To succeed in overthrowing a political system, every tyrant needs a submissive public.
If the public won’t submit, then the tyrant is doomed to fail. If he can manipulate the public to give him free rein for a short amount of time as he gets his ducks in order, then their submission will no longer be necessary. If he has enough time to gut political institutions and put into play a cadre of violent enforcers, then dissent will simply be squashed, dissenters will be jailed or killed, and the only voices heard will be those that praise the Dear Leader out of one side of their mouth while they kiss his butt with the other side.
A vital tool for the tyrant in his early days is to get the public to become complicit with some of his evil revolutionary actions. Donald Trump is wielding this tool with great effectiveness. For instance, he lies and tells us that his ICE masked goon kidnappers are only targeting criminals, “the worst of the worst” as Christie Noem and her ilk love to parrot.
If we choose to accept his lie, then we can shrug and say “well who doesn’t want violent criminals to be taken off of the streets?” But we know that this is a lie. Believing it in order to not to have to oppose these actions is like the person who does their first “small favor” for an organized crime group. The next thing you know, they are being called on to do another favor, or risk being exposed for the first one that they did. Hitler was effective at this tactic when he started his mass murder spree by only demonizing and targeting those he knew to be susceptible to contempt by the German people. He got his “good Germans” to denounce and turn in Jews and others, so long as those good Germans themselves were spared. At that point, the populace was wholly entrenched in the crime. There were those who felt deep shame at their submission. But that shame only made it harder to face reality and easier to continue to go along with the ravings of their lunatic Fuhrer.
Acquiescence, silence, compliance, avoidance and hopelessness are all part and parcel of submissiveness. It doesn’t matter if we are dead set against this regime or if we think it is fantastic. If we are not: dissenting, refusing to comply with regulations, protesting, or organizing, then we are submitting. And everyday that we choose to not act, our complicity gets more deeply rooted and our value to the lawless regime increases.
Trump is attacking our nation on multiple fronts at the same time. He hopes to make it hard for us to figure out how to react, to decide which issue to choose as the one to fight for. This has slowed down the coalescence of resistance groups to become a full throated powerful threat to his illegal actions.
Take for example the genocide and starvation in Gaza. As activists strategize, many say that Gaza is a separate issue and should not muddy the waters of “saving democracy” which is the prime focus. But genocide in Gaza is the ultimate example of collective guilt and shame bringing us into complicity with the Trump administration. Those who cannot bring themselves to criticize Israel and instead stand silently by as Palestinians are starved to death and murdered daily, are now accomplices of Trump. They are willing to look the other way and pretend that this isn’t their issue, even though U.S. actions play a key role in the continued genocide by Israel. They are doing their first “small” favor for Trump, even though they know that he, the mob boss, will soon be demanding more.
There are perhaps a million or more people in this nation who are fighting back in every way that they can imagine. They are organizing protests, vigils, strikes, civil disobedience actions, community building for resilience and resistance and more. But those of us in the vast majority of the populace who have not yet acted should know that these efforts, as meaningful, well organized and thoughtful as they can be, will not be successful until every one of us who disagrees with Trump’s coup gets on board.
We need to be at the protests and at the vigils. We need to be writing to people in power, especially those who are supporting this lawless regime. We need to contemplate not paying our taxes. We need to no longer willingly give out “the last four of your social for security purposes” to every Tom, Dick and Harry of a business that thinks it has the right to ask us for those numbers. We need to see every roadway and sidewalk as an blackboard waiting to be filled in with our dissenting opinions. We need to demand meetings with our “good” congressional delegation and demand that they do more, that they take this fight into the streets as it has become crystal clear that waiting around to win a vote in a congressional session will not cut it. We need to contact public media and demand that resistance to the Trump tyranny be covered as the worthy news topic that it is and not be ignored out of fear of Trump retaliation. We need to be beating our pots and pans in our front yards for five minutes every day at 7 p.m.
None of us want to do this work. It is difficult, overwhelming and scary. But it pales in comparison to what life will be like for us, our children and our grandchildren if we do not fully engage to resist. And while it would be great to have some clear leaders to follow in this struggle, that is not our good fortune. In this battle, we are the leaders, we must do the work. And if we all join in, we shall prevail and our current leaders will be beholden to us and not the other way around when we emerge out to the other side.
Dan DeWalt lives in Newfane, Vermont.