All those lists and instructions and editorials on how to resist authoritarianism and stand up for human rights, the rule of law and climate are good, and I both wholly support them and want to veer off from their recommendations here. Yes, everyone with any capacity to do so should join things, call politicians, support the groups and campaigns protecting the above. But it’s important to not limit our sense of what resistance looks like to these versions of doing something. In addition to these formal, structured ways of defending what you believe in, there are ways of doing so woven into everyday life and our conversations and communications.
Each of us needs to stand on principle, loudly, whenever, wherever we can. Used strategically, our voices can do a lot to preserve anti-authoritarian worldviews about facts, science, history, rights, justice and inclusion. In this moment, it matters to just be a person who, wherever the opportunity arises, affirms that the climate crisis is real and climate solutions benefit us all, immigrants are vital to our economy and their rights matter, trans people harm no one by their existence but face terrible harm, diversity strengthens enterprises and communities and our country, women’s rights and equality should be non-negotiable.
Right now, already, in many institutions and communities, there’s pressure to shut up and toe the Trump line. Every person who doesn’t do so makes it easier and safer and more encouraging for others to likewise dissent. That is, the more we stand up, the more others will stand up too; by standing up you’re inviting others to join you, making it safer to be a dissenter, and those not ready to join you will maybe question their facts or fear or allegiance to the Trump agenda. You may find yourself in a position of being the first to dissent, or circumstances in which you join that first or third or 30th dissenter. Or you may speak up for someone who didn’t exactly dissent except by being a category of person under attack.
The more we stand up, the harder it is for this authoritarian agenda to succeed and the more uncomfortable we make it for those going along with the lies and the cruelty. The huge and furious backlash against the National Cathedral’s bishop Mariann Budde for just saying some pretty normal Christian things about God’s mercy toward the most vulnerable is evidence that the Trump team and its followers expect to be flattered and groveled before and are not very good at coping with even an admonition to be kind.
Something that should be said more often is that the reason authoritarians are authoritarians is that they’re unpopular. They have to use the threat of force along with intimidation and suppression tactics to get their way. They endeavor to scare people into obeying, whether or not they agree, and not being scared and not obeying helps demonstrate how finite their power is and how much of ours remains even in the bleakest circumstances.
Call lies lies, call cruelty cruelty, call fascism fascism, call violations of the constitution and human rights by their true names. Be loud (when you can; I’m not saying get into bar fights or cornered by gangs of Nazis, and you’re a better judge of how to negotiate your family get-togethers than I am). Get on top of the facts you need to make your case. But beware of arguments. There’s nothing to debate about whether or not women are people or fossil fuels cause many kinds of harm, and we’re in an era when the most aggressive debaters are most liable to use bullying, ad hominem arguments, insults, untruths and misinformation, bait-and-switch tactics, and the rest of the arsenal of bad-faith discourse. Standing your ideological ground doesn’t mean wrestling verbally with strangers and slimebags.
We’ve seen people rich and powerful enough to stand on principle cave and kiss the ring, seen huge corporations who likewise have the resources to have some integrity knuckle under, seen universities choose to veer right to please the incoming president, seen news organizations soften up outrageous violations and cruelty with bland and evasive language.
They’re cowards. They’ve chosen craven advantage over courageous principle. But they alone cannot legitimize and normalize this regime. What will normalize it is if we all go along with it. Not going along with it, not pretending this is normal, not pretending human rights violations are anything but, not forgetting that the regime is attempting to make epic and unprecedented changes that dismantle our democracy: that’s up to us. Not only with how we organize and act, but how we talk and how boldly we talk.
I learned something new about animal behavior last week, and it seems really timely. A reindeer cyclone is when a herd of reindeer facing a predator put the calves in the center and whirl around fast, making it difficult to impossible for the predator to pick off one reindeer. The more of us who speak up the harder it will be to persecute any single person who says trans rights are human rights or what’s being done to immigrants is terrorism. It’s not the only example from the animals. When threatened, musk oxen likewise circle up, facing outward with their huge horns, calves again in the middle of the ring.
Some say that murmurations – those beautiful flights of thousands of starlings undulating and pulsating as they whirl through the sky together – create flocks that are hard for predators to attack. There’s safety in numbers, which is why a lot of prey animals move in herds and flocks and schools. For those who dissent from what this new administration intends to do, we may sometimes be able to surround an Ice van or march by the thousands, but every time we dissent we make room for others to dissent. Courage, like fear, is contagious. For a lot of us, right now, we get to choose, and what we choose has an impact on what others choose.
What’s giving me hope now
After Trump took office the first time, I feared that people would be frightened or acquiescent, but the day after the inauguration, there were women’s marches –including plenty of men – hundreds, of them, all over the country. And the next week they tried out the Muslim ban and people all over the country rushed to the airport to support those who might be affected and protest, boldly and effectively. When the Trump administration tried on Monday to seize Congress’s power of the purse, I was heartened to see people speaking up, calling their representatives, elected officials speaking up, and non-profits filing a court case that got a stay. They will be resisted and we will not be silent.
