Important observation you provided: No Kings is a scheduled event, not a movement. It represents no immediate threat to the ruling coalition. Real opposition has to impact the wealthy, e.g., a general strike, although a million-person camp out in D.C. might have some impact.
My fear is that this escalates to violence, most likely between local factions. I'm now convinced that Trump is just a distraction; the real threat is Project 2025's destruction of the Federal government, leaving it dysfunctional. It's an indirect way of overthrowing the government while the FBI stands by, and relies on a cowardly Senate to succeed.
With regard to why we haven't revolted yet, I think of the fight or flight response a lot. If you're a maga dude who views this country as your natural birthright, and everyone else as trespassers on your front lawn, it makes sense that your reaction would be to fight (and to expect backup). If you're a woman who's a survivor of domestic violence or rape, it makes sense that your reaction would be flight, or to remove yourself from the threat. You've brought up trauma a lot in your podcasts and writing, and it's made me think about how trauma expresses itself differently, depending on one's level of privilege and personality traits. Pretty clear which of us externalize harm as opposed to internalizing it.
So what do we do about this? How do we organize a collective fight if some have already been fighting their whole lives and want nothing to do with fighting? If others have stopped believing in the American project altogether? If many of us are so disenfranchised we can't leave the house due to our age, disability, health conditions, or the fact that we can't use a driver's license or a public bathroom in our state?
I do believe Americans are still willing to be brave (Minneapolis). I believe they are willing to sacrifice. But we need leaders. We need 100s of leaders. This country is too big and too diverse to rely on a few national figures or labor leaders. We need achieveable, manageable goals, and we need leaders who operate outside the electoral system (they could be elected, sure, but perhaps have nothing to do with city/state/federal governance -- they could, however, be used to apply pressure to our politicians). Without more localized leadership, people feel like they're flying blind.
Your emphasis on mutual aid is brilliant, Jared, because unless you call your mutual aid group The Satanic Marxist Leninist Antifascist Boom Boom Club it's hard to criminalize mutual aid. Each city, or each neighborhood within large cities, could have a food pantry, a garden, a community library, communal spaces for support groups and music and art. We already have a lot of this infrastructure in place, managed by recovery groups, progressive churches, and nonprofits, but perhaps a way to dip the toe into community organizing is to identify the gaps and help remedy that.
personal trauma informing late capitalist democracies. This is not just an American trait. Of course those that are externaling their trauma will also be those running to Maga, Christo-fascist xtian fundamentalist churches or alt-right political parties. The very bodies being funded by the legacy media oligarchy and Silicon Valley tech bros. Unfortunately this means that unless both of the latter present narrative and financial controlling cabals are broken that any successful attempt at any grassroots mutual aid will easily be spotlighted and publicly calumnised and national attempts at effective collective action subsequently easily fractured and broken.
Global and American resistance to these late capitalist violent predatory men and women is now going to have to be one of longterm endurance and assymetrical civilian rebel warfare. This could manifest as being someone who silently just refuses to believe their lies or sign up to their callous social cruelties to writing truth or really being there for your vulnerable neighbours when they are in a crisis or attacked. For now the first truth to see is that in any of the postwar neoliberal hyper capitalist democracies, state governance no longer exists. It has been replaced by a global criminal cabal of carpetbaggers, ignoramuses and shills run from the shadows by an insane incestuous oligarchy. All of them given free rein by the faultlines of a sclerotic entropic mega bureacracy.
Too many of the American people are still cocooned in their bubble of material comfort. They won't rebel until life becomes actually painful, and the wealth class is working overtime to convince them that life would be worse under any other scenario, so they must stay the course.
Meanwhile, as America collapses, China is ascendant. The Chinese people are prospering. Like it or not this will be the Chinese Century.
Until we build the backbone organization that can lead a revolution the only thing that might spark off genuine rebellion is crop failures and food becoming more difficult to buy (more $$ or just not available.)
Thank you Jared. I always appreciate your perspective and knowledge, especially having grown up in a bubble of sorts. The Iraq war, the 2008 recession, BLM, METOO, and then, Trump, have set me on a path of discovery and wakefulness.
"...leaving a vacuum of power that has been filled by independent groups and actions like the No Kings protests and people just going down to the local Tesla dealership with signs."
The Takedown Tesla movement has been effective. It helped knock Tesla off as the #1 manufacturer of EV's and has put a dent in Musk's wallet. These things *have* made a difference!
"Things like No Kings where people went out on a Saturday, blew off a little stream, posted some pictures on their social feeds, and went about their lives.
"In other words, cathartic exercises."
They may be exercises in catharsis but for want of anything better it's all we have now.
The beauty is that Trump keeps feeding our outrage. Since the last No Kings protest two people have been killed by ICE. Now he's attacked Iran in a war no one wants. He's literally the gift that keeps on giving in that sense, so it isn't like our anger has cooled off since. And everything he does just makes these events bigger. I have the feeling the one coming up this Saturday will be bigger than the last one, and that one was pretty big!
I wish you'd stop being so dismissive of these things or trying to minimize them. As someone else here said, America is just too big and diverse a country to have truly organized revolutionary movements. We'd need leaders for that and so far nobody has been willing to step up to the plate. So we're all we've got at the moment. But they keep us energized and let us know we're not alone. And I also believe you're mistaken in your assumption that once these events are over that the energy dissipates; on the contrary, they help to serve to remind us to stay angry and of our solidarity.
You sound defeatist when you talk like that, and I know that's not your intent, especially as you say you believe "we are going to win."
BLM and "follow the science" were two enormous spontaneous movements of solidarity. People spontaneously played music for one another and clapped for the healthcare workers. People prayed together, congregated together, walked together, sang together. This was an existential threat to the elite class. The elites squished BLM with theatrics (Pelosi kneeling), and they squished "follow the science" with "back to normal". "Back to normal" was the new call for "back in line". The exceptional American intellectual was told to assess their own risk. Many chose to do that. But because they are so exceptional, they never asked with what data and with what methodology - like the kid who did not understand anything in class, but did not raise their hand to ask. The people who did raise their hands, got no answers. So they learned they were being lied to, and they resisted the folly. They still do. This is where the grassroots for change is - it is rooted in solidarity. Find the people who did not bend, who did not fall in line during the most recent brain breaking dissonance episode.
You need to know what you want. You need to visualize it. You need to analyze it. You then need to spread the good news.
There are people who have been resisting for 6 years. Join them. The simplest way to do that is to make them see you and bring you in the fold - wear a nice well fitted respirator, esp in highly dense events such as the anticipated feel-good/pat-yourself-on-the-back No Kings.
Important observation you provided: No Kings is a scheduled event, not a movement. It represents no immediate threat to the ruling coalition. Real opposition has to impact the wealthy, e.g., a general strike, although a million-person camp out in D.C. might have some impact.
My fear is that this escalates to violence, most likely between local factions. I'm now convinced that Trump is just a distraction; the real threat is Project 2025's destruction of the Federal government, leaving it dysfunctional. It's an indirect way of overthrowing the government while the FBI stands by, and relies on a cowardly Senate to succeed.
Trump is a disease carrying tick. Project 2025 is a horde of locusts.
With regard to why we haven't revolted yet, I think of the fight or flight response a lot. If you're a maga dude who views this country as your natural birthright, and everyone else as trespassers on your front lawn, it makes sense that your reaction would be to fight (and to expect backup). If you're a woman who's a survivor of domestic violence or rape, it makes sense that your reaction would be flight, or to remove yourself from the threat. You've brought up trauma a lot in your podcasts and writing, and it's made me think about how trauma expresses itself differently, depending on one's level of privilege and personality traits. Pretty clear which of us externalize harm as opposed to internalizing it.
So what do we do about this? How do we organize a collective fight if some have already been fighting their whole lives and want nothing to do with fighting? If others have stopped believing in the American project altogether? If many of us are so disenfranchised we can't leave the house due to our age, disability, health conditions, or the fact that we can't use a driver's license or a public bathroom in our state?
I do believe Americans are still willing to be brave (Minneapolis). I believe they are willing to sacrifice. But we need leaders. We need 100s of leaders. This country is too big and too diverse to rely on a few national figures or labor leaders. We need achieveable, manageable goals, and we need leaders who operate outside the electoral system (they could be elected, sure, but perhaps have nothing to do with city/state/federal governance -- they could, however, be used to apply pressure to our politicians). Without more localized leadership, people feel like they're flying blind.
Your emphasis on mutual aid is brilliant, Jared, because unless you call your mutual aid group The Satanic Marxist Leninist Antifascist Boom Boom Club it's hard to criminalize mutual aid. Each city, or each neighborhood within large cities, could have a food pantry, a garden, a community library, communal spaces for support groups and music and art. We already have a lot of this infrastructure in place, managed by recovery groups, progressive churches, and nonprofits, but perhaps a way to dip the toe into community organizing is to identify the gaps and help remedy that.
Astute analysis of the rôle of individual
personal trauma informing late capitalist democracies. This is not just an American trait. Of course those that are externaling their trauma will also be those running to Maga, Christo-fascist xtian fundamentalist churches or alt-right political parties. The very bodies being funded by the legacy media oligarchy and Silicon Valley tech bros. Unfortunately this means that unless both of the latter present narrative and financial controlling cabals are broken that any successful attempt at any grassroots mutual aid will easily be spotlighted and publicly calumnised and national attempts at effective collective action subsequently easily fractured and broken.
Global and American resistance to these late capitalist violent predatory men and women is now going to have to be one of longterm endurance and assymetrical civilian rebel warfare. This could manifest as being someone who silently just refuses to believe their lies or sign up to their callous social cruelties to writing truth or really being there for your vulnerable neighbours when they are in a crisis or attacked. For now the first truth to see is that in any of the postwar neoliberal hyper capitalist democracies, state governance no longer exists. It has been replaced by a global criminal cabal of carpetbaggers, ignoramuses and shills run from the shadows by an insane incestuous oligarchy. All of them given free rein by the faultlines of a sclerotic entropic mega bureacracy.
Too many of the American people are still cocooned in their bubble of material comfort. They won't rebel until life becomes actually painful, and the wealth class is working overtime to convince them that life would be worse under any other scenario, so they must stay the course.
Meanwhile, as America collapses, China is ascendant. The Chinese people are prospering. Like it or not this will be the Chinese Century.
Until we build the backbone organization that can lead a revolution the only thing that might spark off genuine rebellion is crop failures and food becoming more difficult to buy (more $$ or just not available.)
Thank you Jared. I always appreciate your perspective and knowledge, especially having grown up in a bubble of sorts. The Iraq war, the 2008 recession, BLM, METOO, and then, Trump, have set me on a path of discovery and wakefulness.
“When everything is broken, everything is also up for grabs”. We get to define our future.
If the project 2025 is the destination of this f’d up nightmare, isn’t it a roadmap to what every move is going to be by the drivers?
Is there some way to use it to counteract what is happening?
Just curious 😕
"...leaving a vacuum of power that has been filled by independent groups and actions like the No Kings protests and people just going down to the local Tesla dealership with signs."
The Takedown Tesla movement has been effective. It helped knock Tesla off as the #1 manufacturer of EV's and has put a dent in Musk's wallet. These things *have* made a difference!
"Things like No Kings where people went out on a Saturday, blew off a little stream, posted some pictures on their social feeds, and went about their lives.
"In other words, cathartic exercises."
They may be exercises in catharsis but for want of anything better it's all we have now.
The beauty is that Trump keeps feeding our outrage. Since the last No Kings protest two people have been killed by ICE. Now he's attacked Iran in a war no one wants. He's literally the gift that keeps on giving in that sense, so it isn't like our anger has cooled off since. And everything he does just makes these events bigger. I have the feeling the one coming up this Saturday will be bigger than the last one, and that one was pretty big!
I wish you'd stop being so dismissive of these things or trying to minimize them. As someone else here said, America is just too big and diverse a country to have truly organized revolutionary movements. We'd need leaders for that and so far nobody has been willing to step up to the plate. So we're all we've got at the moment. But they keep us energized and let us know we're not alone. And I also believe you're mistaken in your assumption that once these events are over that the energy dissipates; on the contrary, they help to serve to remind us to stay angry and of our solidarity.
You sound defeatist when you talk like that, and I know that's not your intent, especially as you say you believe "we are going to win."
BLM and "follow the science" were two enormous spontaneous movements of solidarity. People spontaneously played music for one another and clapped for the healthcare workers. People prayed together, congregated together, walked together, sang together. This was an existential threat to the elite class. The elites squished BLM with theatrics (Pelosi kneeling), and they squished "follow the science" with "back to normal". "Back to normal" was the new call for "back in line". The exceptional American intellectual was told to assess their own risk. Many chose to do that. But because they are so exceptional, they never asked with what data and with what methodology - like the kid who did not understand anything in class, but did not raise their hand to ask. The people who did raise their hands, got no answers. So they learned they were being lied to, and they resisted the folly. They still do. This is where the grassroots for change is - it is rooted in solidarity. Find the people who did not bend, who did not fall in line during the most recent brain breaking dissonance episode.
You need to know what you want. You need to visualize it. You need to analyze it. You then need to spread the good news.
There are people who have been resisting for 6 years. Join them. The simplest way to do that is to make them see you and bring you in the fold - wear a nice well fitted respirator, esp in highly dense events such as the anticipated feel-good/pat-yourself-on-the-back No Kings.
I think it's going to take some defining event like mass murder of protesters in broad daylight.