Well, of course; it's the false equivalance shit all over again. Not to mention misdirection.
Here's something that Tom, Woody, etc. may never understand. The BLM protestors were in the right. The MAGA Morons were in the wrong. Everyone has the right to engage in peaceful protest and when some people protesting are not peaceful, that does NOT invalidate that right. The difference between the BLM protests and the MAGA riots is that the latter were done with the full intention to commit multiple serious crimes, including murder. In that, they succeeded, though they fell short in their goal of overthrowing the government.
The false equivalence argument is stupid and cowardly, but people have been using it to discredit protestors for literally thousands of years. The formula is:
1. Paint the protests as illegal and the protestors as criminals.
2. Either focus on or actively provoke anger and violence (Trump's Proud Boys did this so well, and Fox News fell right in line). Make sure that popular perceptions are of that anger and violence, not of what the protests are about.
3. Make sure that the essential message of the protestors is drowned out in all the faux outrage.
Now, I'd like to think that the rabid, visceral reactions to the BLM protests, and the distorted and unfair way they were depicted in the media, were due to something other than good ol' American white boy racism. The disturbed psyches of all the cracker losers watching black people march down the streets. Because y'know, the last time we let that happen, them uppity darkies got them civil rights that subhumans don't deserve.
I'd like to think that wasn't it. I'd like to think that all the various talking heads on conservative propaganda media, the Proud Boys and their gangs, Bloviating Bob down at the coffee shop, your or my drunk uncle at Thanksgiving dinner, and yes, our resident Trumpers, are genuinely outraged due to something even slightly more legitimate than the hatred they feel at the sight of black people demanding to be treated like human beings. But no. That hatred is where they're coming from; what sustains them; it's who they are.
Maybe that's fixable, but I don't see how. I share your fear, that when the MAGA marchers invaded the Capitol, that was the day our democracy ended. Sure, we'll stumble on for a while. But almost 75 million people cheered the marchers on. They hoped that they would find Nancy Pelosi and kill her. They wanted the election results to be canceled. Is there really any hope for us?