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The way forward is through the places we live

Pabio November 8, 2024

For a year or more, our concern has been the future of the presidency; in particular, the question of whether Americans could actually re-elect Donald Trump, a convicted felon and fascist (the opinion of his former advisers) wordsnot just mine) who attempted to stage a violent coup when he lost his 2020 re-election bid. We now know how the majority of Americans feel, and we know what will happen. With President-elect Trump having secured a mandate, our priority in the near future must be to protect each other, recognize who is most vulnerable among us, and find strength in community.

This is the antithesis of what Trump and his wealthy backers like Elon Musk represent. Their vision of America is a top-down inversion of society in which rights and freedoms are granted to an untouchable class of overlords and stolen from women, racial minorities, and immigrants. So for the next four years or more, our guiding vision must be based on three essential elements: direct action, mutual aid and, as Rep. Ayanna Pressley (D-Mass.) once said, centering the experiences of those who are “closest to the pain” as we work for a better world.

It’s a very good thing that Massachusetts voters gave State Auditor Diana DiZoglio the power to shine a light on our opaque, unresponsive and unproductive legislature, by vote “yes” to question 1— which asked voters to decide whether the auditor should be able to investigate our legislative branch. If we are to have any hope of protecting the Commonwealth from the most destructive and extractive policies unleashed by the Trump-Vance administration, we will need publicly accountable state leadership that can meet the moment. disastrous situation we find ourselves in. If House and Senate leaders oppose DiZoglio’s audits, then all of us who voted for the audits should be ready to fight back.

We cannot allow despair or grief to siphon our energy, because we are going to have to do a lot of grassroots mobilizing and lobbying over the next four years. By January, each of us should have the numbers of our senator and representative in our phone contact list, because we will be calling and stalking them regularly. We will urge them to use every lever of state power to save lives, because these are the issues of the moment. Under plans announced by Trump, immigrants, including asylum seekers, will be targeted for deportation. Women and LGBTQ+ people risk losing access to essential health services. And Trump will undoubtedly try to take away what few resources the poor and homeless currently have.

If our leaders prove incapable of doing this job, we must fire and replace them. This is no small feat in a state with some of the least competitive elections in America, but it’s part of the work we now share at the local level.

Local policies that strengthen the rights and lives of state residents are not something we can hope to see happen or maintain. Consider the recent speech by House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.). slide about Republicans pledging to destroy the Affordable Care Act if Trump wins. We can prepare now, by engaging with our state leaders and demanding a plan for what would happen if people with pre-existing conditions were suddenly stripped of their health coverage. This demand can be expressed at public meetings and in public assemblies, and in the streets if necessary, through emergency demonstrations in the places where our legislators operate.

Just as Americans mobilized at airports in 2017 when the Trump-Pence administration banned Muslim travelers from entering the United States, we must be prepared to bring that mobilization back to other places, like health centers. detention or police stations – in case Trump makes a good show. on his cruel promise to execute “the largest deportation in American history» – or in health care facilities in the event of a much-feared federal ban on abortions and other reproductive health services.

We cannot allow despair or grief to siphon our energy, because we are going to have to do a lot of grassroots mobilizing and lobbying over the next four years.

Even our workplaces are set to become battlefields, as Trump and his allies plan to launch a assault on labor laws that give us the power to organize for better wages and better working conditions. The good news is that there is something you can do without wasting time persuading politicians; you can join a union or try to unionize your colleagues. The labor movement, which has been considerably reduced since the Reagan eramade promises winnings over the last few years. Unions will be a crucial bulwark against Trump and the plutocrat class, and it’s time for more of us to be part of them. (Even as a freelancer, for now, I’m exploring how I might proceed.)

It may seem counterintuitive to devote more attention to our local leaders and our environment as the horizon burns.. But localized political action produces the most visible changes in our daily lives, for better or worse. Using our voices and our bodies to help protect Massachusetts residents from the worst of Trump, Vance and company will prevent deaths. It will also force us to address some of Massachusetts’ most chronic and neglected vulnerabilities, like our shortage of affordable housing, which undermines our conception of the state as this liberal bubble in an increasingly red tide. If people can’t afford to live here, we will lose them to this tide, as we have already seen in recent years with the population decline of the Greater Boston area. Excluded families are most likely dumped into red states where the consequences of Trump will be even worse.

But in my opinion, the most essential reason to embrace more localized political engagement, in the context of American fascism, is that it requires us to spend more time with each other. This requires a kind of social cross-pollination that has been in decline in recent years, to the detriment of our health and happiness. This can take many forms. This might include checking in on a neighbor with a health problem, contributing to community support networks or abortion funds, or simply spending more time each week talking with your loved one. family or friends – resisting the atomizing lure of social media, Netflix and others. accessories of these lonely and frightening times. By spending more time together and helping each other find our way through the darkness, we will increase our chances of retaining a vision of a better world than the one Trump has to offer; a vision you can persuade people to fight for, as the scorched earth reality of Trump’s policies comes into play.

This is the way forward, and it flows through the places we live, through ourselves and through each other. If there was going to be a seismic catalyst for this, I would have preferred it not to be the re-election of Donald Trump. But it is the fire that we must now cross, arm in arm.

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