The last few months have been difficult in these United States, though it has become obvious that we are no longer “united”.  The blue progressive states lie in two distinct regions, one to the northwest and the other to the northeast, with a vast swathe of Republican red between them, with a few exceptions.  In truth, if “did not vote” had also received electoral votes in the last election, they would have received more of those votes than either the Democratic or Republican candidates.  Something is severely broken in America.

I am torn between mockery and pity for the Republican voters who cast their votes for a person who was plainly telling them lies and are now finding that out the hard way as they lose their jobs and see promised benefits yanked away like Lucy playing football with Charlie Brown.  Even sadder, because so many of those voters are motivated by values based in hatred for anyone who isn’t exactly like them, they will be reticent to join those of us who tried to warn them they were being lied to.  They will fail to see the common ground that exists between us, which is what is needed to build a popular force strong enough to repel the capitalist and Christofascist forces now in control of our country.

And that is what those forces wanted and needed in order to secure their victory last November.  They needed a country divided by hatred and intolerance and distracted by propaganda, misinformation, and disinformation so they could go about their nefarious work.  Now the country is nearly evenly split into thirds: those who thrive on hate and fear, those who thrive on love and inclusion, and those who are mired in understandable disgust and betrayal for the entire system because they never received promised benefits from either side.  Those who have their sights set on a truly peaceful and loving future have their work cut out for them.

For a time after the election, I was numb and in shock.  It took a month and a half for that shock to wear off, and I sat sobbing on my porch as I said the words, “I don’t know what to do,” over and over again about a week before Christmas.  Then after Inauguration Day amidst the blizzard of awful executive orders, I experienced despair as I again struggled with feelings of helplessness and powerlessness.  This was alleviated by our church’s efforts to provide avenues of engagement in activism, as well as by the recognition that inducing those feelings as well as a sense of being alone is exactly what those in power want us to feel.  My mantra became “don’t give them what they want” and I tried to find ways to resist, however small.

I had to temper my desire to engage with the realities of my mental health, though.  I can only handle so much input before I become overwhelmed and enraged, and then I am no longer effective at resisting.  I need my critical thinking skills clear and intact in order to do what I do best, which I’ve discovered is writing emails, letters, and blog posts.  I am no good at showing up to rallies and other public gatherings, not only because I don’t like noisy crowds, but because I have a temper and know that I would deal poorly with a belligerent fascist getting in my face.  I’d wind up in a hospital handcuffed to my bed.

Instead, I try to remember that I am just one person in a passive-resistant army of multiple tens of millions.  Each one of us has our pet issues we are working to defend: women’s rights, LGBTQ+ rights, immigrant rights, Black rights, other minority rights, religious and spiritual freedom, economic justice, climate change action, and much more.  Right now in my particular city, I and others are working to defend funding for the public library, an on-call task force that handles people experiencing mental health crises to keep the police out of that arena, plus numerous other community services that are under threat if Republican business interests have their way and get that funding cut.

It’s frustrating work.  For every step forward, there is often another step backward.  It’s a very slow march that is often infuriating as we encounter pushback from forces that believe only wealthy, white, straight male Christians are entitled to a life free from as much suffering as possible.  They honestly believe it is their God-given duty to control and condemn everyone else that isn’t like them.

The religious element to all of this is probably the most troubling, and therefore the most difficult to deal with.  Once a person believes wholeheartedly they are doing God’s will, it is nigh impossible to get them to change their minds about the attitudes and values they hold as a result of that belief.  Trying to point out how the way they are doing things actually contradicts the vast majority of Jesus’ words only causes cognitive dissonance that forces them to dig in their heels and double-down on their contradictory hatred.  It also invokes their ego and makes them feel like you’re not just attacking their beliefs, you’re attacking them as a person.  It’s a personal game that cannot be won.

Which means the only way to succeed is to outnumber them, a lofty goal that will require a great deal of work on the part of not just ordinary citizens, but also the politicians that represent us.  They must be sent a clear message that the business-as-usual politics of pandering to lobbyists and oligarchs will no longer be tolerated.  Our country’s system of political success via cash and ass-kissing must be completely revamped.  Politicians must live up to the ideals of a true representative democracy and government “of, by, and for the people”.

Destruction of those ideals is why so many people don’t even bother voting anymore.  They no longer feel like their voice matters, so why bother participating?  Progressive voters and politicians need to reach out to that huge block of non-voters and attempt to regain their trust, if we can.  It is probably impossible to reach out to those whose political opinions are driven by hate and fear, but it’s probably a lot easier to make a good faith demonstration to the disenfranchised and the betrayed.  With their help and solidarity, we can overcome those who make their decisions based on prejudice, discrimination, and false purity.

Once fascism is defeated, policies can be enacted that benefit everyone, including those who cast votes for fascism in the first place under false pretenses.  A lot of those people did so because, like many of the non-voters, they felt like their needs weren’t listened to, and they fell under the spell of a person who told them exactly what they wanted to hear.  Regrettably, they’re now finding out what the rest of us tried desperately to tell them for the last ten years: that he and his friends were lying just to get their vote.  As I said, I sometimes feel mocking schadenfreude, but I feel just as much pity for them.  As angry as I sometimes am at them, I still do not feel anyone deserves to lose their job for being a woman, regardless of how they voted.  I hope it’s making them think, though, as they search for a new job.

Some people, though, will be immune to changing their outlook no matter what happens.  The biological and psychological drive to belong to a group is incredibly strong due to our survival mechanisms.  It’s easier to survive in a group than it is to do so alone.  Being shunned and ostracized for holding different ideals than one’s in-group, whether it’s a family, a social circle, or a church, is potentially one of the scariest and most traumatizing things a person can go through unless they possess a particularly fierce sense of self-reliance and independence.  The psychological pressures induced by the authority figures in our lives are incredibly strong, those of parents, grandparents, religious leaders, and even friends.  It takes great strength to recognize that the people that surround you are doing something wrong, even greater strength to make a stand against that thing and endure the inevitable punishment, and yet even more strength to walk away from them.

Until the day fascism is defeated, I will continue doing what I’ve been doing for the last five months: trying to stay informed as much as my mental health will allow, looking for sources of goodness (of which there are many), and engaging in both passive and active resistance, also accounting for my mental limits.  I am also trying to stay in the present moment and attempting to avoid catastrophizing about the future.  Right here, right now, things are relatively okay for us.  I know that may change in the future, but I can’t worry about that or allow myself to fall into a hole of “what if?”  That way lies actual madness for me.

I also remember I am not alone in this fight, and the words of Mr. Rogers: “Look for the helpers.”  Whenever possible, I try to be one of the helpers, if only in small ways.  To help our church with the recent Buying Blackout, I created a spreadsheet of recommended local businesses to support, and added “Boycott Big Money” to my mantra of “don’t give them what they want”.  Now we buy most of our groceries from local health food stores instead of big chains and have stopped eating fast food, resulting in more ethical spending right here where we live and healthier eating.  Win-win!

I leave you with a list of motivational thoughts that are also ways to passively resist this fascist, oligarch-driven madness.

• Don’t give them what they want: fear, despair, futility, helplessness, powerlessness, overwhelm.  They want us to feel like we can do nothing in the face of the onslaught of fascist politicians and oligarchs.  THIS IS NOT TRUE. There are many things we can do to fight back.
• SPENDING
  • Boycott Big Money: avoid spending money with unethical mega-corporations unless absolutely necessary.  Seek out progressive and local options as alternatives.  If Big Harmful Money is your only option for something, ask yourself if you really need that thing or service or if you can do without it.
  • Support local and immigrant, minority, women, and LGBTQ+ owned businesses: Big Money has harmed and destroyed many local businesses over recent decades, and even destroyed whole towns, i.e. WalMart.  Stop rewarding them for their evil by falling prey to their cheap prices.  We’ve been slowly conditioned to expect unreasonably low prices.  See if your budget will support somewhat higher prices at businesses that are more ethical and part of your community.  Buy in bulk at local food co-ops to support your community and save cash.
• ACTIVISM
  • Use your words to fight anonymously and locally: speak up and speak out at all levels of the government, from your local council members on up to the Executive Branch.  Do so safely, though, using only your initials and creating a separate free ProtonMail address just for activist purposes in the event that the government begins to target activists.
• HEALTH
  • Head down, chin up: for personal safety, keep a low profile, and for peace of mind, keep your spiritual chin up.
  • Stay healthy physically, mentally, and spiritually: healthcare has become one of the oligarchs biggest sources of cash, if not THE biggest.  Deny them this income by keeping yourself as healthy as possible on all levels.  Exercise, eat healthy, meditate, engage with spiritual community, and do everything possible to stay healthy and out of the healthcare system. 
  • Be mindful of ruminating, demonizing, catastrophizing, and combat mode: it’s easy to become overwhelmed by the daily avalanche of bad news.  When this happens, give yourself permission to take time off and focus on yourself, especially if you find yourself  falling into mental holes.  You are one person among millions engaged in battle, it will go on without you for a couple of days.  Even soldiers have to rotate on and off the battlefront.
  • Take life one day (or hour) at a time: do your best to live in the present day or even hour if you find yourself rueing the past or fearing the future.  The past is gone and can’t be changed, and the future isn’t here yet.  Live and work in the present time to hopefully prevent the future that we all fear. 
  • “Take your pills, engage in self care, live to flip off the world another day” – SpaceMom-Princess Leia/Carrie Fisher
  • Be nice to yourself: if you find your opinion of yourself flagging for any reason or find you are speaking to yourself unkindly, say positive affirmations to yourself, such as “I am enough”, “I am strong”, and “I am wise”. 
  • Enjoy the Silence of Nature: immerse yourself in Nature whenever possible to get away from so-called reality and remind yourself of something that’s more important than almost anything else: your connection to the living world and the people within it.  Watch the birds fly and imagine yourself as one of them without the troubled cares we all currently share.  Watch the River flow by and let it take those troubled cares away.  Look at the misty tree-covered hills and mountains and imagine yourself as a cloud.  If possible, take a day trip to the coast and just sit watching the waves roll in, casting your worries in the form of rocks into the water to be washed away.
  • Create beauty: if you don’t already, do something creative, like art, writing, and music.  Don’t let inner judgment stop you from doing this, we are all capable of creating beauty.  Let your intuition guide you to the best tool to do this, and when you sit down to be creative, don’t think: just feel and let your creativity flow.  Be proud of whatever comes out, it represents your inner self, which is always beautiful.
  • Stop apologizing: if you’re like me, you may find yourself constantly apologizing for not being “good enough” or “strong enough”.  This wears down your soul and erodes your self-confidence, which is what they want.  Don’t give it to them!  Those who would oppress us depend on people with weakened hearts, spirits, and souls.  Praise yourself for your strengths and focus on them rather than your perceived weaknesses.
  • Maintain inner peace: don’t let the onslaught of bad news shatter your inner peace: they depend on this.  If you find yourself getting rattled, take a step back and engage in self-care of some kind.  Go for a walk in the Forest or by the River, call or text a friend, get your thoughts out in a journal so they’re not living in your head, make a piece of art or music.
  • Maintain Faith and Hope: those in power want us to feel as though there is no hope for progress, justice, and equality and to shatter our faith in the goodness of humanity.  They want us to give up, and we cannot allow them to make us feel this way, or else they really will get their way.  Seek out positive news from places like Reasons To Be Cheerful and stay engaged with like-minded people and communities.
  • Remember the Truth of Impermanence: Buddhist philosophy teaches us that absolutely nothing is permanent: all things end eventually, and so will this reign of terror.  However, it is often the uncertainty of when suffering will end that causes us the most grief.  Engaging in the above practices will help ease that grief and suffering until we are finally released from this madness.