I urge you to join me in reading, adding your name to, and joining in these protests July 15th across the country.
On July 15, 2017:
To all who agonize and rage at what’s being done to the people, protest and demand:
THE TRUMP/PENCE REGIME MUST GO!
In the Name of Humanity, We REFUSE to Accept a Fascist America!
IMMIGRANTS ARE FULL HUMAN BEINGS, not “illegals” or criminals, to be demonized, terrorized, hunted down, locked up, and thrown out. NO! We will not accept the cruel and brutal future of the Trump/Pence Regime … they must GO!
MUSLIMS AND REFUGEES ARE FULL HUMAN BEINGS, not people to be shunned, banned, and cast out to be swallowed up by oceans and wars. NO! We will not accept the cruel and brutal future of the Trump/Pence Regime . . . they must GO!
WOMEN AND LGBTQ PEOPLE ARE FULL HUMAN BEINGS, not objects to be grabbed, demeaned, victimized, and denied their fundamental right to control their reproduction, and how they choose to live. NO! We will not accept the cruel and brutal future of the Trump/Pence Regime . . . they must GO!
BLACK AND LATINO PEOPLE ARE FULL HUMAN BEINGS, not people to be denied the right even to live, gunned down by the police with impunity, incarcerated in genocidal numbers, and denied basic rights. NO! We will not accept the cruel and brutal future of the Trump/Pence Regime . . . they must GO!
THE PEOPLE OF EVERY COUNTRY ARE FULL HUMAN BEINGS, and not collateral damage to be subjected to massive bombing, invasions, occupations, the danger of nuclear war, and a program of “America First” that would bludgeon them into submission. NO! We will not accept the cruel and brutal future of the Trump/Pence Regime . . . they must GO!
THE CHILDREN, ELDERLY AND POOR of this country, as in every country, should have food for sustenance, health care to live, homes to live in, and not be denied with cruel calculation for the benefit of the few. NO! We will not accept the cruel and brutal future of the Trump/Pence Regime . . . they must GO!
THE EARTH AND THE SPECIES WHO INHABIT IT – including humanity – should sustain life and not be despoiled by ignorance, greed, and the disregard of science. NO! We will not accept the cruel and brutal future of the Trump/Pence Regime . . . they must GO!
IN THE NAME OF HUMANITY: THE TRUMP AND PENCE REGIME MUST GO! Only the people acting together in the streets and public square can force this demand before the world. Should we fail to do so, the future and values we aspire to could be brutally cut short by the actions of the Trump/Pence Regime.
The Trump/Pence government has been step by step criminalizing dissent and bludgeoning the truth with worse to come. Stripping away basic rights and the rule of law is at the core of fascism. Group after group is demonized and targeted along a trajectory leading to real horrors. We must not let this be normalized. History has shown that fascism must be stopped before it becomes too late.
The demand: “The Trump/Pence Regime Must Go,” can unify people and our resistance. There are different programs of struggle against the multiple attacks of the Trump/Pence regime, people have diverse views for how to achieve a better future, and all of this should be aired, shared, and debated. But, if we don’t stop the consolidation of fascism by organizing together to demand that the Trump/Pence regime must go, people’s lives here and around the world, and the earth itself will face greater catastrophe.
Now is the time to act. The scandal and turmoil the regime faces is an opening through which the mass action of the people could burst through and make our demand resound throughout the country, in the halls of power, and around the world.
On July 15th “The Trump/Pence Regime Must Go,” must be spoken, shouted, and acted on with fiercely creative determination. We have righteously marched for women, for science, for the climate, for immigrants, for Black Lives, for LGBTQ Pride. Now the resistance must pull together to drive this regime from power.
July 15th must be a day when every person, every group – religious, community, service, political organization – all who feel the tremendous threat to humanity posed by the Trump/Pence regime – stand together showing the world that people here are determined that this regime must go … not in two years or four, but now.
July 15th must mark a leap to more sustained struggle, inspiring people to see the possibility of ousting this regime through unleashing the tremendous power of the people – aiming for the time when millions can be moved to fill the streets of cities and towns day after day and night after night, declaring this whole regime illegitimate – Demanding, and Not Stopping, Until The Trump/Pence Regime Is Driven from Power.
On July 15, with conviction and courage, overcoming fear and uncertainty, we will act together to resist and say NO!… Not for ourselves alone, but in the name of humanity.
Sign this statement, find a protest in your area, or add your own here: refusefascism.org/2017/06/09/july-15-2017-in-cities-across-the-country-demonstrate/
(from Sunsara Taylor)
While I certainly agree with the sentiment, there is no path to achieving it until November of 2018. Public demonstrations are good in motivating people and pushing the boundaries of discourse, but we need to put our energy into organizing, putting up good candidates, and getting out the vote. We’re stuck with this disastrous situation for at least the next 18 months, we need to act within that reality.
#1: Yep.
I am disturbed by my real-life friends who get really outraged, go to lots of protests, and seem to think that’s all that needs doing. They’ve lost touch with cause and effect.
There is lot to do before 2018, mainly helping our local Dem orgs get out the vote in the biggest way possible. Starting October 2018 is too late.
If you wish to study a granfalloon
Just burst the skin of a toy balloon
Goddammit. CRIMINALS ARE HUMAN BEINGS. They should not be “be demonized, terrorized, hunted down, locked up, and thrown out.” This is most basic progressive ideology.
I realize that the writer(s) of this call to action or whatever it is probably didn’t intend to say that criminals aren’t people, but that’s how it reads, and how it reads is all that matters. That’s a pretty big fuck up. Did no one proofread this?
Uh, vuco, you really have to strain to see that as an implication of the sentence. It’s objecting to Cheeto Benito’s rhetoric.
I’m a little disturbed by the use of “Regime” here.
That’s how Rush Limbaugh referred to the Obama administration, in a childish attempt to discredit it.
The Trump administration is not a fascist regime, not even by a longshot—it’s just a stupidly conservative-authoritarian, thoroughly corrupt and unethical, and historically incompetent administration.
Calling it fascism is still hyperbole at this point. One should instead, I think, focus on legitimate criticisms of nepotism; emoluments and other ethics violations; brazen corruption and criminality; Trump’s personal indecency, immorality, poor temperament and judgement, and repeated willingness to squander the country’s international standing and prestige; and of course his administration’s fœtid “policies” (for lack of a better term).
A maladministration then?
@ cervantes
Maybe so. I know it’s using Trump’s own rhetoric, but I’ve seen far too many people express the sentiment that a criminal isn’t really a person, and therefore we shouldn’t concern ourselves with what happens to them.
I still think the wording is problematic, but if I’m the only one, then I guess I’m wrong.
I think vucodlak is right, but to be fair, the language is pretty ambiguous throughout. That doesn’t really help, of course; but when the whole thing is kind of a mess, it’s a bit easier to take any particular item less seriously. Here’s the statement:
Saying they’re not “illegals” would suffice to make the point, without seeming to imply anything about criminals. For one thing, criminals very generally are “to be locked up” in our justice system — maybe not the others, but “thrown out” seems to clearly be about deportation, for the specific “crime” of immigrating here improperly. Anyway, one idea is that they shouldn’t be called “illegals” and should instead be described and understood as full human beings, like they actually are.
Combined with that, there is an apparently different objection that they also shouldn’t be treated like criminals (who I would say should be treated fairly/justly and like full human beings). Thus, they should not be “thrown out,” because it should not be a crime. But it’s hard to know whether they think criminals should be demonized, terrorized and hunted down. Demonizing and terrorizing are pretty vague (or even metaphorical), which sets a pretty low bar…. And cops pursuing and catching criminals may be described as “hunting down” those people.
Altogether, that could easily be read as saying all of that is okay in the case of criminals, but don’t treat immigrants like criminals. What more specifically does it mean to treat someone like a criminal? All of the nasty things listed there are how (at least some would say) we treat criminals. That’s certainly different from merely proposing not to call them “criminals.” Not calling those people “illegals” is about the harmful rhetoric that gets tossed casually, one effect of which is to dehumanize them or paint them as subhuman. The quotes apparently mark it as a word that’s only being mentioned in the statement, having to do with its rhetorical function in standard Republican bullshittery; whereas there are no quotes around the word “criminals,” which is actually being used in the sentence like any other word. When that’s the case and you’re not just mentioning it in quotes, then I would normally take all of the logical implications about it seriously (especially when it immediately follows a quoted word which is doing exactly that). That definitely looks problematic to me.
Let’s look at the some of the other formulations.
In this one, unlike most of the others, they didn’t use the word “people.” It would be extremely uncharitable to read it as implying any inanimate objects could be demeaned, victimized, or denied such rights. And it would be a wild stretch to think that the objects which are to be treated that way (if any are being claimed, which in basically every item is being left rather mysteriously as an open question) are precisely some of the (animate) objects known as “people” or “human beings.” It would simply not make any sense to read it that way. So this one really takes an absurd amount of nit-picking, and I’d say it’s about as clear as it could be.
In that one, they’re almost certainly not implying that there are any “people to be denied the right even to live” or any of the rest, but that all people (all of whom are of course full human beings) are not to be treated that way, including specifically the groups cited because of the major concerns the Trump/Pence administration has raised. Unlike the statement about criminals above, which does sound very problematic, nothing else about this statement seems to suggest there are any peoplewho ought to be treated that way. (It does however use “people” and not some other vague thing like “objects” or “collateral damage” or “illegals.”)
The implication here is (presumably) not that if a person is counted as collateral damage, it’s therefore okay for them to be subjected to any of that. The only apparent exception would be people who have no country, for any number of reasons, but I’ll go out on a limb and assume they are supposed to count as “full human beings” as well, since it sounds like it’s supposed to be a completely inclusive statement.
Here, they may not mean to imply that people who are not in those groups should not have any of that, or that such people may be denied it with cruel calculations. However, it could be a deliberately weak tea type of progressiveness, because many (in the notional “center,” as well as obviously the right wing) would object to the idea that all people should be provided with food, health care and a home. (Why do they stop with just those three items? No idea.) Once some realize that it will cost them in taxes, they suddenly realize that they don’t actually support it.
Protest between elections is not ineffectual. It puts pressure on decision makers as they make those decisions.
Critiquing the wording of a call to action after it is released is just undermining it. You want something better then put forward a supporting call and get more people to join.
So what can non Americans do to help?
Signed and donated. Indivisible Lagrange NY-19 will try to be there.
Hey, if you just wanna punch someone, who would you rather punch, someone who’s gonna respond with “HEY! What did I do?! I didn’t deserve…shit…DID I do something to deserve that…I’d better think on this…” or someone who’s gonna punch back as hard as they can and invite six of their friends to join in?
Glad to hear it, Raucous Indignation. I hope more people will do the same. We are living in dangerous times — yet there are so many of us who detest, fear, and are outraged by what is being done. If we dare to stand up with courage and defiance, there is absolutely no reason we cannot do what hte people of South Korea recently did and drive a regime from power.
To JohnQuixote, who writes, “Calling it fascism is still hyperbole at this point. One should instead, I think, focus on legitimate criticisms of nepotism; emoluments and other ethics violations; brazen corruption and criminality; Trump’s personal indecency, immorality, poor temperament and judgement, and repeated willingness to squander the country’s international standing and prestige; and of course his administration’s fœtid “policies” (for lack of a better term).” I strongly disagree.
Hitler was a fascist not just in the 1937/38 when he started the large scale death camps… he was a fascist not just in 1934 when Jews were being fired from all the universities and communists were being tortured… he was a fascist all the way back before he even held state power.
Trump and his whole Regime are fascists already. Popularizing assault on the media (and “enemies” generally), leading chants calling to lock up your political opponent, banning people based on religion, demonizing whole peoples based on their countries of origin, appointing a proven white supremacist KKK-sympathizer to head the “Justice” Department, saying women should be punished for abortion and murdering thousands of women by implementing the most repressive Global Gag Order ever, unleashing a witch-hunt against scientists, asking three times during a briefing “If we have nuclear weapons, why can’t we use them?”… and so much more that can be listed.
The point is — exactly as the statement above emphasizes — there are millions of real human beings whose lives and rights are being targeted. Its not about nepotism or emoluments. Those are problems, sure, but not on the scale of forcing half the population to bear children against their will or be grabbed against their will. Its not on the scale of the wave of nooses — as well as actual murder/lynching of Richard Collins — that has been unleashed. Its not on the scale of the millions of mothers and fathers, children and others who are living in absolute TERROR because ICE has expanded and is even more brutal and going after a far, far, far wider section of undocumented people. Or dropping the Mother of All Bombs and threatening nuclear weapons.
These things are fascist. And we need to do what the German people SHOULD have done. Rise up and drive them from power before it is too late. 2018 is waiting too long. And, by the time you get there, what is “normal” and “mainstream” has moved so far to the right its just part of normalizing and stamping with the false sense of “popular mandate” a program that no one should ever accept.
Basic truth: No fundamental and positive change has ever come without people rising up, protesting and waging political resistance. Why would now be any different?
Never underestimate the power of the people rising up with right on their side. Lets do this not just for ourselves, but in the name of humanity.
Azkyroth @12 sorry but I don’t understand how your reply relates to what you quoted. Could you explain please?
I’d like to echo the question:
So what can we do to help from outside the US?
I notice they left out DISABLED.
Guess we’re just not important enough to be considered. After all, it’s not like able-bodied people never become disabled…
Protests are dandy and I fully support them. Yet those who give a damn about these issues don’t show up for special elections which is now 0/4 for our team.
This is a desperate plea to all who care about these issues. For the love of un-god, please, please, please, please show up at the ballot boxes in 2018. Once Ruth Ginsburg dies or steps down, a rightwing majority in the SCOTUS will develop if Congress continues to be dominated by Republicans. If that happens, protests such as this won’t mean jaquez-shite.
I do stand corrected that in Georgia there was a significant voter turn out but not enough to give Ossoff the victory. And the other districts are pretty hard core GOP. Maybe we are totally screwed.😢
WMDkitty — we actually added disabled to this statement based on very constructive input from disability activists who are part of this effort. I sent the statement to PZ before the change was made, but its been updated on the central http://www.refusefascism.org website for a while now. Also, here is a very powerful video promoting these protests that highlights Trump’s mockery and cruelty to the disabled in particular: https://youtu.be/UI2hq6Q1BHM?list=PLq8YMfbcdWPHuk56GG8hitqVqwN2VhyMW
then you better get a move on and help these guys.
It’s really your ONLY chance to have a legitimate vote.
really.
REALLLLY.
did I mention this is your only chance?
not kidding.
ready?
https://democraticredistricting.com/
…you will be able to do NOTHING, your vote WILL NOT MATTER, unless the gerrymandering the GoP has done over the last 25 years gets reversed.
not kidding.
do not be at all surprised if the GoP GAINS seats in 2018 unless this happens, and you literally only have months left to accomplish it.
good luck.