Antisemitism
The #protesters in michigan, virginia, and minnesota whom #trump incited to violence are fighting for a #secondwave. Many of these #angrywhitepeople flew #nazi and #confederate flags demonstrating not only their #selfishness but their #racism and #antisemitism.
#covid19 #pandemic
This week was more terrible than most in the last couple of years, and that's saying a lot in Trump's America. A middle aged white male killed two African Americans in a Kroger after failing to enter a black church. Another domestic terrorist Trump supporter made multiple assassination attempts at Democratic political leaders and mainstream media outlets, all of whom had been longstanding targets of Trump at his hateful rallies. And yet another AR-15 was used in yet another mass shooting, this time at synagogue in Pittsburgh in a despicable display of violent anti-Semitism that took 11 lives, including a 97 year-old Holocaust survivor. She survived the horrors of the nationalism of Hitler and the Nazis, only to meet her end by the nationalism of Trump and the hate he exhibits and engenders in his followers. Our nation's character cannot withstand such assaults while Trump, his GOP enablers, and his virulent supporters still maintain control over all the levers of power.
In many ways, this week was yet another setback in the pursuit of justice. I have found it hopeful that in these dark times, movement builders have deepened our collective understanding of the call to justice with a radical inclusion that leaves no one behind. Seekers of justice have rightfully emphasized the interwoven systems oppression. For example, it isn't enough to solely work against a patriarchal society and how it adversely impacts women. The racism that black and brown women face is an added dimension to systemic oppression that requires us to view the intersections of those systems with a critical eye. Adding the layers of LGBT and class deepens the analysis and leads to different strategies to unwind these systems through collective action. This analysis is thankfully not about comparing victims as were the unfortunate results of so many discussions twenty years ago, but rather taking seriously the various identifies each person has and understanding how structures oppress and grant privilege based on those identities.
I learned anew this week, that hate is also intersectional.
All week long, the President targeted the caravan of immigrants coming from Central America in an act of mass desperation that deserves every charitable impulse we have as a nation to address. Instead, Trump and the White House dog whistled xenophobia and racism, suggesting that there were Muslims seeking to do harm in the caravan and that they should turn around despite their legal right by US and International law to seek asylum as refugees.
In reality, Trump's dog whistle has transformed into hateful bullhorn. At one rally, he proudly declared himself a nationalist. This supposed leader of a nation that built the post-WWII order through a series of deep alliances throughout the world has continued to strain and at times break the bonds that maintain peace across much of the world. He has continued to the conservative project of undermining the United Nations, founded by the United States to overcome the past and perhaps inherent violence of nationalism through means of diplomacy.
This white domestic terrorist's hate was ginned up this week by Trump's bullhorn, because Trump actually needs this anger to survive politically. His base is supportive because he gives voice to their supposed victimization, whether it is immigrants coming to take jobs, African Americans living off their tax dollars on the government dole, liberals coming to take away guns, or any of the tired and untrue narratives that Republicans have been trotting out for years to ensure that white folks vote against their own economic self-interest. Trump does this was a special flare which includes more overt racism than was socially acceptable even a few years ago in the primarily white Republican Party, let alone the rest of this increasingly diverse country.
The domestic white terrorist was intersectional in his approach to hate. He wasn't just an anti-Semite, or a racist or a xenophobe. His white male Christian identity is completely wrapped up in needing to feel superior in every way. The terrorist targeted this synagogue in part because they were supportive of HIAS (https://www.hias.org/) an organization that helps refugees and migrants globally. HIAS was one of the principle voices challenging Trump's xenophobic caravan narrative and organizing congregations to support refugees. His hate and violence was directed at Jews, in part because of their willingness to understand how their long standing oppression as a religious minority is wrapped up in the oppression of refugees and migrants from Central America. From Biblical times, Jews have too often found themselves in similar migratory situations so the connection and the commitment to justice often runs deep. And yet again, in 2018, in America, they found themselves the victims of hateful violence.
Hateful people who commit acts of terrorism serve a useful purpose for those who share their ideology in positions of power. They serve to intimidate and enforce the order that those in power are building or maintaining, while being able to absolve themselves from direct complicity . Most fascist movements have closely aligned vigilante groups willing to act on their hate in concert with the interests and grievances of the powerful. This is the America we now live in. Vote for sure and hopefully we can stem the tide, but make no mistake about it. The overt hate is now completely out of the bag like we haven't seen since the reaction to the Civil Rights Movement. One election in 10 days or in 2020 will not be able to recover what has been lost, but it is our mission to be Stronger than Hate now and every day until this nightmare ends. This hateful violence must never be normalized and we must never accept that this is what our nation has become.
We are Stronger than Hate and We Shall Overcome.
#strongerthanhate #racialjustice #antisemitism #gunviolence #domesticterrorism #guncontrolnow
#boycott #siriusxm for hiring #stevebannon. #cancel your subscription. #fightracism #stopracism #racism #antisemitism #activism #economicactivism #votewithyourwallet
#nazis chant "Jews will not Replace us" and commit acts of #terrorism. Trump's true response today was that there were fine people involved on #bothsides. #impeachtrump #finepeople don't go to #whitesupremacist #rallies. #antisemitism #racialjustice
#whitesupremacists are #domesticterrorists. We are calling on folks, especially white folks to speak out and fight back against the #hatred, #bigotry, and #violence of #whitesupremacy. #racism #antisemitism #fightracism #blacklivesmatter #islamophobia #xenophobia
Like most of you, I was shocked with the election results. Election night, my stomach turned with the almost immediate realization that Hillary wasn't winning this thing. For the next few days and sleepless nights, I struggled to come to grips with fundamental questions about what I thought I knew about my country.
- For all the division and rancor, for the institutionalized racism and vast economic inequality, wasn't there at least some modicum of decency that would preclude people with any sense of goodness about themselves to vote for a blatant xenophobic racist?
- How could 53% of white women voted for a misogynist who brags about sexual assault and has acted like the skeevy guy you ran from your whole life?
- Wasn't it just eight years before that I was jubilant in the Obama victory which seemed like a rebuke of pre-emptive war and a small step of progress towards ending racism?
Hillary was not a candidate I was excited about given her embrace of neoliberal economics and overly hawkish foreign policy, but Good Lord. Compared to the alternative of a Trump Presidency, this seemed like a no brainer. People aren't stupid generally. This isn't about intelligence, it is about hardened hearts. People vote against their interest when fears and prejudices are played upon in ways that reject others humanity.
For all my personal reckoning about this election, I am still a person of tremendous privilege. In comparison, some of my black friends say to me, "I'm scared. Half of the country literally hates me." Undocumented mothers share their fears of being ripped from their children at any moment. Indeed, many parents have been. In the days leading up to election, my brother, who came out about 7 years ago, was door knocking for HRC and a couple of Trump guys drove by yelling "Go Trump, you Faggot!" There have been racial shootings. The displays of anti-Semitism in the blooming of swastikas and the making of bomb threats to Jewish institutions strikes a unsettling fear into our society. In a new turn for my white self, I fear what my Latinos kids now face as other Latino kids are being yelled at "Build the Wall" and "go home". We've seen similar hate against an Asian American kids and certainly seen a good deal of scorn and hate directed at Muslims.
America. In 2017. Racism. Xenophobia. Antisemitism. Islamophobia. Misogyny. Homophobia.
Yes, economics of white working class folks is a huge set of issues that must be addressed. But don't fool yourself, racism never went away and remains one of the major drivers of political activity including voting. Dehumanizing others is again en vogue. Trump has brought lots of ugliness out of the woodwork and into the open. Education and economic dislocation are real issues but how do you get a working class white person to vote against their own economic interest? Gin up racism and xenophobia. Talk about those immigrants taking your jobs. Get tough on those black protesters. Speak English! Ban Muslims because they might be terrorists. Terrorists! This old playbook has been around a long time. We thought we might just be past some of this because we had a black President. Stupid of us.
Turning this around in any sense will be difficult, especially with another round of supply side (tax cuts for the rich) economic policy that actually created much of the inequality in the first place. We are going to have to do two things at once: engage white working folks in a way that takes their legitimate economic concerns seriously while addressing and not tolerating hate. We will need to reset the economic discourse through economic education measures that build support for unionization, living wages, universal health care and tuition free college. We also need to hold folks accountable for dehumanizing someone based on their sexual orientation, race, religion, gender or country of origin. Yes, I want your vote. But I’m not going to tolerate hatred and dehumanization in any form in order to get that vote.
More to come...
#racialjustice #racism #election #xenophobia #misogyny #sexism #islamophobia #homophobia #antisemitism
#stophate #neverisnow Over 700 incidents of hateful intimidation have occurred since the election, many in Trump's name. Trump must rescind his appointment of Bannon which emboldens the white supremacists. Link to petition on Civic Action Center. #racism #antisemitism #misogyny #islamophobia #fightracism #breitbart #bannon #civicaction #nazis #bigotry
Given the Trump win and the acts of racism we are seeing throughout the country, I pledge to act. I pledge to engage our brothers and sisters, aunts and uncles, friends and colleagues, parents and grandparents who are white to discuss issues of #racism, #homophobia, #ableism, #xenophobia, #Antisemitism and #Islamophobia.
I will do so with the humility that we are all at our different places in our understanding of racism and diversity issues and that we all face tough issues in our lives in which we need healing.
I understand that in order to make a change I have to take the risk of creating discomfort and receiving the scorn of others.