In order to resist Trump, you need to be able to cut through the media clutter, seeking out information and analysis that doesn’t always make it onto cable news or the front page of the newspaper.
Writer Sarah Kendzior, an expert on authoritarianism, has done an amazing job chronicling and analyzing Trump and his authoritarian appeal; you can find links to her writings in various publications here. Absolutely essential reading: An essay with the somewhat cumbersone title We’re heading into dark times. This is how to be your own light in the Age of Trump.
On Twitter, meanwhile, she signal-boosts important articles as well as useful information (and information sources) that fill in a lot of the gaps in the mainstream media’s coverage of Trump and Trumpism. She also devotes considerable energy to digging through newspaper archives for background information. I’ve learned a lot from her Tweets, and I suspect you will as well.
These are just from the last couple of days:
Thread from researcher on Trump's financial ties to Russia. Very informative; read the whole thing. https://t.co/1rFpFvxO0k
— Sarah Kendzior (@sarahkendzior) January 2, 2017
Thread on Trump and Russia in 1980s. Updated with info that current Russian UN ambassador and Trump fan invited him to the USSR in 1986. https://t.co/NR9StRugiC
— Sarah Kendzior (@sarahkendzior) January 2, 2017
Elite was a modeling agency notorious for abusing underage girls. It's where Trump let Ivanka work at age 15. https://t.co/anrA02GIZ1 pic.twitter.com/ZMaq8sAo7x
— Sarah Kendzior (@sarahkendzior) January 2, 2017
All you need to know on the dynamics of "Morning Joe"/Trump relationship. Now ask who else he is blackmailing. https://t.co/mAL1gh8Keo pic.twitter.com/nHHMcKsoqV
— Sarah Kendzior (@sarahkendzior) January 2, 2017
Trump-Putin, in three parts
1. July: lies about collusion
2. November: admission of collusion
3. December: flaunting of collusion pic.twitter.com/SUZb2km9Ny— Sarah Kendzior (@sarahkendzior) December 31, 2016
Spend a few minutes going through her Twitter timeline to see what else Kendzior has uncovered.
I found Sarah Kendzior by happy accident a few months ago, when one of my students suggested I might like to follow Amber A’Lee Frost. I found Frost a bit ‘meh’, personally, but an article she’d written about brosocialists led to a shitstorm involving Kendzior. I read Kendzior’s account of it here, and have followed her ever since.
Which is my unnecessarily detailed way of saying: yes, follow/read Sarah Kendzior. She’s formidably intelligent and knows how to dig stuff up and put pieces together.
The first thing I read on her twitter feed was a post about how the republicans want to make it so that ethics investigations never go public.
*sighs and grabs flamethrower*
Trump’s Press Secretary Begs The American People To Stop Mocking Donald Trump
We’re getting to him.
I’ll say what someone elseweb said: I will give Trump every bit of the support and respect that the Republicans gave Obama.
@Otrame And with more reason!
@mish:
Thanks for posting that link. That’s horrifying. As a socialist myself, there’s an extra layer of fury when I see this kind of misogyny coming from the Left. As a man, I don’t always know how to respond to these things, because I don’t want to be one of those #NotAllMen people, but when such garbage comes from the Left, I feel like I have to say NO, you do not speak for me.
I’ve been reading and thinking about feminism for many, many years now, but only recently have I truly realized just how deep misogyny goes in our culture–all the way to the very core. I’m still finding vestigial remains of it in myself, and I’m sickened by it every time I do. I mention this because I don’t think feminism is just something to read about, it’s a process that changes a person, and it’s not easy to change things that were implanted in you before you even knew it was happening. So when I hear about things like “gamergate,” I can say to myself, well, of course, that’s right-wingers for ya, and distance myself from it all. But when it’s from the Left, I can’t do that.
Sorry for venting at you. I’m just angry and sad and frankly embarrassed after reading that link.
@vox,
No need to apologise, seriously. I didn’t feel vented at. In fact I really appreciate your post.
I understand (I think) the frustration and even pain when one’s own ‘side’ falls short, or worse. It’s not exactly parallel, but it reminds me a little of white feminism’s struggle to recognise its own racism. I’m from Australia so this has a very particular resonance and history here.
For what it’s worth, I don’t think that “you do not speak for me” is quite the same as #NotAllMen – you’re addressing certain left/socialist men, and explicitly distancing yourself from their behaviours; you’re not being pre-emptively defensive towards feminists. Does that make sense?
Anyways, thanks for your post. Many moons ago I was part of the International Socialists. I have no idea what they’re like now, but back then “brosocialist” would have been an apt label 🙂
A little distasteful, please delete if too bad
http://i.imgur.com/7DwzrYq.png
I’m a bit afraid of Twitter. Just yesterday, I put an “@[account]” in a tweet to show that I was talking about someone who had a Twitter account. Of course, the idea of the “@” is that you’re talking to them.
But that’s just me not knowing what I’m doing.
Kendzior seems to know what she’s doing, and communicates facts well. I’ll definitely check her out.
The SWP (Socialist Worker Party) had an absolute shitstorm a few years back because of the harrassment and rape of a comrade by another comrade. The Party did NOT want to deal with it – basically wanted the woman to shut up and go away. She didn’t, and the ensuing conflict led to an exodus of about 400 members, mostly women.
http://www.theguardian.com/society/2013/mar/09/socialist-workers-party-rape-kangaroo-court
@mish
Thanks for your response.
I think it was in a speech Dworkin gave that she talked about men who would come up to her and say that they don’t agree with the way the men she talked about think, and she’d tell them, don’t tell me, tell them. Tell the pornographers who presume to speak for you. So now I try to remember that.
An online socialist group I belong to recently instituted a policy about ableist speech and I was shocked by the pushback against it. It’s possible that I’m ridiculously naive. Even after a person posted his personal experience with ableist language, and how it can sometimes be painful, people didn’t seem to care. And this guy was really, really nice about it, too, pointing out that even if you’re calling an argument “dumb” or “stupid,” at its heart the meaning always goes back to someone who isn’t put together in the head. To me, it was the exact same reason I don’t use “bitch” in the sense of complaining about something–in the end, it goes back to the image of a shrill, shrieking woman, and that’s not something I want to promote.
I’m in the US, and I guess it just seems to me that if someone in this country found his way to the Left, against all odds, that should establish a certain amount of critical self-awareness in him. I mean, I’m setting the bar pretty low: don’t threaten to rape anyone. But I guess even that’s too high of a hurdle.
I’ve said it before and I’ll say it now, I really don’t know how women can stand it. And that’s coming from someone who knows he doesn’t get all of it, but just based on the things that I do understand? I’d be outraged ALL THE TIME if I had to put up with it.
@Ellesar,
I hadn’t heard of that story – wow. Thanks for posting about it. In a way, it reminds me of women’s accounts of Left organisations back in the 1960s and ’70s, which makes me sad.
@vox,
Andrea Dworkin, who I strongly disagreed with in my doctoral thesis, yet whose courage and conviction I always admired nonetheless. Yes, she had a good point there.
But that’s not the same as the #notallmen thing, in my view. Funnily enough, I just saw a post on a FB group about this; the hashtag is trending again, apparently, in response to feminist demonstrations against sexual assault in Bangalore. Sigh.
Yup, this indeed!
Dear #notallmen men, who insist that the cap does not fit and meanies and misandry and yadda yadda yadda:
if the cap doesn’t fit … why do you try so hard to cram it onto your head?
As a journalist working in Russia, I can tell you that Kendzior has gone off the deep end in some ways, just like this idiot Dworkin has been doing now. He’s been listing companies in the name of Trump. What he fails to understand is that in Russia there are many companies with the Trump brand that are essentially using it illegally. You can also find “Clinton” and “Obama” companies in the registry as well.
This tweet contains some examples. If you don’t read Russian, look on the left side of the tables for ОБАМА and КЛИНТОН. That’s Obama and Clinton. One such business, for example, is a shop literally named Obama.
As Julia Ioffe, an experience Russian journalist wrote before the election, Trump has actually been quite poor at doing any meaningful business in Russia, even at a time when all sorts of Westerners were making a killing here. That is a big sign that his connections were rather poor.
During the election, Trump’s seemingly pro-Russian comments were likely just part of his bullshit “anti-establishment” schtick. If Hillary had praised Vladimir Putin, Trump would be screaming about how Hillary’s a traitor.
People also tend to forget things such as when Trump said he’d have the Navy shoot down Russian planes if they buzzed any more US ships in the Black Sea.
Right now the reason Trump is being so defensive about the hacks is that it’s challenging his legitimacy. Of course he’s going to just go and say the opposite because he’s a grown man with the mind of a child and that’s what children do.
But as for the hacks itself, there’s no evidence to show that they swung the election in favor of Trump. If any revelation did it was that Comey letter.
Unfortunately in the wake of such a devastating defeat, some folks have decided to play junior detective and inquire into a realm they know little about.