If there’s a part of you that still holds out hope that, for all his autocratic tendencies, Donald Trump will revert to a sort of political normality as president, you need to read Masha Gessen’s chilling but essential article “Autocracy: Rules for Survival” in The New York Review of Books.
Gessen, a journalist who has devoted much of her career to making sense of Russia under Vladimir Putin, offers a number of hard-won lessons for surviving in the autocracy that we may soon find ourselves living in here in the US.
The first and in some ways most important lesson for those still holding out hope for a more-or-less normal presidency:
Believe the autocrat. He means what he says. Whenever you find yourself thinking, or hear others claiming, that he is exaggerating, that is our innate tendency to reach for a rationalization. This will happen often: humans seem to have evolved to practice denial when confronted publicly with the unacceptable. Back in the 1930s, The New York Times assured its readers that Hitler’s anti-Semitism was all posture.
I think we’re going to have to suspend Godwin’s Law for the length of Trump’s presidency; the comparisons are simply too apt.
He has received the support he needed to win, and the adulation he craves, precisely because of his outrageous threats. Trump rally crowds have chanted “Lock her up!” They, and he, meant every word. … Trump has made his plans clear, and he has made a compact with his voters to carry them out. These plans include not only dismantling legislation such as Obamacare but also doing away with judicial restraint—and, yes, punishing opponents.
Gessen’s other rules:
Rule #2: Do not be taken in by small signs of normality. Consider the financial markets this week, which, having tanked overnight, rebounded following the Clinton and Obama speeches. Confronted with political volatility, the markets become suckers for calming rhetoric from authority figures. So do people. …
Rule #3: Institutions will not save you. It took Putin a year to take over the Russian media and four years to dismantle its electoral system; the judiciary collapsed unnoticed. …
Rule #4: Be outraged. … [I]n the face of the impulse to normalize, it is essential to maintain one’s capacity for shock. …
Rule #5: Don’t make compromises.
The final rule offers up a little bit of hope:
Rule #6: Remember the future. Nothing lasts forever. Donald Trump certainly will not, and Trumpism, to the extent that it is centered on Trump’s persona, will not either.
Gessen ends her piece with a call for “resistance—stubborn, uncompromising, outraged.” Thousands of Americans are already taking to the streets in cities across the country to let the world know that Trump — who after all lost the popular vote — is not their president. He’s not mine either. We need to join those in the streets — literally, figuratively, or both — to make clear we don’t want, and won’t stand for, Putinism in the United States.
I mean, if people want to speak to white nationalists in soothing tones, be my guest. Just don’t tone troll in here and expect others to do it.
@sunnysombrera
Ugh. If you live in the United States, and you’re hearing people say, “We have to listen to bigots, and empathize with them, and establish a rapport, in order to influence them and thereby change their behavior,” this should sound very familiar. If you give a shit about making the country a less bigoted place, it should sound very suspicious.
@losername
Inasmuch as we hold the line against bigotry, I don’t care what words we use. Inasmuch as Donald Trump won the Presidency by deliberately ignoring truth and accuracy, I don’t think words and their meanings matter very much to his voters.
I’m positive Trump will crash and burn.
He doesn’t want to be trapped in the White House (or Mar-a-Lago) for the next 4 years, surrounded by Secret Service agents monitoring his every move – he’s used to filling his days with ‘monkey business’.
He’s not a serious person, an autocrat has to have lazer-focus and an end game that he’s working toward. However, the Republicans do have lazer-focus.
Trump will do something that will give the Republicans an excuse to impeach him so that they can work with Pence. It would be a win/win for them – they would be seen as the ‘principled’ party for impeaching him, and they would get Pence.
@ramen I give so much shit. Do you think hostage negotiation style tactics will make it worse? Please tell me. I want to do something that will actually work. What do we do about the bigotry? Fight them, change them, what are we supposed to be doing? They’re winning!
Honestly, I think being willing to compromise may have just made bigots bolder. They are not looking for common ground, they are looking for control.
I’ve politely explained my viewpoints to Trump fans until I’m exhausted and when they run out of arguments they whine “Well, I just don’t like Hillary”. They aren’t interested in facts and they don’t argue in good faith. I will show my disapproval of them publicly, not hide it, and not waste my time treating them as though their bigotry is a valid viewpoint that deserves consideration.
Where I think hope lies is in motivating those who did not vote and working on behalf of those whose votes were suppressed. That’s a lot of people, and it may be a better use of our time and energy to get them voting.
Because of this election,I am also working on figuring out in what ways to become more activist and spend my time and energy where it could do the most good.
My state just passed ranked choice/instant runoff voting, in which you can vote for candidates in order of preference. So a voter could choose a third-party candidate first, the Democratic candidate second if they wanted. I’m anxious to see how this pans out and if it improves the system.
@losername
Don’t worry about Trump or his supporters. Worry about all the people Trump and his supporters are going to hurt.
I voted for Clinton and was thrilled to do it. But now is not the time to listen to her, or to Obama. Listen to Harry Reid: this divisiveness isn’t on us, and it’s not on us to fix it. If Trump and his people give any shits at all about fixing it, then they’ve got a lot of work to do.
(Take note of the fact that they’re not doing any of that work.)
@losername – I think I understand what you’re getting at.
I, too, am a privileged white woman. I don’t want to put words in your mouth, but for me, being hostile and confrontational with the Trump voters I know would leave me nearly utterly alone.
These are, over 75%, people who love me, and who genuinely care about me. Friends and family members. People who are not outright racists and sexists, or rather, not consciously racist and sexist, but who nevertheless have internalized most of the institutionalized racism and sexism we have here in the U.S.
These are people who volunteer more than most, who contribute donations, who do genuinely care (or genuinely believe that they care) about people less fortunate, who would never use a racial or sexist slur, etc.
In fact they are a lot like me before I truly realized the extent of my own privilege.
I think maybe this is what you’re getting at? How can we hasten that lightbulb moment that we ourselves had, that “Hey, wait a second, they’re right. I don’t really know anything about how it is to be black/LGBTQ/Asian/Hispanic/disabled/etc. etc. in this country. All I really know is how I, a privileged, middle-class, liberal white woman imagines that to be. I do not live under the real-life threat of violence, under the real-life deck stacked against me on a daily basis.
So, maybe instead of being hurt because minorities don’t like how I have been choosing to “help” them, I should shut the fuck up and LISTEN to what they’re telling me. “
Is that what you mean by doing less-direct “YOU’RE A FUCKING RACIST ASSHOLE” arguing with people who love us, because as you and I know that makes them far less likely to listen to us and far more likely to double-triple-quadruple down on their racism? How do we get them to have that moment of clarity like we’ve had (and continue to have, because I’ll tell you, you don’t undo a lifetime, generations of privilege with just one realization moment)?
@ramen We should do everything we can to help the victimized to survive their victimization. But to really help, don’t we need to do something to stop the victimizers from doing the victimizing in the first place? And when they are so many, doesn’t that mean we need to convince them in some way?
Maybe my solution was way off base. Maybe that’s already been tried and proven to fail and I was too ignorant to realize it. But what then? How do we convince millions of people to stop doing horrible things?
We seem to be getting some crossed wires here where “argue firmly but respectfully” gets translated as “make compromises.” I am NOT arguing that we give bigots a single thing. I’m not even arguing that we be nice and empathetic, ramen. My argument is simply that we don’t talk to them in a rage by default. We all feel the anger, for sure. But would expressing it at all our family/friends/colleagues help or hinder things?
@losername
I think we need to stop letting bigots hide from who they had. Throughout this election we’ve had people making excuses for people’s bigotry (ex: they don’t like trump for his racism/sexism/xenophobia, they like him because of economic anxiety) and we need to tell them their excuses don’t hold up when compared to facts. We also need to make it clear what the real world effects of those attitudes, beliefs, and policies on POC and the poor this might come off as shaming but that’s ok, I don’t think you can change the average bigot but we should focus on trying to change “moderates” who while they don’t think they support bigotry, defend it.
I think the only way that you’re going to change bigots is when it becomes undeniable that most people do not agree with them. I think a lot of bigots are operating under the understanding that they are the silent majority and we need to take that away from them.
Also, the majority did not vote for Trump–Clinton did not loose because “bigot shaming” doesn’t work but because of problems with the electoral college and voter suppression.
@psycho gecko
calling Trump (and the republicans) populist is also a pet peeve of mine, both for the reasons you’ve listed and because when you look at people who vote republican they’re different than people who supported populists
This^ So much this^
If you compromise with bigots you just make them stronger and bolder. If it’s only ever the one group compromising then all that is happening is (apologies for the visual, I can’t think how to explain what I mean otherwise):
A…….B
.A……B
..A…..B
…A….B
….A…B
etc.
Every compromise shifts things towards the bigots side and eventually bigotry is normalized.
@sunnysombrera, losername
We have been crossing wires, I’m sorry. I’m an untutored layperson talking about how I think the not-bigoted half of the country should proceed. I have no useful advice on how to handle bigoted friends and family. I’m just avoiding mine, precisely because I won’t be able to hold my temper, but that’s a luxury, and I can’t do it forever.
How about we don’t compromise with people who time & again prove they will do everything in their power to treat nonwhites as second class citizens/convenient tools? Because compromising tends to give them ground and legitimacy. As Obama has shown with his “reach across the aisle”, that doesn’t do shit, especially when the chips are down he’ll follow the donors.
The majority did not vote for bigotry, the majority had voted for Clinton. The electoral college is heading towards making the orange fascist president unless they actually go vote in clinton instead. So yes the bigots are the minority, that has shown that centuries of social progress has done right. There is no reason to give ground and have them destroy all of that.
Slightly related:
Well if you’re talking about. Changing bigotry, I have a request. My mom doesn’t get trans people, at all. How am I supposed to be able to convince a devout Catholoc to not treat trans people as “not real”?
No compromise with fascism, with sexism, with racism. Call it out – be calm if calmness is in you, be angry if anger is in you. I think that the important thing is to never be comfortable with bigotry. How you express that discomfort will vary based on your life.
Tactics will vary based on the individual and situation – there’s no best-practices here. Some people need a good shouting-at. Others need a few pints of beer in a quiet pub. Others need to see tears and heartfelt expression. Some need a mixture. Others won’t be moved.
In my opinion on combating bigotry in individuals:
Worry less about coming up with a best-practice for how to fight bigotry, worry more about how to read the feelings and desires of the people you’re with. Trump supporters voted in racism and sexism and fascism, painting themselves with those colours, but I suspect many of them aren’t very aware of it. Like privilege being invisible until it’s starkly demonstrated, they won’t see their bigotry until it’s backlit – and even then, they’ll only see its shadow. Doing that will be a personal task. There’s no uniform way to do that. Watch them to see what sorts of things make them change their minds. Start small.
In my opinion on combating bigotry in society:
Get active in politics. Call your representatives. Encourage others to do the same. Raise your voices. Get nerdy, learn to enjoy policy discussions. Follow what your officials are doing closely. Follow what bills are being floated in the government, and if you don’t like one, say something. Share it. Make America interested in democracy again.
If you feel comfortable and safe with it: Make a scene. Make it awkward. Learn how to be comfortable sticking out. Toughen your feelings and your skin. Protest. Let’em know – Democracy isn’t going down without a fight, women aren’t going back into the kitchen, minorities aren’t leaving.
It’s still a democracy. And if it isn’t, make it one.
They aren’t winning. Millennials voted overwhelmingly for Hillary. They’re losing and they know it.
They’re seeing their children look at them dubiously when they say something snarky about Obama at the dinner table. They’re frowning when they see their children with rainbow buttons on their book bags. They’re glowering when they turn on the news and see young people in the streets, protesting against a line of riot police while an announcer calmly describes how uncivil these young people are. They’re losing and they know it.
The future’s bright, everyone. We won’t ever be rid of these fascist cowards, but we’re pushing them into irrelevancy. They’ve won a few battles, and it looks like they’re pressing for a breakout, but it’s their last gasp. They’re out of gas.
Just don’t let’em have that breakthrough. Don’t let’em get behind us. I’m looking at you, @Mark, @Richard, @Gert, @MRAL, all of you. You’re the past. The future is here. They’ve got one angry, shrinking demographic. We’ve got their kids on our side, we’ve got all of the cultures of the world on our side, we’ve got science on our side. We’ve already won.
Oh my fricking deity, you people are so amazing. Thank you so much for being so strong and insightful and developing the theory and discussion so much. I went into this comment thread despondent and depressed, but now I’m geared up and full of hope. Thank you thank you thank you!
@ramen Don’t be sorry! I’m so grateful for the discussion!
OT, but if we have any folks on here from New Zealand, stay safe!
I learned that people said Hitler would settle the fuck down when he gets into office. He did not.
Do not get complacent, this will get worse.
I’ve already seen calls to the left to try and heal the divided country. To reach out to the right in the spirit of compromise.
Yeah? No. One cannot seriously keep asking the olive branch to be extended, when the assholes who it is extended to keep breaking it and are the ones who divided the country in the first place.
I’m pissed.
I wanna reiterate, the bigots didn’t win. Trump won cos of geographic shenanigans, but his voters will have lost by over 2m when all is said and done. We talk about not compromising. This is the 1st test of that. It is ceding ground to treat a loser as a winner. You work around winners. You accommodate winners. You fear winners. Fuck that noise
Remember, the bigots lost. Don’t do a damn thing for the express purpose of placating them. Argue with them to reach out to their victims. Argue with them to salvage relationships with family/friends. Argue with them cos I have aggression issues and I just like arguing. Don’t try to change their minds, so we can win next time. We already won
@Oogly
Oof! My mom’s neither Catholic or super devout, but there’s evidence to suggest she’s not exactly supportive of that particular community. Solidarity, brother. The only advice I have is that silence is the only tactic guaranteed to fail. Beyond that… Let me know if you figure it out, huh?
Not that we needed another one, but we’ve just had a further example of Trump’s pettiness.
You may be aware that Trump snubbed Theresa May by bumping her down the list of leaders he spoke to after the election. He has however found time to invite Nigel Farage for a chat.
Apparently that’s because May and other members of the cabinet said “some very rude things” about Trump during the election campaign and were “nasty” about him.
Farage has been sent back with the message that our government needs to “mend some fences” and then Trump might be more accommoding. Farage has offered to be the go between in that regard.
The government has not taken up his kind offer and their spokespeople are now using the slogan ‘no need for Nigel’. Farage is now on the news whinging that that’s rude too.
The news of Farage’s butthurt lifts my heart.
OMG they’re blaming Obama for the racial tension because he hasn’t spoken out against the peaceful protests. Holy shit.
Alan : oO. At least, the reaction of May is dignified. Do you have an article for that ? I have to talk about that, and saying “I have read that in the comment of an article” isn’t a super credibility start.
@ ohlmann
It’s from an interview on the BBC (with a follow up from some people from the government). Can you access IPlayer? You can get it from there.
@ vicky p
If Farage’s discomfort is helpful during your convalescence I’ll happily keep you updated. 🙂