Putin/Trump/Musk/GOP Corporate Fascists who attempt to oppress us, silence us, jail us for speaking out - as in other fascist authoritarian shit-holes like Russia or N. Korea- THEY KNOW we MUST work to eat; this gives them more power to oppress us w/ tariffs/inflation/market manipulation/lay-offs.
I have twins getting ready to apply for college. Both have interest in humanities—fields like yours. I have no idea what to tell them or how to help them plan.
I had a professor of Latin American history who always made this point: while people are disappearing life goes on and you still have to cook dinner. It’s extra crazy-making!
Got to the end of that article and said, this sounds like it was written by a straight person ignoring the situation of LGBTQ+ ppl. Yep: sodomy laws on the books; “There are no Malaysian laws that protect the LGBTQ community against discrimination and hate crimes.” https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/LGBTQ_rights_in_Malaysia
The point of the article is that new dictatorships are not like living under Stalin, Hitler or Mao. For about 95 percent of the population, life goes on as normal.
The ability of roughly 90% of the population to have their life go on as "normal" under authoritarianism requires that they accept & and participate in violence & erasure against the roughly 10% who are LGBTQ+. Forced closeting, abuse, 'conversion' therapy', snitching, blackmail, arrest, torture.
I didn’t even click, because I suspected that the moral of the story was gonna be “authoritarian states are boring…if you are still alive to be bored.”
Every single day when I get up and do my routine, there are several extra "FUCK!!"s thrown in at the thought that I have to continue on as if we aren't living in Idiocracy. But I also don't want to be homeless...
Doge can end our ability to buy or sell with a button click. Whether job, ss check or bank. One click. Wear his Maga on forehead and be safe. Sounds biblical. Former Christian who knows antichrist beliefs.
We do not have a central point to focus on while also coming up with a plan.
I created a group on FB, but decided to come here to create another.
My goal is to use our collective financial resources, and shopping habits to send a message.
What do you suggest? @tressiemcphd.bsky.social
After getting laid off from a company I worked at for 15+ years, I’ve been able to transition out of corporate and into growing food for a living. It’s hard work, but I feel I can contribute in a more positive way than I ever did before. That’s how I’m handling the dissonance.
Part of me is like I have to go like normal if I don't no one will see my patients. Another part of me is like if this keeps on most of these patients won't have health coverage and who knows what will happen to them *and* I'll be out of a job.
It’s extremely weird to work in the DC Metro area rn, in a job far enough removed from the feds that it’s going to be a while before it trickles down to hit us, like, refreshing dashboards and reviewing KPIs while the world burns
Sighs in Texas public school teacher. Today we got an email offering us training for a new state curriculum rife with religiosity and it barely registered in my day
I also plan to refuse payments on student loans because when I signed, i had the expectation that the interest rate proceeds would fund department of education initiatives.
Watching from afar, I am in contact with lots of Americans. It is crazy how many of these people have absolutely no idea what has happened over the last 3 months. They all go to work, come home to play, go out to a restaurant, sleep and repeat. When a person mentions the US government, they laugh.
It is very frustrating for me, when I find what is happening before my very eyes, terrifying, but my neighbor doesn’t know that his veteran benefits are in jeopardy.
I'm genuinely afraid to speak out because I'm surrounded by Trump supporters but I know they are hurting and about to be hurting worse and I just want to scream at them that this is their fault.
Had a dr’s appt recently, and one of the screening questions was like “do you feel anxious (a) not at all (b) some days (c) most days”. I wanted to answer “do you mean anxious about a possible WW III, getting abducted by masked gov agents, or losing my retirement savings due to global recession?”
They checked my BP when I was at the dentist last time and it was really high. And what do they expect?
1) it’s freaking 2025 and I was looking at the news
2) it’s the freaking dentist!
I say this everyday. I work in cancer research and never actually thought my particular “industry” (?) would be at risk. My subjects have been calling and asking if they will stop getting their (necessary) treatments
It’s so wild. Part of me is researching protest dates and also possible countries to flee to and the other part is making sure I get my mandatory days in the office because I need to eat still.
When people casually ask me how I'm doing, I respond "well, besides the fascism, I'm okay", as a reminder and reality check for myself and them. I do not plan on becoming well-adjusted to this horror.
it's really bizarre. I tell myself I need to keep doing this because I have a two year old. but I'm not sure how different it would be if I didn't have a young kid.
It’s hard to get in front of 16 year olds who either don’t care at all or care so much they’re suffering and pretend like we are just doing our normal routine. I just want to run screaming down the hall.
like in south korea there have been hundreds of thousands of koreans in the streets and the country's largest union is threatening a general strike until yoon is impeached
I was thinking that too while walking around DC full of tourists and school trips in town to enjoy the museums and the Cherry Blossoms and then seeing all the agencies that have been defunded and had their staff fired. It is so painful.
I can't believe we still have to pay our fucking taxes this year. If only the unelected billionaires get to decide how they're spent, why should we be taxed without representation? I'd rather keep that money and send it to Meals on Wheels or something myself.
Yes!!! I keep saying this on here and it gets no traction. Maybe most people don’t feel safe expressing the idea. But #notaxationwithoutrepresentation is America’s oldest democratic idea.
Right. They will not be incompetent at cashing our checks, if it's the last and only thing they do. Also they are super into massive retribution for inconsequential offenses. If there's one thing fascists don't do, it's let the little guy slide.
It's been tough as a high school social studies teacher. Scaffolding it all -- here's the conventional way of it; the reality/revisionist correction; what's happening now -- to frame it properly, while maintaining a semblance of personal steadiness for kids whose lives are already volatile --
while trying not to overburden them into defeatedness, to include lessons of resistance and overcoming... it's just a lot and I'm having a hard time keeping it together even describing it in these broad terms.
Definitely finding myself here on bsky as cope while I should be prepping...
(in other news I'm using your old blog post on "The Logic of Stupid Poor People" in a 12th grade Socratic Seminar on the persistence of poverty, thank you)
For a long time, I would wonder and rail at the Germans who ignored the rise of Hitler "why didn't they DO something?" and now I'm the person who is trying answer the next customer email, get to my appt on time and BIPOC peeps being snatched Gestapo style from the streets...
Why all the defeatist rhetoric. Have you done a protest? You should. I've done lots of them and I'm always comforted by the support from passers-by. Try it. You'll see that not all people are accepting of the way things are. I'm not. I'm doing my best to support the cause of Good against Evil. Rise!
I’m guilty too. Although I flatter myself to think that some of my work is part of admitting things aren’t normal.
But then I like login to my vpn to approve an institutional form in a bad database and I’m clicking like a well-trained lab rat and it hits me — this is weird right now.
Every second of every day. Putting together another tedious application to a university which is liable to institute a hiring freeze the second I hit send, or possibly not exist in any functional way at all.
I will add: I’m privileged af. My privilege will be like the second to go, though. And I actually do spend *some* time around people organizing on-the-ground. Maybe a bit more than is normal?
I just wanna hug both of y'all. I wish I could promise it would be okay, but it's not looking good. I feel like we get one ray of hope for every ten piles of crap they shovel on us. I don't even know what to do besides what I'm already doing. You are not alone.
Same. Def privileged AF with an income of appx 50% higher than my states median, in a recession-pandemic- apocalypse-proof industry (generic pharmaceuticals). I donate to boots on ground b/c getting arrested=losing my clearance=losing my job=homeless.
Feel exactly the same. I just keep telling myself that my normal day to day with the family, school, and work, is how I stay sane and keep my energy to fight.
I keep telling myself that my day-to-day is still good, my loved ones OK for today. So I’m taking it while the last of the sand falls from the hourglass.
Yeah I think about that all the time. Having meetings with my Canadian colleagues at work is weird too, no one talks about the stuff. Just regular work stuff. The gun hasn't been pointed at us yet but it will be.
I know a lot of people who are working, but I know next to no one who's working like anything is normal. I'm working like a one-person ER, exhausted and hypervigilant all day every day; everyone's working traumatized and desperate.
Agreed and many people still don’t want to discuss it, even those acknowledging our authoritarian regime - mention and move the conversation along, don’t be a Debbie Downer. Feels surreal.
Insurrection is not normal. How he is managing to get away with that, impeachment is the only safe way to remove him, because he has already began to endorse his forever King role and will make it work against all of America
Some of us aren’t working because we don’t have jobs despite doing our damndest to get one. 😅😬
And I can’t even take advantage of all the “free” time by getting more engaged in resistance action because I’m very broke & beyond fried in my functioning. 😩😤
I feel like I'm trying to function. My body is actively just trying to fail on me. This is the 3rd day in a row I've been just dizzy and ill. I'm literally praying I'm better by April 5th so I can at least do something. It's so annoying not having a job and still feeling like you can't help much.
It’s almost like we’re not meant to be individuals functioning solely on our own but need intertwined connections with support & resources & community & care.
I’m a middle-aged, white, straight-presenting woman. I resent not being able to fully use that privilege in service to others.
Depending on what you do for work, a lot of this is trying to minimize negative impacts. Keep feeding people, teaching kids, treating the sick, etc. Even just continuing to care for our own kids elders disabled fam. There is avoidable suffering and unavoidable suffering. We're trying to mitigate
It's somewhat akin to how I feel when someone important to me has died. Kind of an observing myself from outside of myself and marking time thing. "Here I am doing the laundry the day after they died. And here I am paying the bills even though they died on Monday... (1/2)
And here I am doing my job even though they aren't here anymore." But with the extra added bonus of trying to organize and also keep people safe. (2/2)
Listened to this Project 1933 episode of the brilliant @inbedwiththeright.bsky.social podcast today. "[W]hat it did to society, what it felt like to live through it,..." is joltingly relevant to our discussion here.
We FINALLY admitted this weekend that the clinical trials situation is not going to be solved
in the background by the lobbyists and lawyers and stopped the “Everything is normal!” work.
Still in the dark about the future and twiddling my thumbs, but it already feels better than the “play pretend.”
It seems like an important coping mechanism, to keep moving forward somehow and stay connected to the minor league, everyday crazy that imposes meaning and laughter in life.
Honestly one of the only things keeping me going is being able to walk into a classroom and reassure students that they are not losing their minds, it really is this bad. It's still weird, to your point, and I think it would probably be weirder to have a job that wasn't in confrontation to reality.
I hear that. I’ve also felt like even my difficulty in answering snatches people into reality. I’m talking to people WHO KNOW, but they are also in the fever dream.
Then we awkwardly try to find a way forward (in the conversation/the day/our lives).
It's shocking and disorienting. It's the first time it has really hit me that in every societal disaster there have been people who were oblivious and felt just fine the whole time, the whole way through.
I wish I'd see more discussion on the attempt to plan for kid things, against all the rest of this, because it is also breaking my brain, but I hardly ever see or hear other parents talking about it. I can plan a week or two out, but beyond that? 🤷♀️
I keep thinking, I am a smart human. I have read history. I have Timothy Snyder and Octavia Butler in heavy rotation. Why don't I know what the eff to do right now? So I am calling and organizing and teaching and totally not resting / pacing myself.
Every time I answer a call from a client & they make the requisite nicety “how are you?”, I pause & quietly exhale a heavy sigh, & reply with some sort form of half-hearted “good, all things considered”. When what I really want to do is primal scream.
a wee group of political scientists say, "well, that's the thing about authoritarian regimes... everything feels kinda boring and tolerable..." except when it isn't, then it is "maddening and stupid" --which, of course, is still inadequate to describe how work go on as everything falls apart
This. It feels very much like we're playing at life, going through the motions...but I'm starting to crack more and more each day. I don't get how anybody is working like normal through all of this.
I quit my job last year. The arbitrary authority refusing to listen and constantly making everything worse instead of better was torture. I was suicidal. Mom said to bear through it. What a bitch.
I've been working a lot on myself, but now our country is doing the same stupid thing my job did. 😵💫
I’ve been saying this to my department head. Sorry I’m not actively doing professional development, the constitution we teach about is being eviscerated daily…
It is surreal...everyday i feel like i should stop working, stop paying taxes, and stop paying bills and live in protest until the orange menace and his goons are removed...but we gotta all do it together...when do we start and who leads?
Yep, still gotta deal with rent, food, healthcare, taking care of dependents if you got ‘em, and generally attempting to keep the lights on! None of that stuff goes on pause!
Comments
(…not in Gàidhlig, but you’ll forgive…)
I didn’t even click, because I suspected that the moral of the story was gonna be “authoritarian states are boring…if you are still alive to be bored.”
And that story always makes me feel worse. 😔
How do we stop? This makes no sense.
I created a group on FB, but decided to come here to create another.
My goal is to use our collective financial resources, and shopping habits to send a message.
What do you suggest? @tressiemcphd.bsky.social
I'm doing what I can.
I'm living a bare bones lifestyle and withholding labor from the private sector, while working part-time for the City of Los Angeles.
And I’m like “…it is 2025.”
1) it’s freaking 2025 and I was looking at the news
2) it’s the freaking dentist!
(in other news I'm using your old blog post on "The Logic of Stupid Poor People" in a 12th grade Socratic Seminar on the persistence of poverty, thank you)
But then I like login to my vpn to approve an institutional form in a bad database and I’m clicking like a well-trained lab rat and it hits me — this is weird right now.
But then I'll spend time hunting down some specific branded apparel my CEO wants, and it feels so silly and worthless.
like...what future? why bother
And I still feel like I’m in a fever dream. Sigh.
meanwhile I guess I’m going to keep doing my little desk job and paying my little taxes until I break
Roof caving in? Rent is still due
Pandemic? Rent is still due
Various natural disasters? Rent is still due
Attempted coup? Rent is still due
Fascist takeover? Rent is still due
C’est la vie 🙃
When faced with an unprecedented power grab, they relied on compromised institutions to hold the line.
That’s us.
Honestly, I don’t see anything short of a national strike ending business as usual until there is substantial change and resignations.
I have savings to cover a few months of bills, which is better than a lot of people. But by September I'd be another homeless veteran.
And look at this pretty dog, she clearly can't do that.)
And I can’t even take advantage of all the “free” time by getting more engaged in resistance action because I’m very broke & beyond fried in my functioning. 😩😤
It’s almost like we’re not meant to be individuals functioning solely on our own but need intertwined connections with support & resources & community & care.
I’m a middle-aged, white, straight-presenting woman. I resent not being able to fully use that privilege in service to others.
https://youtu.be/PuWVgVkMiHE?si=0C6pxYHVhuQxeNhj
GeneralstrikeUS .com
in the background by the lobbyists and lawyers and stopped the “Everything is normal!” work.
Still in the dark about the future and twiddling my thumbs, but it already feels better than the “play pretend.”
I tell people in a playful/sad way, “Stop asking 2024 questions in 2025!”
But I am so stressed
Then we awkwardly try to find a way forward (in the conversation/the day/our lives).
Hold on. I’ll do the same.
I have been amazed how many people don’t fully get what’s going on
Me: sure! [changes subject]
DAY: I need to put a deposit down for my kids’ summer camp. (🫠)
NIGHT: Up all night trying to figure out how to survive/escape this.
Because it ain’t paranoia when they wrote 900 pages about coming to get you.
I just have no idea how
And now they FAFO'd and are now crying and raging. I'm like, well, it's your fault.
Most of human history, and even perhaps most countries today, the people in power were completely unaccountable to the broad populace.
I've been working a lot on myself, but now our country is doing the same stupid thing my job did. 😵💫
There's a reason "inflation" has kept us all an inch away from losing what little we have.