatic strategy, voters, according to Chomsky, often prioritized tactical harm-reduction over informed engagement, inadvertently bolstering the very outcome they sought to avoid. Simultaneously, the allure of disruption, as Friedman observed, led many to embrace a boldness that ultimately destabilized established systems, misjudging the unpredictable nature of markets and global forces.  Ultimately, this confluence – an electorate prioritizing feeling over analysis, idealism over strategic coalition-building, and disruptive impulses over cautious assessment – created a fertile ground for the rise of authoritarian tendencies, demonstrating a dangerous disconnect between expressed desires and the long-term consequences of electing a leader lacking institutional understanding and driven by policies that fundamentally undermined democratic safeguards.

When Unity is a Threat

 

In a time when public trust is eroding and unpopular decisions mount, the preservation of power increasingly relies on division rather than unity. By selectively awarding lucrative contracts to favored groups—often funded by gutting federal programs or displacing others—leadership manufactures economic loyalty while deepening resentment. Aligning with influencers ensures that curated narratives drown out dissent, turning public discourse into a performance of consent. And by appeasing one marginalized group through the targeting or deportation of another, the administration exploits fear and prejudice to fracture potential coalitions. These tactics, though cloaked in modern language, echo centuries-old strategies designed to keep the majority fragmented, distracted, and disempowered—ensuring that the true source of their hardship remains obscured.

The Art of Division 

In halls of power, where silence buys time,
A whisper becomes policy, cloaked in design.
They carve the nation not by need, but by scheme,
Feeding one hand while the other bleeds unseen.

Contracts fall like rain on the chosen few,
Funded by the jobs of those they undo.
Programs gutted, safety nets torn,
While the hungry are told to weather the storm.

Voices once loud now echo through screens,
Influencers crowned as the new kings and queens.
Truth is a script, rehearsed and refined,
While dissent is drowned in a well-curated mind.

And when unrest stirs in the belly of the land,
They point to the stranger with a trembling hand.
Deport the dreamer, cage the plea,
To calm the fears of the angry and free.

But this is no new play, no novel deceit—
It’s the same old mask with a modern beat.
Divide the poor, distract the wise,
So no one sees where the true power lies.

Co-written with Microsoft Copilot

The Cost

 

Justice

Justice

That Justice is a blind goddess
Is a thing to which we black are wise.
Her bandage hides two festering sores
That once perhaps were eyes.

—Langston Hughes, from Scottsboro Limited