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TygrBright

(20,733 posts)
Sat Feb 11, 2017, 07:26 PM Feb 2017

The Role of Resistance

I am old enough to remember Kent State. And I am old enough to remember how effectively the right-wing establishment was able to de-legitimize the anti-war movement with agents provocateur (and provocateuse,) surveillance programs, counter-intell, planting of false evidence, imprisoning leadership based on (you should excuse the expression) trumped-up charges, and the rest of COINTELPRO machine.

If you think that was dismantled when it was exposed, or even after the Church Committee findings, give yourself a merit badge for naive optimism. Successful counterintelligence programs never die, they just change names, shed a few embarrassing personnel, acquire new tools, reorganize the taxonomy, and carry on.

That's what we're up against, with our resistance. And today I watched this short clip and it crystallized the "why" for me. (The relevant bit is from 00:35 to 01:36)



Transcript:

Piers Morgan: "Calm down, Bill... there is no 'Muslim ban'. If there was..."

Jim Jefferies: "Oh, FUCK off... Fuck off! There's a fucking Muslim ban, he SAID there was a Muslim ban... There's a Muslim ban! "

Piers Morgan: "This is the point... the... this is the hysteria I'm talking about! Eighty-five percent of the world's Muslims are allowed into the country!"

Jim Jefferies: "This is what you do, Piers... you say, 'he hasn't done this, he hasn't done that, he's not gonna do all these things...' Give him a fuckin' chance, mate! Y'know what I mean? Because... Hitler didn't kill the Jews on the first day... he worked up to it!"

>>applause<<

Bill Maher: "All right! I have to stop you all..."

Piers Morgan: (talking over) "There, see? That is the exact... that is the exact ridiculous, hysterical, over-the-top nonsense.."

Jim Jefferies: (talking over) "Not ridiculous! If people got hysterical, in Germany, right away, then it wouldn't have..."

Piers Morgan: (still talking over) "...that is, I'm afraid, making people like you ridiculous! He's not the new Hitler!"

Jim Jefferies: "You just like... you just like that you won 'The Apprentice' and you have a famous friend, mate, that's all you fuckin' like."

>>Several panelists and Maher talking at once, Jefferies repeating 'that's all you like... that's all you like!'<<

Piers Morgan: "Mate, mate... You're losing... I know where you... listen, you're losing your audience, here is why, 'cause you're sounding unpleasant, and you're also..."

Jim Jefferies: (talking over) "I'm not losing my audience!" (to audience) "Am I losing it..?"

>>wild applause, whistles, shrieks of approval, clapping<<

Jim Jefferies: (gives Morgan the finger)


And there you kinda have it. Almost lost in there, but critical: "If people got hysterical, in Germany, right away, then it wouldn't have..."

And he's right.

It wouldn't have.

Tyrants are enabled by silence, which they can spin as acquiescence, even approval.

The role of the resistance is to make it impossible for the GOP regime to make that spin. To make every attempt to delegitimize us ring hollow through persistence and stubborn, principled, peaceful but passionate clarity about what we are resisting:

  • We are resisting the promotion of fear and xenophobia and the creation of scapegoats to deny rights to some in the name of 'security for all'.

  • We are resisting the assumption of imperial power by an Executive Branch willfully ignoring the structural checks and balances required by our Constitution, and the GOP-controlled Legislative Branch's supine lack of resistance or even collusion in such perilous usurpation.

  • We are resisting the wholesale and reckless dismantling of a complex structure of laws, regulations, and resources created under due process and review by the mechanism of a democratic republic, for peaceful domestic governance and responsible relationships with other nations.

  • We are resisting the efforts of a small cabal of extreme ideologues to empower a demagogue in the subversion of a deliberative and democratic process for a 'winner take all' power grab.

  • We are resisting the destruction of a flawed but functional structure of agencies and processes to deliver the benefits of civil order, economic regulation, and social progress, in favor of wholesale corruption and cronyism.

We are resisting ALL of it. And that is why this resistance needs ALL of us.

It needs those concerned for the rights of people denied access to the privileges accorded others by reason of gender, race, religious belief/atheism, sexual orientation, age, health, and physiological ability.

It needs those concerned for the principles of law, equity, and constitutional government.

It needs those concerned for the future of our land and our planet to support life in the time of our children's great-grandchildren.

It needs those concerned for freedom of the press, freedom of speech, and the power of factual realities, science, and truth to guide decision making.

They will try to delegitimize us with this very breadth of scope and concern. They will try to drive wedges among us, find cracks, exploit the concerns of some against others. They will try to out-spend and out-wait us. They will talk over, spin, gaslight, propagandize. They will try to exhaust us, weary us, willfully misunderstand and misdirect. They will mock us, laugh at us, ridicule us. They will pretend to negotiate, and do so in bad faith. They will send the current version of COINTELPRO to subvert and undermine us.

NONE of that will matter, none of it will be effective, if we just keep resisting. If we just persist. In numbers too big to ignore, with voices clear and passionate.

We are doing this. We are "getting hysterical", right now. And staying that way.

We are giving them NO ROOM to turn silence into consent.

This is the role of the resistance.

adamantly,
Bright
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The Role of Resistance (Original Post) TygrBright Feb 2017 OP
Exactly! Phoenix61 Feb 2017 #1
Yep. We'll persist past the point where every well-known "liberal billionaire" would be bankrupt... TygrBright Feb 2017 #2

Phoenix61

(16,954 posts)
1. Exactly!
Sat Feb 11, 2017, 07:47 PM
Feb 2017

Squeaky wheel and all that. IMO you are so right about silence being seen as agreement or acquiescence.

TygrBright

(20,733 posts)
2. Yep. We'll persist past the point where every well-known "liberal billionaire" would be bankrupt...
Sat Feb 11, 2017, 08:03 PM
Feb 2017

...from paying "paid agitators," and we will KEEP RESISTING.

There will be a price.

I'm good for it.

And I don't think I'm the only one.

determinedly,
Bright

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