A Blog that isn’t A Blog but Really a Call to Action for those Under Threat
“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.”—Masha Gessen (New York Times Review of Books, Nov 26, 2016)
“It’s easier to fool people than to convince them that they have been fooled.” -Mark Twain
“You don’t fight Nazis because you expect to win, you fight Nazis because they’re Nazis.” -Chris Hedges
“When fascism comes to America, it will be wrapped in the flag and carrying a cross.”—Sinclair Lewis
“It’s dangerous to be right when the government’s wrong.” – Voltaire
“It is forbidden to kill; therefore all murderers are punished—unless they kill in large numbers and to the sound of trumpets.—Voltaire
“Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable.” -John Fitzgerald Kennedy
“Before mass leaders seize the power to fit reality to their lies, their propaganda is marked by its extreme contempt for facts as such, for in their opinion fact depends entirely on the power of man who can fabricate it.”— Hannah Arendt, The Origins of Totalitarianism
“The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing”-Edmund Burke (British Statesman and Philosopher, 1729-1797)
“As long as ‘security’ continues to justify the banning and dispersion of demonstrations, assemblies, and encampments, it serves the decimation of democratic rights and democracy itself. Only a broad-based mobilization—a form of embodied and transnational courage, we might say—will successfully defeat xenophobic nationalism and the various alibis that now threaten democracy.”— Judith Butler (Mediapart)
“No Trump, no KKK, no fascist USA.”— All Thinking People of Conscience Everywhere
“Fascism is not just a word. It`s not just a way to insult someone with whom you disagree. It is a specific thing. It is a specific form of far right politics that involves a sort of narcissistic cult of superman action around the leader of the party.”— Rachel Maddow
“To sin by silence when they should protest makes cowards of men.”– Abraham Lincoln
“They that start by burning books will end by burning men.” -Heinrich Heine (1797-1856), from his play Almansor (1821)
“Are you a communist?”
“No I am an anti-fascist”
“For a long time?”
“Since I have understood fascism.”
— Ernest Hemingway, For Whom the Bell Tolls
“We can either have democracy in this country or we can have great wealth concentrated in the hands of a few, but we cannot have both.”-Justice Louis D. Brandeis
“A fascist is one whose lust for money or power is combined with such an intensity of intolerance toward those of other races, parties, classes, religions, cultures, regions or nations as to make him ruthless in his use of deceit or violence to attain his ends.”— Henry Wallace
“Few of us can easily surrender our belief that society must somehow make sense. The thought that the State has lost its mind and is punishing so many innocent people is intolerable. And so the evidence has to be internally denied.”— Arthur Miller
“In a time of universal deceit, telling the truth is a revolutionary act.”— (Probably-Not-But-Often-Attributed-To) George Orwell
“The hottest places in hell are reserved for those who during times of great moral crisis maintained their neutrality.”— Dante Alighieri
“Fifty-one percent of a nation can establish a totalitarian regime, suppress minorities and still remain democratic.”— Erik von Kuehnelt-Leddihn
“Civil disobedience becomes a sacred duty when the state becomes lawless or corrupt.”— Mahatma Gandhi
“Racism may wear a new dress, buy a new pair of boots, but neither it nor its succubus twin fascism is new or can make anything new.”-Toni Morrison
“It is very difficult, and perhaps entirely impossible, to combat the effects of brain-washing by argument.” -Paul Feyerabend
“There are two ways to be fooled. One is to believe what isn’t true; the other is to refuse to believe what is true.” -Søren Kierkegaard
“The world is a dangerous place, not because of those who do evil, but because of those who look on and do nothing.” -Albert Einstein
“Anyone who trades liberty for security deserves neither.” -Benjamin Franklin
“Law is often the tyrant’s will, and always so when it violates the right of an individual.” -Thomas Jefferson 1819
“There comes a time when silence is betrayal.” -Martin Luther King, Jr.
“Take sides. Neutrality helps the oppressor, never the oppressed. Silence comforts the tormenter, never the tormented.” -Elie Wiesel
“The world will not be destroyed by evil people but by good people who do nothing to stop it. Hopefully there will always be good people courageous enough to take on the bad guys, this is the only way humanity can hope for salvation.― Bangambiki Habyarimana, The Great Pearl of Wisdom
Do not sit by silent. Reach out, make a difference while it still matters. Here are two lists put together by groups that are fighting for those endangered by today’s political environment. If you do not feel comfortable giving money, then call you local reps and senators, let them know this is not what you voted for. One voice means nothing, one voice in a chorus means everything.
https://www.advocate.com/politics/anti-donald-trump-charities#rebelltitem2
https://greaterandgrander.com/the-best-progressive-charities-to-give-to/
We Are the Rebels of the Written Word. Rebel, Refuse, Resist
