It’s 1933.
Some people are saying we should stop Hitler now, in 1933.
Some people aren’t trying to stop Hitler in 1933. They just want to talk about what Hitler is going to be doing in 1935.
Some people are trying to stop Hitler. Some people are talking about Hitler.
It’s 2026.
I’m saying we should stop Trump now, in 2026.
You aren’t trying to stop Trump in 2026. You just want to talk about what Trump is going to be doing in 2028.
I’m trying to stop Trump. You’re talking about Trump.
Are you ever going to get it into your thick fucking skull that WE can try to stop Trump in 2026 and talk about what Trump is going to be doing in 2028?
I’d like to read those conversations, if you can find and link to them.
And what did the Nazis do that was against the law?
This is the heart of the matter here. Awful things are happening now, which must be stopped. But you can and should game out all the scenarios, including the positive ones, while planning effective resistance.
We now have two intellectually dishonest fucking idiots on that side of the argument.
And to be crystal clear: neither of those would be you.
You can’t.
You simply can’t.
It’s a metaphysical impossibility.
Haven’t you heard??
That’s one of the things I truly do not understand.
If you do not consider the implications of something seemingly neutral that Trump proposes then how could you know what you should oppose until it’s too late?
Just for grins … a post from much earlier in this thread:
I stand by this position.
What I would like to see (and probably never will) is something like: “When I kept saying for everyone to calm down and realize that he doesn’t post much of a threat, that calmer minds will prevail, that he won’t go far, that this will all blow over etc. …I. Fucked. UP. I apologize.”
In my opinion over-the-top political obliteration was totally called for, but it is probably too late now.
Keep telling yourself that. It’s patently, stupidly untrue, but we get that you need to believe it.
We are trying to stop what Trump is doing now and what he has planned for the future. And if you remain wilfully ignorant of what he has planned for the future, you’ll always be three steps behind and ineffectually fighting the last war.
So, a guy in 1933 saying Hitler shouldn’t be supported because he wants to murder all the Jews was, effectively, complicit in allowing the Holocaust to happen, because he talked (accurately) about things Hitler explicitly said he wanted to do, but hadn’t done yet?
There are MILLIONS in the USA standing up to Trump. The rest of the entire world despises him and understand that he is a complete fool that only cares about himself.
Yet, here we are.
Thank you for the kind words. I have come to accept after reading some more of this thread that Nemo is not worth anyone’s time to argue with. His rhetoric, while not racist or supremacist in and of itself, is deeply rooted in white systems and white narratives that he clearly has not unpacked. It’s not worth arguing what is genocide, or what marginalized communities have a right to be afraid of and preparing for, with someone who is not yet ready to give up their “right to comfort” ideas, or overall just hasn’t fully analyzed and unpacked how pervasive these bigoted systems are.
I’ve retyped this overall a few times just because I really want to make this clear:
He is very clearly standing in his best opposition to these people, and that is great. I will always take another person on my side in the fight against bigots, and Nemo is definitely on my side.
My claim, as it stands, is that the rhetoric he uses is in style, format, sometimes basis, etc, rooted in white systems, white narratives, or in the base ideas of white supremacist rhetoric. It is not at ALL an accusation of harboring personally bigoted viewpoints, solely pointing out a style of rhetoric that is entrenched in it’s own whiteness in a way that is at times harmful or counter intuitive to a productive argument.
I believe he means well, and means no harm, but at the end of the day he is still behaving like he is throughout this thread and proving that he is not worthwhile to engage in discussion with.
Also misogyny. That’s been my point.
ETA: To clarify, misogyny is part of white supremacy culture. But it doesn’t always come to mind as such, so I feel it’s worth highlighting on its own.
Yes, this.
Or, let’s say you have a time machine, but every time you die it resets. You go back in time to 1933 with the powers of a regular German citizen and the intent to stop the holocaust. Dozens of attempts turn into hundreds, hundreds into thousands, until eventually you come to the inevitable conclusion that by 1933, anti-fascist German citizens had already lost. What would you say to a hypothetical German who, whether they knew it’s inevitabiliy or not, described the situation accurately? “Hitler is doing illegal things now, he’s going to do much worse, and there’s basically nothing any of us normies can do to stop him.”
If you don’t accept that 1933 was already at that point, then substitute 1936 or whatever year you want. At some point, the doomsayers weren’t being pessimistic, they were just right.
It’s the same thing with climate change. We (humanity) lost. There’s nothing we can do to stop catastrophic global warming anymore. It’s done. Acknowledging that is just living in reality.
Could we be wrong about how bad the situation in America has gotten? Maybe. But attacking us on ideological grounds for “hurting the cause” when there’s a chance we’re just the sane ones seems bizarre.
Have you packed a bug-out bag? I need to do that. It’s looking like we trans people may need to flee the country at a moment’s notice to avoid being put in concentration camps. I am dead serious.
(my bolding)
This post has gone by without comment so far.
I realize this isn’t the thread to express hope about the eventual outcomes of Trump’s second term. Still, it’s worth pointing out that if you follow liberal Substack (e.g. Heather Cox Richardson, Jay Kuo, Simon Rosenberg, et al), it’s frequently pointed out that the overall US judicial system – even the Supreme Court at times – is generally working against the Trump administration and is generally doing so effectively.
Now, when Trump and/or his lackeys are beaten back in the courts and knuckle under, the press often doesn’t report on it. I guess the opposite case sells better.
I don’t believe Trump can or will be stopped suddenly – the way 10th-story plate glass stops a bird in flight. I prefer a somewhat more complicated analogy: a track-&-field stadium.
Trump, the DOJ, the Project 2025 crew, ICE, what have you – they started off running around the track unimpeded and covering lots of track. Constitutional guardrails, protests, injunctions, and lost court cases are like so many spoonfuls of sand being strewn upon the track. At first, the sand makes no real difference and the Trump crew keep circling the track apace. Eventually, though, after many spoonfuls of sand have been deposited … the runners are running on an inch-deep layer. It doesn’t slow them down too much, but it’s a slight hindrance.
By and by, the spoonfuls have kept going and the sand is at ankle depth. Eventually, to mid-calf and later knee deep. And the spoonfuls keep coming. Little by little, spoon by spoon, the worst most damaging actions of the Trump administration are not – SLAM! – stopped cold. Rather, they are slowed – eventually to a pace that is (hopefully) functionally equivalent to being stopped.
Anyway, that’s kind of what Elizabeth Booker Houston is telling us, I think. Spoonfuls of sand are still being dropped onto the track. There’s been a bunch already, and there are a bunch to come … regardless of whether it makes good press or biting social-media content.
It’s a good point, and worth considering. My counterpoint is that Trump’s court losses very often feel strategic. They lost on Abrego Garcia, yes, but meanwhile they were deporting hundreds or thousands of people to El Salvador. So the good guys fought for one of them, and won, and after sucking up so much attention and energy from those good guys. Meanwhile, all the Trump jagoffs had to do was lie and file AI generated motions.
The 5 year old and his dad returned to Minneapolis, but once again, that one case consumed tons of effort from well meaning people, while the bad guys continue to arrest and detain people illegally.
They are swarming the courts, they fight every case and then back down at the last second, because why not? They’re still getting away with literal murder on a regular basis. They can take their lumps as long as the playing field is so convoluted that they can keep sneaking across the goal line without anyone noticing.
…they would hate you for using their name to make a shitty argument on the internet. Just let them rest in peace already. If you had a decent argument (and you don’t) you wouldn’t need to use them as a shield.