I thought it might be a useful exercise to revisit Masha Gessens’s “Autocracy: Rules for Survival http://www.nybooks.com/daily/2016/11/10/trump-election-autocracy-rules-for-survival/
Many of my friends were quick to scoff at her analysis as fear mongering and sensationalism. I had a different feeling about it [especially as I looked into her life and professional experiences] .. hmmm I thought. She has seen this first hand- I wonder how close to the mark she’ll be….
so….
Rule 1 “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. “
yep- recently on Kos, Hunter posted yet another instance https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2018/6/21/1774207/-The-New-York-Times-compares-the-internment-of-children-to-swear-words-used-by-internment-opponents#read-more of the NYT “contrasting the rhetoric of those that endorsed those atrocities with opponents who said fuck. “ It is maddening the degree that this is done and I take a bit of heart that , finally, even congress critters are no longer constraining their language ….
Gessen goes on to predict : “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.”
I’m guessing that we might agree that she nailed this one- from ending ANY legislation that Obama had a hand in to appointing administration heads who have been outspoken in their desire to destroy the very agencies they now “lead”… this one was a prophetic slam dunk .
Rule #2: Do not be taken in by small signs of normality. I am thinking that the recent sop ’no children separation at the border’ is a perfect example of this. I confess too that in my own rural life I want to believe - as did Gessen’s example, Simon Dubnow , that he “was well aware that he was living through a catastrophic period in history—it’s just that he thought he had managed to find a pocket of normality within it.” [he died shortly after he wrote that he had found safety] She’s right- it requires vigilance on my part to understand how abnormal and un American this gov’t is.
Rule #3: Institutions will not save you. I”t took Putin a year to take over the Russian media and four years to dismantle its electoral system; the judiciary collapsed unnoticed.” So far, we have seen our judiciary- including its DOJ investigators, stand pretty tall. IMHO it IS our one salvation from now until this November. BUT it certainly has been stressed and attacked continuously by the WH- and, if enough bottom feeders gain positions within the judiciary ….
In light of the aforementioned Hunter essay re the press, I thought it germane to quote Gessen at length:
“Coverage, and thinking, will drift in a Trumpian direction, just as it did during the campaign—when, for example, the candidates argued, in essence, whether Muslim Americans bear collective responsibility for acts of terrorism or can redeem themselves by becoming the “eyes and ears” of law enforcement. Thus was xenophobia further normalized, paving the way for Trump to make good on his promises to track American Muslims and ban Muslims from entering the United States.”
And how many of us have seen the Biblical verse discussion revolve around verse citation instead of: ’since when does a religious book drive national governance?’
Rule #4: Be outraged. If you follow Rule #1 and believe what the autocrat-elect is saying, you will not be surprised. But in the face of the impulse to normalize, it is essential to maintain one’s capacity for shock. This will lead people to call you unreasonable and hysterical, and to accuse you of overreacting. It is no fun to be the only hysterical person in the room. Prepare yourself.
Yeah- I’m pretty much over being told to calm the fuck down….
Gessen predicted a GOP supported war to maintain tRumpian popularity. We have certainly seen an unprecedented brinksmanship , a total rearrangement of erstwhile alliances and an unhinged trade conflict with Canada, Europe and China- I think she gets this forecast as well….
Rule #5: Don’t make compromises…..”Republican politicians have fallen into line. Conservative pundits who broke ranks during the campaign will return to the fold. Democrats in Congress will begin to make the case for cooperation, for the sake of getting anything done—or at least, they will say, minimizing the damage.”……”In an autocracy, politics as the art of the possible is in fact utterly amoral.” [emphasis mine]
Unfortunately I believe this HAS been the case BUT I have some hope that recent elections- especially as women have begun to effectively carry the progressive fight - may signal a new spirit of morality injected into our political process
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. Failure to imagine the future may have lost the Democrats this election. They offered no vision of the future to counterbalance Trump’s all-too-familiar white-populist vision of an imaginary past. They had also long ignored the strange and outdated institutions of American democracy that call out for reform—like the electoral college, which has now cost the Democratic Party two elections in which Republicans won with the minority of the popular vote. That should not be normal. But resistance—stubborn, uncompromising, outraged—should be.”
I’m not interested in blaming any one facet of the last election for our current reality. I will only say that every week I meet with my Indivisible group, I write. I message . And I’ll be on the streets next Saturday.