by Sunsara Taylor
May 25 An organized movement of fascist trolls is systematically “doxxing”—looking up and publishing the home addresses and many other personal details of—thousands of people who courageously added their names to the Call to Action from Refuse Fascism which declares: “NO! In the Name of Humanity —We REFUSE to Accept a Fascist America! Drive Out the Trump/Pence Regime!”
This attack is a cowardly and craven violation of people’s privacy and threat against their right to stand up for what they believe to be true and right free of harassment and intimidation. This attack should disgust and motivate every person of decency and conscience. Not only should everyone who signed this statement be defended if they come under attack, thousands more must be rallied to step forward, sign the Call to Action, and join in driving out the fascist Trump/Pence Regime.
A Hideous Glimpse of a Fascist Future
The Refuse Fascism Call to Action begins: “The Trump/Pence Regime is a Fascist Regime. Not insult or exaggeration, this is what it is. For the future of humanity and the planet, we, the people, must drive this regime out.” A version of this Call was published as a full-page ad in the New York Times and the Washington Post and Refuse Fascism has been important in leading people very broadly to recognize the fascist nature of the Trump/Pence Regime and in rallying many thousands to stand up to and join the fight to drive them from power. This is very important—and clearly the fascists were stung.
Reading the comments in the chat rooms of fascist trolls is like bathing in raw sewage. Grotesque white supremacy, racist epithets and Nazi cartoons of Jews permeate. Misogyny—graphic threats of sexual violence, posting and reposting a photo of a woman being punched hard in the face—oozes through it all. The language of violence, of extermination, of racial purification resounds. They invoke the fascist head of Turkey who summarily imprisoned, tortured, and disappeared tens of thousands: “Erdogan got it right when he sacked 21,000 teachers who were fomenting dissent in the hearts and minds of the turkish youth.” They uphold the notorious anti-communist Senator Joseph McCarthy who launched vicious witch-hunts that destroyed thousands of lives. They proudly extol the fascists of Mussolini in Italy. They call for “Anyone in law enforcement with access to the NCIC [National Crime Information Center]” among them to illegally abuse this access to “find out what state [the signers] live in and get their address, what kind of car they drive, vehicle registration number, DOB, and in some cases, their SSN.”
It’s a window into the hate-filled, violence-craving fascists who have been whipped up and consciously unleashed by the Trump/Pence Regime—and to the future they are fighting for. These fascists are out for blood, and will not stop until they have destroyed all opposition—or, until they are defeated.
Not a “Fringe Movement”—Foot-Soldiers to a Fascist Regime
This is not some lunatic “fringe” movement and it will not go away if it is ignored. These people have been summoned and unleashed by the Trump/Pence fascist cabal now occupying the White House, dominating the “Justice” Department, being packed onto the courts, controlling Congress and almost all the state houses.
In his campaign, Trump didn’t merely “dog-whistle” to these modern day Brown Shirts,[1] he stood before the watching world and sneered about those who protested at his rallies, “I’d like to punch him in the face!” Trump openly longed for the days when protesters were “carried out on stretchers.” Trump declared undying loyalty to his crowds as they chanted “Lock Her Up!” and thumped chests bearing t-shirts proclaiming towards Hillary—really towards all women—“Trump that Bitch!” Everyone not deluding themselves or others knows that, “Make America Great Again” has always meant “Make America WHITE Again.” And every day since being elected, the Trump/Pence Regime has wielded the power of the state to carry this forward: threatening the press, attacking the courts, demonizing and attempting to ban Muslims, ramping up deportations of immigrants, issuing the murderous, anti-abortion global gag order, launching witch-hunts against scientists, threatening of nuclear war, introducing a sadistic budget, and more.
Mounting Frustration—Even Rage—From Trump’s Social Base
But the Regime has also run into obstacles. Starting the day after the inauguration with the Women’s March, millions of people have taken to the streets in repeated waves of protest involving students, scientists, immigrants, environmentalists, and more. There have been statements and concerts and professional athletes snubbing White House invitations. The courts—even as they are being threatened and remade by the Regime’s appointments—have pushed back, twice blocking his Muslim Ban. The media—even as it normalizes the Regime—still dares to expose some of its lies and crimes. Powerful figures within the FBI refused to treat Trump as “above the law” and now several investigations are underway against the Regime’s doings.
None of this has stopped the Regime, but these obstacles have fueled a palpable frustration—even rage —that is bubbling up from Trump and from his fascist social base. Things aren’t advancing as quickly or as smoothly as they want. Many feel very deeply that Trump is their “last chance” and they don’t intend to let this chance slip away. This is the context for what can only be described as a dramatic escalation of storm-trooper tactics to terrorize and knock down any obstacle in their path.
A Dramatic Escalation in Shock-Troop Tactics
In recent weeks, the level of fascist threats and violence has being ratcheted up. A KKK-style torch-light rally was held in Virginia against the removal of a Confederate statue. A Mississippi state representative publicly stated that people who remove Confederate statues “should be LYNCHED.” The neighborhoods of a Jewish and Muslim leader were blanketed with threatening flyers. Hundreds of fascist militia-types converged on downtown Berkeley, outraged that Ann Coulter’s speaking event at UC Berkeley had been canceled.
Pull a thread in most of the purportedly “grassroots” fascist outpourings and you can find powerful donors and influential operatives in—or close to—the Trump/Pence Regime. For example, the Young American Foundation (YAF), the organization behind the wave of fascist provocateurs spewing racism and whipping up fascist foot solders on campuses (including Ann Coulter at Berkeley), received ten million dollars from members of the Devos family (Betsy Devos is Trump’s Secretary of Education). Several of YAF’s alumni occupy top positions in Trump’s administration. Also, the campaign currently underway to intimidate CUNY School of Public Health into dis-inviting Women’s March leader Linda Sarsour from a scheduled commencement speech is backed by fascist powerhouses like Sean Hannity, Breitbart, and Milo Yiannopoulos.
All this—and much more that could be listed—is exactly the kind of thing Refuse Fascism warned against in its statement, saying (in part): “Fascism foments and relies on xenophobic nationalism, racism, misogyny, and the aggressive re-institution of oppressive ‘traditional values.’ In Trump’s election campaign he encouraged and fed on the threat and use of violence to build a movement and come to power. In his inaugural address he pledged allegiance only to this movement. What is crucial to understand is that once in power fascism essentially eliminates traditional democratic rights.”
Defy Fascist Intimidation—Drive the Fascists From Power
The current wave of fascist attacks is aimed at silencing anyone who would stand up against the Trump/Pence fascist regime. It is part of consolidating fascism—and going forward to destroy the lives of millions of Muslims, women, immigrants, refugees, LGBT people, Black people and others who are not white, people around the world threatened by U.S. war and nuclear weapons, and threatens the planet itself.
This must not be allowed!
Defying and defeating the growing wave of fascist attacks on the people is not a distraction from the fight against fascism, it is integral to it. No movement against injustice has ever advanced without having to defy intimidation and attempts to crush it—and, through doing so, growing stronger. This is the lesson of the Freedom Riders who, when the first waves were beaten and arrested, sent wave after wave of other young people after them until the jails of Mississippi were full, the whole world was watching, and they began to break the back of Jim Crow. A more recent example is when more than 10,000 professors and others who responded to a McCarthyite Professor’s Watchlist launched after Trump’s election by publicly adding their own names to the list.
Every person of conscience must have the backs of anyone who comes under attack. People need to condemn and defy this intimidation and join the movement to stand up to and drive out this fascist regime and all the ugliness it is unleashing by adding their names to the Refuse Fascism Call to Action. Read and spread the statement from Refuse Fascism, responding to this outrageous doxxing attack. Join Refuse Fascism in manifesting the power of NO! on signs, stickers, in windows, on bumper stickers, on t-shirts and spreading the unifying demand: NO! In the Name of Humanity—We REFUSE to Accept a Fascist America! Drive Out the Trump/Pence Regime. Join Refuse Fascism in meeting each new outrage committed by the Regime with greater and greater resistance. Most of all, join Refuse Fascism in ORGANIZING: working with creativity and determination toward the time when millions of people can be moved to fill the streets of cities and towns day after day and night after night, declaring this whole regime illegitimate—Demanding, and Not Stopping, Until the Trump/Pence Regime Is Driven from Power. Click here to volunteer.
This is what humanity and future generations need from us. Everyone—coming from a great diversity of political perspectives—should join in. As it says in the closing words of the Call to Action: “Let it not be said that we did not move heaven and earth to drive out this regime. This must be a moment in history when millions stand together with conviction and courage, overcoming fear and uncertainty, to resist and say NO! Not just for ourselves, but in the name of humanity.”
[1] Brown Shirts were a brutal paramilitary wing of the Nazis which played a significant role in Hitler’s rise to power.