January 19, 2025
Tomorrow, January 20, 2025, the observance of the holiday honoring Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. will coincide with the second inauguration of Donald Trump. The cognitive dissonance of celebrating a man who pushed this country to recognize the civil rights of Black people on the same day as a white supremacist administration is installed to control the Executive Branch is head spinning, to say the least.
Every person that Trump has nominated for a cabinet post is profoundly unfit for their proposed position. The defining characteristic that unites them all is sociopathic cruelty and a history of abusing women or animals (or in the case of RFK, Jr., both).
None of them are distinguished in any field of endeavor, unless you include Elon Musk’s talent for making obscene amounts of money by acquiring companies from innovative founders. The incoming administration plans to produce the modern equivalent of throwing Christian’s to the lions, terrorizing non-white immigrants and trans kids to distract people from their main goal—looting the Treasury to enrich the already wealthy.
The elevation of rapists and abusers to power is meant to signal to American women, whose increasing economic independence is seen as a threat, that any attempt by us to be more than incubators or sentient sex toys for men will be met with violence. The threat of violence lies in the background of all of Trump’s policies, which can be summed up as “money for my friends, punishment for my enemies.”
Although the majority of American people didn’t ask for this, Trump’s popular vote victory will add a veneer of legitimacy to these heinous policies. This is part of the reason that mainstream media companies, tech giants and corporations have been so quick to bend the knee. That and the tax cuts, of course.
The eager acceptance and normalization of people who are cruel, stupid, and corrupt is dispiriting. Many of us will be tempted to simply turn away and focus on our little lives. Some of us with the means to do so will run away— leaving the country in order to preserve our safety and sanity. Still others of us will accommodate this new reality, in large ways and small, whether by platforming pseudo intellectual racist, Curtis Yarvin, like The New York Times, or performing at a Trump inaugural ball, like Snoop and Nelly.
It will be more important than ever, and harder than ever, to hold on to truth and one’s moral compass. We are heading into uncharted waters, so all I can offer are these thoughts about how to keep one’s soul intact, and fight back against what is coming in the next four years:
- Resist the urge to make yourself feel safer by demonizing someone different than you. That means don’t scapegoat immigrants if you are a native born citizen. Don’t demonize trans kids if you are straight.
- Be skeptical of any political analysis that omits or elides racism. Racism is this country’s original sin and the reason behind every public policy that doesn’t make sense. Remember that most white people in this country will happily suffer, if it means Black people will suffer more, (“Black Reconstruction in America,” by W.E.B. DuBois; “The Sum of Us,” by Heather McGhee).
- Get a DVD player and a Bluetooth enabled turntable and buy physical media. Buy classic films and documentaries. Buy physical copies of banned books. Buy artists you love on vinyl. We have no assurance that these tech bros won’t erase “subversive” media from their platforms and we must preserve knowledge and culture at all costs.
- Buy local. Buy from Black, LGBT and women owned businesses where you can. While Costco and Target have done the right thing, most retail giants have not. Some things cost more than money.
- Lead with love. Shaming and scolding those who share our belief in a multiracial democracy is not the path back to power. Meet with people in real life. Mobilize mutual aid and community education to ensure that more of us survive, and even thrive, despite what’s coming.
This will be my last blog post on Facebook. Most of you know that I host a blog on WordPress and this post, along with my archive of the last seven years, will be available there (link in the first comment under this post). I don’t know how much I will write in the future, because I plan to take my own advice and be out in my community in New York and New Jersey, helping my folks as much as I can. See you there!