I know they’re going to say it is only jokes. Fuck that. I get y’all want to be edgelords, but this is the most dangerous thing that has happened this century. I would be surprised now if we make it to the end of the year without some people getting assassinated for real, and it will target overwhelmingly the leftest end of the spectrum.
Example, example, example. There are others.
Y’all are on the precipice of finding out firsthand the difference between “OMG I’m so oppressed, the police are racist and I’m struggling to pay my bills, civil war y’all” and “OMG I’m so oppressed, a gang of big violent fuckers with bats and boots and the support of the government just attacked my whole community, seriously hurt me, and burned part of my house down. They told us if they find us here tomorrow, they’ll kill us.”
If you are celebrating this because it’s a step in the right direction as far as your life being in danger from Trump and his followers, you have a lack of grasp of reality that implies pretty strongly a position of privilege and safety. Most people I know who have a lot of unsafety in their lives show a lot of common sense and caution when it comes to threats to their safety; they don’t have this luxury of bravado, or not thinking about consequences.
Yes, Trump is incredibly dangerous. For that reason I would rather fight him with methods that work, and not methods that make things exponentially worse. If that makes me privileged, then call me Privilege McPrivilegeson.
Because non-violence has been so effective at stopping fascism historically?
Read “How Democracies Die” for a pretty good breakdown. The question isn’t really violence versus non violence, but escalating the breakdown of democratic norms versus trying to maintain them.
I don’t care how oppressed you think you are right now; this has the potential to make it much, much, much worse.