1. Happy New Year seems inappropriate as we enter 2025. Yes, enter, like we are going into a different space. Where the traditional rules of engagement are ignored by the incoming president of the united states. The rest of us can no longer depend on the rules to protect us. And by taking the high road and simply following the rules, we will be buried.
We're still in this place where people are going about their lives almost normally, when in 20 days we get a broken human as our new president and he's surrounded by similarly afflicted people. That normality is going to change. Rapidly for some, more slowly for others. The unhoused have been living in that world already. LGBTQ+ and immigrants and people of color have also been feeling it, and it will quickly get worse.
The rest of us have to help protect them, because it's the right thing to do. But for those who need a more personal reason, well, eventually it will be you with a target on your back.
There are times when following the rules can get you killed. Like packing your suitcase and quietly following the directions of the Nazis to get on the train. Times where acts of resistance and sabotage are the morally correct actions. It's time to reread Saul Alinsky.
"In his theory of means and ends, Alinsky puts across a question, which states whether the ends justify the means. According to the theory, the ends entail what individuals want, or goal, while means entail the activities of how to get what they want or to achieve the goal. In his discussion, Alinsky thought that the morality of actions did not require to be judged in itself, but rather be weighed against the morality of inaction. In the chapter on the means and ends, Alinsky stated that the issue of means and ends is usually viewed in a strategic and pragmatic manner by the man of action. In his arguments, he pointed out that the man of action only gets to ask of ends when they can be achieved and of means whether they will work for his plans."
Morally balancing ends and means is not a simple task and many have and will do it poorly. Start with actions whose ends are not major violations to practice before taking more consequential actions. Remember, many of our incoming President's supporters are rabid supporters of their interpretation of the Second Amendment, and they have and intend to use their guns.
Examine your values. List them. Prioritize them. Know which ones are most important. Then use your values to actively guide your actions.
2. Small But Vocal
United Against Book Bans offers an important lesson:
A small but vocal group is driving the current flood of book bans in school and public libraries across the country.Every resistance group, almost by definition, comes from a very small group that is dedicated to their cause. We don't all have to fight every battle. We each need to focus on one or two issues (while also supporting people fighting other battles as we can). Here's United Against Book Bans tools:
"It's important to counter those voices by uniting in support of the freedom to read in your local community. How can you and your community unite against book bans? We've put together this action toolkit to help you get started.
Are you part of an organization? You can find additional resources to amplify and support the Unite Against Book Bans campaign in the UABB Toolkit PDF.
3. Focus
We took the grandkids to Cirque du Soleil yesterday. (An example of how we are still living what seems like a normal life.) All the performers break the rules of what normal people can do. This woman, wrapped in a long red cloth found ways to seemingly defy gravity. They are able to do these amazing feats by focusing on their skills, building the appropriate body and mind muscles, and then, during their acts, focusing on perfection.
I challenge my readers to keep this image in mind as you focus on keeping our democracy alive.
4. My New Years Resolution
My resolution is to perform at least one act of resistance every day of 2025. I realize 'resistance' seems to be 'against' and I want to also include acts of affirmation, of strengthening democracy, but haven't figured out the right word yet.
This can be as basic as speaking up to racists, misogynists, homophobes. You don't have to save the world each day. Just plugging a hole in the dyke is resistance. in Reading Alinsky's books and other books that give you tools for your spirit and for action. Reading the United Against Book Banning group's Tool Kit to take action and applying them to your most cherished causes is a first step. Go to all the links in this post and read. Those are acts of resistance and building your resources. Find other good resources and prescriptions for action and leave them in the comments.
Hi Steve. I felt a disruption in the Force this past week (sure, it works). It was watching a Northern Ireland film from 1989 about a country-western preacher from Tennessee who came with his band to sing & preach the 'Gospel'.
ReplyDeleteI have rarely been left so devastated by a documentary. It took me days to climb out of the pit it threw me into. And how was this?
The guitar-evangelist was from Tennessee. And he was of that stock of Irish Protestants who left my part of the world back in the late 1600s to the mid 1700s, first settling in the Virginias and then pushing through the Appalachian mountains to to settle what was still Indian Country by treaty of the British Government.
They were evangelical Christians of the day, quite unwelcome to the British powers of the day and VERY welcome to leave Ireland, taking up home in the American colonies. These are people who today comprise (ancestrally) 23pc of the US Marine Corps, who were instrumental in establishing the Plantation system of crop farming using African slave labour, who brought a firebrand religion with them that became the inception of many of today's South's baptist traditions.
This man who came back to my neck-of-the-woods was returning to where so much of the American South's religious convictions were set in steel & fire.
I see this culture in the States now. I couldn't have known its source as I do know living in the country that sent them forth to a New World. They are called the 'Scotts Irish' (here called the Ulster Scots) after the people who were 'transplanted' from Scotland in the early 1600s to take control of lands owned by the Catholic Irish who had lived in these parts for many centuries.
Let's just say here that this is the start of a major history, but I am going to put this out to you today: I have never felt so compelled to bring this cultural fact to light for my American friends & family. The American South is a project of the Old World, and particularly, those renegades from Northern Ireland who sought to make a new home for their 'way of life & worship'.
I see so much in America today, base on what is still known (and feared) here. America settlement was a project of Europe's empires. The Stars & Bars the flag of the Scottish Saltire and the protestant flag, here, in Northern Ireland. The whiskey, the songs, the 'fighting' spirit of these people are found today in America's south.
The other Irish Americans know so well are the Catholics who left to America during the Famine years 1845-52 settling in much greater numbers in the North. I see so much that is familiar now (to me) since living here in what I knew as an American.
But the biggest thing of all was the subjection of Africans by many of the people who were Scotts-Irish in ancestry. Hugely religious, moon-shiners, 'Hill-billies' (so named as William was a common name of many Scotts-Irish, so called in tribute to King William of Orange).
This has given me a much deeper appreciation for the fundamentalism America came to call this form of belief & Christian worship. It is, from a cultural, folk-ways system here in Northern Ireland that it came be called by the name: Clan.
It helps me understand MAGA and the worship of might.
My apologies for a 1st-draft of what I may have taken more effort to polish. I'll let it stand, though, as guests are arriving for a chat and no time to make changes. I'll let stand any errors; the ideas speak for themselves.
DeleteSometimes the content is more important than the style. The comment is fine and informative. But you didn't tell us the name of the movie. I looked it up from your description and came up with "Power In The Blood." The link has a bland description of the film. The comments are bit more pointed. Neither give the message you gave.
DeleteSorry about not giving the name, but you got it. In the place I now live in, Protestant and Catholic are (nearly) as culturally-polarized as Muslim and Jewish in the Middle East.
DeleteThe documentary is entirely complimentary toward Baptist tradition in this country -- Eugene and I both feel (I would go so far as say 'know') that the camera crew must have been from members of the Baptist or Presbyterian (yes, here Presbyterian is FAR removed from the form practiced in the USA) as they were able to deeply go into faith practice here (as a 'performative' art form, really). Steve, it's the result of living here and in the USA that lets me understand how this religion moved to and was firmly 'planted' in the Southern USA.
It is this power to make people encamp in its design for 'salvation' that is a wonder to see, to almost feel. It is quite a good documentary of how this form of Christian faith gains its hold on reason -- and makes passionate 'disciples' who can & do surrender reason to faith.
Really Jacob, you have done nothing but rag on the U.S. Lets look at the country that you left The U.S. so you could mooch of that country’s health system. Northern Ireland, if I am correct.
DeleteSo please tell us why where you live is SO superior than the United States.
I seem to remember something called ‘The Troubles’.
More than 3,500 people were killed in the conflict, of whom 52% were civilians, 32% were members of the British security forces, and 16% were members of paramilitary groups.
Your country did a mortar attack trying to kill the Prime Minster. You did manage to kill one of the Royal Family (Lord Mountbatten).
So tell us about ‘Marching Season’. Tell us about Peace Walls. Tell us about the phrase Grasses.
Republican paramilitaries were responsible for some 60% of all deaths, loyalists 30% and British security forces 10%.[39]
Additional estimated statistics on the conflict[12]
Incident No.
Injury 47,541
Shooting incident 36,923
Armed robbery 22,539
People charged with paramilitary offences 19,605
Bombing and attempted bombing 16,209
Arson 2,225
Responsibility for killing[39]
Responsible party No. %
Republican paramilitary groups 2,058 60%
Loyalist paramilitary groups 1,027 30%
British security forces 365 10%
Persons unknown 77
Irish security forces 5
Total 3,532
Get off your high horse Jacob.
It's a fine day here. All good.
DeleteI like your Resolution and have forwarded the suggestion to friends and family. I'm part of a group that normally makes and shares resolutions, and I was feeling unmotivated this year, but your idea is a "manageable bite." I'm looking for the right word, too.
ReplyDeleteMy resolution is to perform at least one act of resistance every day of 2025.
ReplyDeleteI remember a year After the Occupy Wallstreet protests. At the anniversary the Tea Party had elected X number of Senators and Representatives and the Occupy Wallstreet folks were having ‘affinity dinners. ’So, My resolution is to perform at least one act of resistance every day of 2025’. So may be if you would have done more than just sat and sipped your latte and wagged you finger at the ‘deplorables’ it might have been different. Never the less Steve to the Barricades.