So I’m putting together a page (or possibly two) of anti-Trump resources, and I could use your help over the next few days. (No need think about any of this stuff today, obviously!)
I’m looking for a bunch of different things:
Information and graphics to help make the case that Trump’s victory is illegitimate, based on:
Hillary’s big win the popular vote; the ways in which the electoral college effectively overcounts the votes of rural whites and those in swing states and undercounts those of minorities; dirty tricks, from Russian hacking and wikileaks to the machinations of Comey and pro-Trump FBI agents (I’m especially interested in stuff talking about Trump’s connections to the dirty tricksters, as well as his public encouragement and exploitation of leaked emails and the like).
Information on protests and other anti-Trump activism:
Both local and national (and on the internet). Links to help people who want to get involved.
Information and resources to help people deal with Trump-related anxiety, etc.
Information on Trump’s massive conflicts of interest, and whether or not this could rise to the level of an impeachable offense
Information on his worldwide business dealings. Examples of the conflicts that have already become an issue even though he’s not yet in the White House. The issues raised by his plan to have his kids run his business — despite their continued involvement in the transition and their attendance at meetings with foreign leaders.
Information on Trump’s connections to white supremacists
The possibility that he engaged in “pay to play” for favorable coverage in Breitbart. Connections to far-right parties and activists in Europe. Examples of horrible stuff said and done by his white supremacist supporters. His refusal to clearly and specifically distance himself from these people — in person, on camera.
Trump’s compulsive lying; his vanity; his obsession with revenge; his encouragement of violence at his rallies; his flip-flops, mood swings, erratic behavior; his susceptibility to flattery; his promulgation of fake news and discredited claims
Trump’s racism and misogyny
Trump’s attacks on Muslims and Latinos. His record of discrimination against black tenants. His long history of misogyny. The accusations of sexual assault raised against him.
Historical parallels between Trump and fascist/authoritarian leaders in the past
Information about Trump’s unwillingness to follow traditional norms of presidential behavior and/or do his job
His massive ignorance about this country and the world and unwillingness/inability to learn. His attempts to dodge the press and threats against press freedom. His refusal to attend daily intelligence briefings. His refusal to make his tax returns public.
Trump’s terrible advisors and allies; the Russian connections
Further reading on Trump
Ranging from the terrible things he’s said about women, to his bankruptcies and sleazy business practices, to his embrace of assorted conspiracy theories over the years. I’m generally looking for longer articles here, but short primers on some issues are welcome as well.
Further reading on fascism. authoritarianism, right-wing movements and media
Information about Pence, particularly his anti-LGBT policies
Funny stuff
Recommended publications, writers, podcasters, etc to help make sense of Trump
Anything else you can think of that I’m forgetting
Thanks!
I see @Eyes On The Right has had the same thought.
Here’s a Huffpost article containing the cartoon I referred to, although the resources in the article are UK-relevant, rather than US:
http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/islamophobic-abuse-advice-bystander-hate-crime_uk_57c83652e4b09f5b5e3596fb
I think the Left needs to copy everything the Far-Right is doing….including hacking. If we can’t fight them the regular way, we can fight them in a covert way.
Unfortunately, my computer skills are of “Dopey average Jane”-levels and I know ZILCH about that sort of thing.
I agree that it’s quite possible that the Ruskies have been possibly messing with the voting machines to make a Trump win out of a Hillary one…..especially since the Hillary votes actually outnumbered the Obama vote in the last couple of elections.
I don’t get why Putin’s so butthurt over the USA, we haven’t been hurting him (apart from commenting on how he’s a jerk who’s a bigot and has been destroying the spirit of Glasnost). It’s one thing for him to be horrible with surrounding former-Soviet countries (which is no doubt awful and I’m not excusing it at all), but then he has to attack us! It’s like he wants to bring back the USSR (but more Fascist rather than Communist) AND The Cold War…..Perhaps he’s just a nut who wants to *Brain the mouse voice* “TRY TO TAKE OVER THE WORLD!”
I’m not part of the “Reynold’s Wrap Chapeau” bunch….but sometimes I do wonder if there is some sort of dark cabal working behind the scenes. Okay; They’re not Lizard Monsters, an Anti-Semitic Fantasy or some Dark Magic thing….but rather a more mundane coalition of some “Robber Baron” types working with corrupt political folks and the weapons industry. There’s bucks to be made when the world is violent and crappy….which is why they hate Progressives, The Left, “Hippies”, Anti-Bigotry, Equality, Environmentalism, etc. so much.
It never dawns on them that they could still make mega-bucks by switching to Green Energy/Industries/etc. but….that’s “Evil” for ya.
There’s got to be a way to fight this. We need to be as shrewd and underhanded as them. Infiltrate their spaces! Run for their offices! Fill their religious institutions! Computer-Hack the snot outta them! They did it! We can do it!
Now; I’m not a strict “religionist” or “Bible-Butt” (I’m a spiritual Pantheist NeoPagan)….however, I do feel that various scriptures, like a lot of myths and fables, can teach a lot of truths or have kernels of truth. A common theme in The Bible is “The small and insignificant ‘Little Guy’ fighting the powerful and corrupt ‘Big Guy’ and winning”. You have the myth of Gideon, David vs. Goliath and even Jesus of Nazareth saying “Blessed are the Meek, for they will inherit the Earth”. I never took “meek” as meaning “meek”….it took it as “Blessed is ‘The Little Guy or Gal/The Powerless’, for they shall inherit the Earth (and conquer the corrupt and powerful)”. Jesus, to me, spoke “The Truth To Power” and was part of a long line of countless Social Justice people (Fredrick Douglas, Susan B. Anthony, Ghandi, Mandela, MLK Jr., Rosa Parks, Harvey Milk, etc.) and that his message was universal.
Surely; The underdog can and will win….If we fight and know what to do!
Bethd,
Zumahzumah admitted to only posting when they want to disagree with people because that’s their personality. In other words, they said they liked to be contrarian. Why should we be obligated to be nice about that?
Again remember that the internet is still real life and the people who post here are still people. If you knew someone out in meatspace who never talked to you except when they wanted to criticize you, would you like them very much? Would you feel compelled to be nice to them? If you saw them treat other people that way, would you tell those people to be nice them? If the answer to any of those is no, why is it different here?
And why should we take the advice of an admitted troll and sockpuppet with a grudge anyway? You say you used to be less mature and wouldn’t troll now but it’s hard to take that seriously when you didn’t even come clean about who you used to be? For all I know you’re trying to shit stir again.
I’ll never understand why people lurk until they decide they want to pick a fight and then act all shocked when that’s what they get.
This SpukiKitty character is a gotcha troll, right?
@SFHC
I’ve been hearing that phrase, or a permutation thereof, a lot over the past 2 weeks. Aimed at a slew of people. Unfortunately, it’s never true, and they never are…
@Beth
Your conflation of relative civility and genuine niceness is emblematic of the whole issue, and, in that vein, I’d ask you to remove your blinders
@Viscaria
Precise! How “Comments policy. Thanks” is a frenzy, I’ll never know. Speaking of which:
@Spuki
Comments policy. Thanks
@Scented Fucking Hard Chairs
The “speech” pattern of @SpukiKitty matches the way a person using that same alias on FSTDT and FQA (both atheist sites, FQA used to be the discussion forums of FSTDT until a couple of years ago, it’s a long story) posts. I don’t think that they’re (I’m not sure of your pronouns Spuki, hope you don’t mind) strictly speaking a troll, just rather shall we say “intense”. Basically, I wouldn’t dismiss them outright as a troll, but judge for yourselves as to the need to correcting unwarranted behavior.
I know I’m not a very established or popular poster on here, but I did feel that I could maybe help a bit in this particular situation.
ETA: Corrected some iffy grammar.
Oops! I’m sorry. I’ll try my darndest not to do that again. Thank you.
It’s kinda hard at first to stop using slurs like “crazy” and “nut” but I can learn. Some things should be challenged.
Thank you.
Also; I hate trolls.
I just want to be a regular commenter, here.
What’s a “Gotcha Troll”? I’m trying to find the definition, online.
Was it my “hacking” suggestion? Oh man! I’m sorry! Nix that suggestion! I think I know what you’re saying. You’re saying that I’m one of bad guys and I’m being an agent provocateur and promoting stupid unlawful things so that you’d agree and then get arrested or something.
I’m sorry. I was wrong. Sometimes I don’t think. We must do things lawfully.
@Monzach, I think that you are a regular and popular poster here <3
@Spukikitty, welcome!
I’ll second Monzach. I frequent FSTDT enough to recognize SpukiKitty is and I don’t think they’re intentionally trying to be ableist (best way I could put it). But if they continue I won’t keep defending them.
ETA: And I’m late to the party again. In other news fire is hot and Bethesda makes games with hilarious bugs in the final build.
Anyway. Everything that must be done to fight corruption must be decent and lawful. We should be moderate in our approach and not come off as jerks. I take back completely the hacking suggestion.
I must be super-careful with what I say, here. I don’t want to be seen as one of the bigots, trolls, sexist, racist, homophobic jerks.
I understand your suspicion.
I’m so sorry.
@Scildfreja
Thanks! <3
You have the most easily recognizable username and avatar combo on this site, and I'm always happy to see the Eth-rune in your name. ^_^
@Spuki
Regular is easy, productive is harder, good even harder still. Aim high
*ahem*
Then don’t be one
@SpukiKitty
“Gotcha” trolls try to use one anomaly or other slip-up to discredit a broader movement or issue. They try to drop truth-bombs, essentially. Like any number of creationists going “But what about X!?” in their latest attempt to discredit evolution.
Thank you. Yes. This is me. I haven’t been on FSTDT, lately. I will return, eventually. I must stop inadvertently using ableist slurs related to mental illness. I don’t mean anything by it (heck, I’m mentally ill) but it’s a cultural thing. It can be un-learned.
Anyone who knows me on FSTDTs will tell you that I’m a good egg. That said; I can understand the feeling of caution concerning me, here.
@Axe
To be fair, long before you started posting and while I was still lurking there was a rather intense period of trolling that got everyone very defensive and they started getting rather mean and jumpy against casual ablism. Not saying they were in the wrong, but a single usage of the word “crazy” would result in half a dozen posts of varying levels of niceness, and then a multi-page war would break out. Because of this, the comments policy was changed and now it’s policy to not pile on. I got the impression that Bethd was referring to that behavior, though that’s rather unfair of them because that was over a year ago and everyone has been following the new rules just fine since then.
Ah; Thanks. No; I don’t want to be seen as that. I don’t want to be a jerk. Anyone who knows me from FSTDTs will know I’m one of “The Good Guys”.
I saw that and corrected that. I replaced “sane” with “decent” and “Loons” with “jerks”.
I’m tryin’. I’m learning! Old habits die hard but I’m fighting that habit all the way.
Keep in mind that, I’m mentally ill, myself. The words I was using is a cultural thing that must be undone.
Can’t resist stealing a schtick here:
Bethd Delurked to Scold
Concern Troll is Quite Concerned
Stop Tone Policing
Is it okay for me to post a page from FSTDTs with an archive of my quotes, or would that be a big no-no?
Oh! We need to get back on-topic and collect anti-Trump resources.
We need to talk about Mr. Annoying Orange II.
@Spuki
Ah! Fair enough. Sorry 🙂
I’d rather not
Why?
That last bit was a silly idea, I agree. I guess I was trying to prove that I wasn’t a jerk/troll/awful person.
Enough about me. I don’t want to be the focus. This thread’s been derailed. We need to get back to the program and post stuff to fight Trump and his Trumpy Trumpsters.
“Trumpster” will be my euphemism for Far-Right Reactionaries in general. “Trumpy” will be an adjective (forgot who suggested it but it’s a great idea).
Oh, I don’t know about elsewhere, but I use it to mean How Do You Do, Fellow Feminists who say something awful in the hopes that we’ll agree with it and they can run back to wherever with their “Proof” that we’re all Hitler squared.
In this case, “Let’s hack Russia!” Fuuuck no.
@SpukiKitty hi! I didn’t read your post as trolling, but I can see why people would be feeling cautious. I suppose that’s neither here nor there but I just thought it might help to know that not everyone read it the same way.
I also just want to caution you to be careful about suggesting techniques like hacking, etc. for your own safety. Neither the U.S. nor the Russian governments are known for taking words like that casually, even from someone like yourself who (as you said) does not have the skills required to carry out a plan like that on your own. And they both have eyes just about everywhere.
It’s clear you’re very action-oriented which is a respectable quality in any person. I’m just honestly worried about you getting put on some kind of list (or worse) by making suggestions like that, and because your comments come across as you being very high-energy or as others have said, intense; and because those of us with mental illnesses are more likely to find ourselves in a bad position when caught on the wrong side of the law.
Protest/activism : There’s a #GrabYourWallet group that is boycotting stores that sell anything by Ivanka or Donald Trump. Started by Shannon Coulter.
Look we’re not going to commit criminal activity. That would further legitimize the fascists. Instead we’ll pursue legal and constitutional methods in order to remove Trump from office, or what is seeming to be more likely, push back harder against institutional dismantling of human rights.
@Schnookums Von Fancypants, Purveyor of Misandrist Klondike Bars
Yay more poems for the poem goddess, bonbons for the bonbon throne.
I’ve been railing against trumpocalypse since day one (well, two) and now I call my daily tweet #TrumpocalypseReport on twitter.
https://twitter.com/search?src=typd&q=%23trumpocalypsereport
Some of it is based on future knowledge but I try to keep it tied to facts that have already been brought up*. It is plain to see from the actions taken by Trump what is shaping out for America (and it’s bad in a way that is completely impossible to manage.)
Except for the #PrezzoTheClown hashtag, totally stole that from the future.