Sam welcomes back onto the show Anthony DiMaggio and Henry Giroux to discuss their latest book Fascism on Trial: Education and the Possibility of Democracy. Dr. Henry A. Giroux is a renowned educator and author of multiple books on fascism and pedagogy. He holds the Chair for Scholarship in the Public Interest in English and Cultural Studies at McMaster University, Canada. Follow Dr. Giroux on Twitter at @HenryGiroux and visit his website at henryagiroux.com. Dr. Anthony R. DiMaggio is a Professor of Political Science at Lehigh University, USA. He is the author of Rising Fascism in America: It Can Happen Here. Read his writings at Counterpunch and Salon.
Transcript:
this is a fascism that expands the logic of disposability we’re not just talking about a specific group now we’re talking
about anybody who doesn’t fit into this white Christian nationalist notion so what’s at stake here is a shrinking of
the Public’s fear and a shrinking of the notion of who counts as a citizen and who doesn’t counter as a citizen isn’t
just excluded but now are the objects of potential violence if not elimination people don’t recognize what fascism
actually is to the point where they may be embracing many elements of it in a sort of dressed up form more diplomatic
language you need to build a movement so where does that start it starts with you know average people it starts with people who are willing to do these
things in alternative media people in higher ed who are willing to sort of stick their neck out there’s really no excuse in these situations for people
not to be taking these things seriously because we’re the people who are going to have to build this [Music]
movement [Music]
welcome to episode 196 of the refuse fascism podcast a
podcast brought to you by volunteers with refuse fascism I’m Sam Goldman one
of those volunteers and host of the show and as you can hear I have a bit of a
sinus infection and I apologize for the sound of my voice refuse fascism exposes
analyzes and stands against the very real danger and threat of fascism coming
to power in the United States and as we’ll get into more in this episode but I want to say upfront fascism is not
just a gross combination of horrific reactionary policies it is not the worst
of all insults we can sling it is a qualitative change in how Society is
governed what is crucial to understand is that once in power fascism
essentially eliminates traditional democratic rights I want to extend a warm welcome to New listeners and a
thanks to everyone who shares this show to help reach more people during a year
when I think we can all agree refusing fascism is needed more than ever after you listen to the show be sure to share
it with others click the share button in your app to send this episode to a friend or 10 or let the world know why
you listen by raing and reviewing on Apple podcast or your listening platform of choice today we’re sharing a
conversation I had with Anthony dagio and Henry jro esteemed academics Friends
of the show and authors of the new book fascism on trial education and the
possibility of democracy I want to also add that long before many were
recognizing the fascist threat Henry was an initiator of refus fascism adding his
name to the call to action to stop Trump and Pence before they come to power in the name of humanity we refuse to accept
a fascist America which called for a month of massive resistance and this was
issued in December of 2016 an Tony and Henry were signers of the pledge to all
the people of the world in the name of humanity we refused to accept a fascist America the Trump Pence regime must go
that was written by Andy Z and COK do members of the refuse fash editorial
board in November of 2020 I want to share a few thoughts from this past week
as they relate to the accelerating Republic fashist threat first it’s worth noting that in addition to his golden
sneakers Trump is now Hawking a trump branded Bible let’s be frank yes it’s a money-making scheme yes as many have
pointed out Trump has often seemed entirely ignorant of the contents of the Bible but those facts have too often
covered over the point point that what Trump is aiming to do is consolidate a fascist theocracy and any hypocrisy or
ignorance of scripture on his part is incidental at best to his ability to
lead that process it’s extremely dangerous to laugh this off like many
theocrats before him religion is fundamentally a means to an end violent
patriarchal reactionary and most importantly in this regard unobstructed
power we’ve seen this and more on display just this week as reports came out that the RNC is interrogating
staffers and new hires on their views on the 2020 election as a litmus test for
loyalty to Trump unencumbered by evidence or any loyalty to nominally Fair elections relatedly the threats
against election workers which began at Trump’s Direction in 2020 have escalated
to the point that states are beginning to consider changing voting protocol in order to insulate the process and the
people from magga violence mulling the increased use of ballot dropboxes and
Firearm bans at polling places the Department of Justice has been investigating these threats and at this
time at least 20 individuals have been charged for crossing the line from vague threats to criminal actions and speaking
of threats in this week’s edition of Trump’s openly threatening his political Rivals he used his truth Social account
to share an image of Biden hogtide on the back of a Maga pickup truck as the media continues to hem and ha about
whether these threats cross the line of decency we’re running out of Novel ways to scream from the rooftop that these
threats aren’t rhetorical that the fascist movement is actively developing the legal means and methods to literally
carry out these threats along with gassing up their loyal foot soldiers to
do so lastly we have to talk once more about misto and one of the two drugs
used together in well over half of abortions in this country and the case against it the Supreme Court entertained
this past week we’ve covered this extensively as the focus of previous episodes and commented on it even more
frequently as the case worked its way through the courts but now the court has
given us quite clear insight into where they stand and what might happen next if
AO and Thomas were to have their way this case could be used to revive the comto act that Victorian era obscenity
law that could ban mistone all abortions and even ban some forms of contraception
thankfully at this stage it seems that those two are alone in their interpretation so we can all breathe a
big sigh of relief right no because it’s clear that even if this case seems
destined to be decided against the plaintiffs on the basis of standing with the court keeping my of Prestone safe
from this challenge we are not even close to safe it’s a good thing that the majority seem to imply that this case
should never have been brought because no harm has been done to the fascist complainants and probably never will be
but as this court has signaled through actions like overturning Biden’s debt forgiveness they refused to combine the
reactionary agenda by only serving those withstanding and as Moira denigan points out in what has become something of a
tradition for this court quote if the opinion is written by a consern conservative it will likely operate as
something of an instruction manual describing the kind of case that the conservative legal movement could bring
that would successfully overturn the fda’s approval of Meer Prestone end quote meanwhile even without action by
the court if Trump or anyone like him does regain power they could technically just start Prosecuting people left and
right using the comto act as the court has never officially overturned it and
even if the plaintiffs lose one person who seems to be coming out on top is the
author of the opinion which brought the case to the Supreme Court the fascist Federal appeals court judge James ho a
Clarence Thomas acolyte seemingly being groomed to join him on the highest court
we’ll have more to say about this case and about the ongoing bore on women’s
lives and on abortion rights in future episodes and we’ll cover it when the
opinion is delivered in June there are other high stakes cases before the court
in the interim and stay tuned for more discussion of those with that here’s my
conversation with Tony and Henry today I am so glad to welcome back on to the
show Henry dero and Anthony dagio to discuss their latest book fascism on
trial education and the possibility of democracy Henry is holds the chair for
scholarship in the public interest in English and cultural studies at McMaster University in Canada and Anthony is a
professor of political science at Lehi University in Pennsylvania welcome back
thank you thanks for coming on thanks for having us so here we are eight years
into the horror show that is the truma scene and we still have people denying the fascism despite the coup attempt the
big lie the Muslim ban the rounding up of
immigrants the family separation all that was Trump’s term in office a debate
still rages as this movement Rises right back potentially into the White House
folks will call it authoritarianism when he speaks of being a dictator day one they’ll call it grift
when Trump sells his Bible they’ll call it performance not promise when he says
that there will be a blood bath should he not win first thought it would be
helpful to set the parameters of what fascism is and is not it’s at the heart of your book and I think is really worth
coming back to who wants to start with that I’ll say something and I want to
begin with the big lie the big lie is that it’s impossible to imagine fascism in the United States and what that
suggests is that if we going really talk about fascism we’re not just talking about Trump we’re talking about the longstanding conditions that basically
allowed it to move from the the the margins of society to the surface of society so in a sense fascism involves a
series of mobilizing passions and I think that Tony and I have focused on a few that are quite serious and I’ll just
mention a couple Central I think to our argument is that there’s one element of fascism that nobody wants to talk about
and that is white supremacy and the logic of disposability and how it works
and that if you look at fascist movements from the beginning of the KKK to what we see in in Hungary today with
the claim that mixed racing is the last thing we want in democracy you sort of begin to get a sense that we’re really
talking about a politics of racial cleansing it’s not just about anti-intellectualism it’s not just about
elevating Instinct over reason it’s not just about distain for the past it’s about a politics of elimination and that
element of elimination has many factors and many forces and I think that all too often people don’t focus on this enough
because the legacy of racial capitalism and the legacy of fascism is not something they want to argue for
particularly liberals in light of this false myth of American exceptionalism the way we’re talking
about in the book and the way that a lot of Scholars have talked about it historically is there’s like these basic Dimensions you know Henry mentioned
white supremacy but we’re also talking in the book about the glorification of violence whether it’s vigilante violence
of the Kyle writtenhouse variety or of the January 6 variety Trump has really sort of fully lionized these people now
he’s not even trying to hide it it has to do with the cult of personality and people BAS basically worshiping at the altar of a leader that more than you
know about two-thirds of trump supporters said that there’s nothing he could ever do that would make them not support him and obviously that’s a
cultish level of devotion the extreme misogyny where you can have a president and then a presidential candidate now
who not only openly brags about sexually assaulting women and grabbing them by their privates but also has been
convicted in civil court of sexual assault and rap and Christian nationalism too like you know whether
Trump himself sees himself as a legitimate Christian Nation or not or whatever he clearly has played that card
to Perfection here in terms of appealing to the Evangelical born again right in terms of his Supreme Court nominees in
terms of the rhetoric he uses in terms of tying this idea of the cult of personality to religion you know he used
to refer to himself as the chosen one infamously and so you got all these things coming together right and
especially not just the white nationalism and the heterosexism but the glorification of violence is what makes this particularly
dangerous with regards to trying to overthrow and overturn elections which however imperfect and flawed they are
clearly there is at least a rule of law there that isn’t supposed to be susceptible to people who just aren’t
happy with the result and then they want to use violence to get what they want these are some of the main Dimensions I think that we’re talking about in the
book that are key to understanding the Contemporary fascist moment I mean I think the other thing regarding the question of American exceptionalism is
the argument seems to be that America is incapable of moving towards fascism because after all it’s has a
longstanding Embrace of democracy however flawed which is often lost in the historical and political analyses
but I also think there’s something else I I think that you know if I may bre said something that we tend to not
remember and that is if you want to talk about fascism you better start talking about capitalism and it seems to me that
one of the things that we’ve explored in this book that I think is new is that just exactly how does Fascism emerge in
a different form and under what conditions how different are those conditions well you have the collapse of
capitalism its promises no longer matter they don’t care so they need to a new kind form of legitimation to sort of in
some way justify neoliberal capitalism and that justification now takes the form of violence a kind of endorsement
of lawlessness and language in the in the service of of violence it also takes the form in some ways of attempting to
convince people that the Real Enemy because the enemy friend distinction is Central to Fascism the real enemies are
black people the real enemies are brown people the Real Enemy are immigrants the Real Enemy are those and this I think is
crucial to the book this is a fascism that expands the logic of disposability
we’re not just talking about a specific group Jews as in the past now we’re
talking about anybody who doesn’t fit into what Tony knows better than I do this white Christian nationalist notion
so what’s at stake here is a shrinking of the Public’s fear and a shrinking of
the notion of who counts as a citizen and who doesn’t count as a citizen isn’t just excluded but now are the objects of
potential violence if not elimination and that’s an alarming signpost to say
the least that far exceeds it seems to me anything that we’ve seen in the past if it’s fully implemented I really
appreciate what you both were getting at there and what ran through your book as the centrality of this being a form of
rule that is overt brute force and I think that overtness is often lost
amongst those on the left who think about the continuity of Horrors that
have been integral to the American Experience who don’t want to see the
shift or the leap if you will and I think that in addition to that you were talking about where this comes from I
think is a very puzzling and challenging question for many people on how did we
get here and I think it opens up a lot of questions that as you talk about in your book and have to do with how people
see this country if we can bring ourselves to the idea that this could
happen here and that elements of this did happen here then what does that say about this country what does it say
about us this is a society where everything comes back to me and then there’s that reflection of
challenging the most common dear held beliefs about on and one’s nation and
the worlds that we’ve accepted I want to make an intervention here educ ation is Central to our book it’s not just about
brute violence it’s about the potential for brute violence and the Adoration of brute violence but the fact of the
matter is you have a shift in Mass Consciousness in this country because you have a collapse of Civic culture you have a collapse of educational
institutions you have a collapse of the notion of literacy and all of a sudden you have the merging of power the new
media and it seems to be everyday life in a way that constitutes what I would call a paradigm shift in the United
States if not globally you can’t change Consciousness forget it there isn’t going to a global resistance move and
it’s not going to be resistance based simply on the threat of violence it’s going to be on the recognition that this
doesn’t work it’s Dreadful it has to be overthrown and it’s a threat to any viable notion of democracy I would
follow up on that I mean you know as Henry knows better than anybody there’s been a real hollowing out of Education K
through 12 and Collegiate level because of neoliberalism and the idea that with
what’s called professionalization I think inaccurately there’s this idea that academics are objective and neutral
and they don’t get involved in contr ities and all that ends up happening there is that you end up siding with oppressors because as Howard Z used to
say you can’t be neutral on a moving train like these things are happening right so you’re either part of challenging them or you’re part of
sweeping them under the rug by not talking about them it’s nominal objectivity in the sense that people don’t talk about these issues like
fascism but in reality you’re fueling them by being denialists implicitly this
is something that filters down to many people who see themselves as liberal or left some of the survey work that I’ve
done that made it into the book looks at like these different metrics where you pose in very sort of diplomatic ways
words that are like really compatible with white nationalism by talking about how we have to really prioritize white
European culture or something well that’s white nationalism just because you say it diplomatically doesn’t mean it’s not white nationalism and you know
a lot of liberals country what people might want to admit people who identify as liberal you know they oftentimes go along with this stuff it might only be
one in five one in four one in three depending on the survey question but you have a lot of racism among liberal
Americans and even other people who report to be radical left in the sense that you know they often times don’t
want to talk about things like BLM or me too they see them as distractions from the larger real battle which is
capitalism and they’re not really seeing the ways in which sexism and racism and capitalism work together to oppress
people that willful blind spot among people who claim to be left is something that I’ve been dealing with for a long time I’m I know Henry has too it’s not
just on the right it’s not just people in the middle ignoring it it’s people on the left doing it too as Henry said Sam you mentioned this a minute ago and it’s
very crucial you know you said well people are so self- you know you’re talking about neoliberalism you know you’re talking
about a philosophy that makes the template for everything you’re talking about the elevation of self-interest
over social needs and you’re talking about many ways the way in which money drives politics but you’re also talking
about liberals who seem to believe that individuals alone responsible for their problems and I think that one of the
crucial factors in the rise of fascism in the United States is the inability to translate private issues into largic
systemic considerations that notion of literacy which depends on a notion of being able to train translate to
recognize where one fits into a system and to understand the totality of that system means that it gets fragmented it
gets disjointed that people can’t understand the connections and if they can’t blame themselves and feel utterly
alienated and lonely social atomization being a point that we’re talking about here then they end up in false
communities seduced by what I call the Swindle of fulfillment okay there’s a community here let’s hate blacks it’s
called white supremacy but I think that liberals particularly are really in some way so complicitous with this because
they really believe there’s nothing beyond the market they really believe there’s nothing Beyond individualism
they really believe the social contract is a drag they really believe that the notion of the social is not a place
where you can fight against the possibility of fascism and they don’t believe that education matters you have
people in this country Banning books you have people in this country criminalizing the behavior of Educators you are people in this country attacking
trans people there’s a lesson to be learned learn here right as Tony and I have said repeatedly and it’s not a
lesson just simply about fascism it’s a lesson about the conditions that produce it and what it means to learn from
history in order to recognize it one of the things that I think Henry you had
mentioned earlier in your remarks was the notion of this expanding Target
where Community after Community is dehumanized as you both get into in your
book The Perpetual othering one of the things that that I’ve struggled with people over who are kind of hamstrung in
this idea of feeling only safe with calling an authoritarianism what we face
or what we confront in Trump is that it it loses in my opinion this definite
content of dehumanization that there is a program and an ideology that is
driving this yes it is the evisceration of civil or Democratic rights but it’s
doing that relying on fomenting upon the vicious hatred of black folks of LGBT
folks of immigrant communities of people of Jewish ancestry the targets go on and
on and on often times that gets lost from the conversation and was something
that especially in a lot of academic conversations is completely lost is the
lives that this already affects and could affect I just wanted to underscore that as a appreciation for what’s
explored in in your book it was alluded to in things that both of you have said
so far but I think one of the biggest questions that I think is profoundly important for confronting and opposing
this threat is what is propelling this Fascism and why if folks voted Trump out
did the fascist movement not go away you have to be older to recognize that
there’s a counterrevolution going on in this country and it begins with the onslaught of the 60s the endless
democratization called for the democratization of the universities the rise of the social welfare state in a
more pronounced way and then bam 1980 and all of a sudden the power memo you
know starts to become operative and the right says look we are going to fight the left which means anybody who’s not
white and a nationalist or Christian nationalist that doesn’t believe in racism then we’ve got to get into the field of ideas we’ve got to take the
question of ideological struggle seriously so what do you have you have the emergence of Foundations you have
the emergence of policy centers you have the emergence of What I Call and Tony and I call anti-public intellectuals but
I think that you begin to have a cultural politics emerging unlike
anything we have ever seen coupled with the new media that basically is an insurrectional culture that’s what it is
it wants to kill democracy and it wants to make sure that nobody outside of what
Tony has described that privileged group of white people has any power in this counter ution takes many forms couple
that with the collapse of education and the attack on education as an absolutely
crucial critical element in the fight against fascism I think that there’s this push in the mainstream media about
the narratives of Democrats and Republicans battling for the votes of some abstract Center I’d love to hear
you speak more you spoke some about this ideology that’s driving this American
fascism your book speaks to fascism fundamental passions and what you call the fascists organizing passions this
space isn’t simply rational people who are going to lean one way or the other
and I think that That’s essential to understand and if there’s anything else that you wanted to say either of you
about what’s driving the members of this fascist movement to their beliefs the real problem is when we talk about this
is the denialism so if you ask people are you a fascist you could find like maybe one in ,00 people who would say
yeah I’m a fascist if you ask people if they’re white nationalists nobody’s going to say that explicitly they’re not going to say they’re a white supremacist
even the white supremacists who are openly white supremacist in terms of like their language alt-right types they
talk about white genocide or something right they turn it around if you look at the polls very few people want to identify as any of these things because
they are Savvy enough to know that it’ll come with a stigmatization because Americans have by and large convinced
themselves to a large extent at least that America’s gotten Beyond issues like racism and sexism it’s a huge number of Americans who believe these things
you have to change the wording for a lot of these questions the polling work that we’ve done and the polling work that other people have done they look at
these things like oh are you concerned that white majority in America is be going to become a minority they’re going
to be replaced and that there’s some sort of active effort on the part of the democratic party to replace white voters
with immigrants do you want to privilege and prioritize white European history
what about the blood of the nation this is a recent Trump one where he says the blood of the the country is being
poisoned by immigrants what he’s done is he sort of shifted what’s considered
mainstream in the Republican party and what people still might think is conservative to what is realistically a fascist rhetoric and he’s made it okay
for people to agree with these kinds of sentiments that they don’t in their minds associate with fascism because
they see fascism as something like historians overwhelmingly argue there something happened between the 19 and
1945 in countries called Italy and Germany and by people named Hitler and melini and that’s it end of the story
case closed and so when you have a country that’s been that hollowed out in terms of their understanding of the history of fascism people don’t
recognize what fascism actually is to the point where they may be embracing many elements of it in a sort of dressed
up form more diplomatic language but is fully compatible with that stuff it’s beyond black comedy when I see people
like uh Samuel Mo or this recent piece in the New Yorker people are still arguing about whether it’s fascism or
not when you have a president who’s using language for btim from Nazi Germany and from Hitler about the blood of the nation this is beyond black
comedy it’s just dangerous at this point it’s it’s a dangerous complicity I mean James Bowen has a great quote you know
he’s talking about fascism when he was in Paris in the 19 maybe 40s or 50s there and he says Liberals are
interesting he said you know they don’t talk about fascism until one day they get a knock on the door and manyways Tony has really captured it well what
we’re talking about here is a legitimation crisis among the ruling Elite the planet is in shambles
inequality is staggering racism is no longer on the margins it’s at the surface violence has become an
organizing principle of everyday life and we have to ask ourselves first as Tony said and Tony’s absolutely right
how do you name the problem if you can’t name it you can’t do anything about it but I think the question that not many
people are asking is who benefits from this it’s not just who’s being mobilized but who benefits well it seems to me you
have an economic and financial Elite that’s consolidating their power in ways
in which they’re a bit concerned about the civil rights movement and where it’s going they’re a bit concerned about gay
rights they’re a bit concern con ered about women sort of arguing for Reproductive Rights they’re concerned about a variety of movements that
haven’t unified but it’s signaling that there is a possibility for a genuine
Insurrection in this country and as far as they’re concerned it’s got to be stopped and it can be stopped with
people like Trump who basically is simply a showcase for their own fascist views when we say that neoliberalism can
no longer justify itself it can’t make a claim to social Mobility it can’t make a claim to equality you know it can’t make
a claim to political and social rights without making a claim to economic rights it can’t do that and so now it
has to go somewhere else and we know where H is going it’s going towards fascism that’s where it’s going one of
the things that I’ve been reflecting on a lot you know in conversations with people is and I think Tony you might
have spoken to this earlier maybe both of you the rezonance to go there to look
at the FedEd soil from which of this system and when I’m saying this system
for listeners I’m talking about the system of capitalism imperialism of which this fascism is an extreme
expression of and it can only exist within and I think that there’s two sides to that one is confronting the
reality and you know you both spoke to this in a really clarifying way I
thought there are crises that this system is facing that fascism is the
solution to the horrific unspeakable ecosystem collapse that we are facing
produced by the system this is a solution that they think is the way to solve for them not for the interest of
humanity but a situation where people’s lives are ripped apart destroyed by the
system and flung all over the globe because of Wars for Empire as because of climate change because of gangs propped
up by the United States and and all sorts of other reasons that have propelled this migrant crisis and I think that this is their solution I
have found in my conversations with people over these past few years that those who have the best understanding of
the fascist threat of trump and the whole GOP still struggle with seeing the
role that the Democrats have played and play because of this concessions piece
that Henry you brought up the rights that people were won and not wanting people to get too out of bounds to get
too beyond their control control and I think that that’s something that I find myself continuing to work with people on
what we’re really talking about is just not having the institutional framework necessary because you have corporate media outlets and mainstream Academia
and mainstream what’s called mainstream political parties but as Henry has pointed out are fueling fascism one way
or another more lightly or more explicitly and so without like having these major institutions with power that
would challenge this because they’re either tolerating it or actively promoting it you need to build a movement and so where does that start it
starts with you know average people it starts with people who are willing to do these things in alternative media whether it’s truth out or counter Punch
or other venues people in higher ed who are willing to sort of stick their neck out people who have the protection of
tenure there’s really no excuse in these situations for people not to be taking these things seriously because we’re the people who are going to have to build
this movement so people like Henry and I are trying to do this but obviously we can’t do it alone right we need things like refuse fascism the podcast to reach
out to a larger audience of people to really put this on their radar because these mainstream insti or what’s called mainstream are just really not up to the
task or they’re perpetuating it I wanted to go there in terms of this education piece that this show exist to help
provide we’re not going to do it alone and the weight of denialism is still
heavy despite all the evidence we were talking before the show started about the New Yorker article and this moin
quote that’s in there just strikes me time and time again as like something that is really paralyzing I think for a
lot of people where he writes quote abnormalize American the expression of
enduring an indigenous syndromes end quote as if that means that it can’t be
both as if it’s the either or not the both and yes exactly and therefore and
I’m wondering for myself and for listeners what strategies should we be
employing to help people dispel the persistent denialism that continues to
pervade the decent folk well people just need to force themselves to talk about these things and make for unpleasant
conversations because it’s an inherently unpleasant topic you know whatever setting people are working in whether
it’s in a private workplace or in the academy or in family conversations
Thanksgiving dinners this is where this stuff needs to start when I teach about social movements the women’s rights
movement the Civil Rights Movement gain lesbian lgbtq plus rights you know the idea of Consciousness raising is the
first step of any sort of real movement without people being willing to have these conversations with people even if
it becomes unpleasant you can’t get to the part of organizing I mean that part is absolutely essential and you know we
just don’t have enough people who are talking about the fascism question to the point where intellectuals like myself Paul Street and others have said
this is like the new F-word fascism you don’t use this word and poite conversation because it’s seen as like
paranoid or something or or crazy or deluded and we have to really sort of challenge that sort of denialism
anywhere we can at this point without that Consciousness raising you’re not going to get that mass movement one
question that came up earlier but I regularly like to ask people is
transitioning to the 2024 election repeatedly many are told right now that this election is the mechanism for which
we defeat fascism in fact those who longk kept people passive with the trials the Justice the courts have now
predicted pivoted to the if he is defeated it will be at The Ballot Box
how do you go about responding to to this almost incantation that people deliver I mean we had 2020 already if an
election by itself was going to defeat fascism then that would have happened wouldn’t it I mean what happened was people convinced themselves after that
election that it had been defeated and they didn’t want to talk about politics at all let alone Fascism and it just
sort of regrouped and reorganized and Trump has been spending the last four years doing that so you know I’m not going to Trash Talk elections as a
short-term mechanism for avoiding worst possible outcomes but it’s not any sort of Ideal mechanism substantive mechanism
for the kind of proactive democracy that Henry and I are talking about related to socialized values and Revolution and the
way people think I mean these are at best like short-term stop gaps to stop the worst possible outcomes they can do
something for that as they did in 2020 but even then we almost didn’t have that outcome because Trump had his
Insurrection politics where it came down to one guy his vice president not being willing to refused to certify that
election result and you would have had complete chaos it’s a very precarious thing to sort of put your hope into that
basket because increasingly people don’t seem to have a lot of faith in elections to to a large extent because of trump
he’s undermined confidence in elections so I don’t know how you say that that’s going to be your sort of Saving Grace
here when most of the Republican party doesn’t even believe in these elections when they don’t win I mean that’s a crisis mean it’s very interesting I mean
these elections are driven by money and power why would you presuppose that elections in some way are a way to fight
fascism in this country the other issue of course is that fascism is not about one person it’s not about defeating
Trump it’s about basically defeating a history that suggests something about how fascism is as Primo every said every
age has its own fascism right and how it’s engrained in the history of this country and so what we’re really dealing with is not a matter of defeating Trump
what we’re really dealing with is a legacy that has emerged over the last 200 years that we’ve got to confront and
we’ve got to understand how it gets reproduced how it emerges in new forms and who benefits from this and what it means for the future if that’s the way
that people want to go I found both of your answers very helpful and meaningful and I’m sure our listeners will as well
you know one of the things that has come up in conversations when I’ve been reflecting on my answers has been adding
in the degree that it was a stop Gap then we’ve passed that now it is now
clear that they will not accept any election that they lose they will not
accept it and they are creating a situation where it’s very possible where they don’t even have to do that where
they could just walk right back into power lawfully now they have lessons learned that they didn’t have before in
case listeners you don’t know take a look at project 2025 it outlines it pretty clear the mistakes that they made
they’re not going to make again that doesn’t mean that it there’s no solution but it does mean that we’ve passed that
stop Gap moment again this is just my opinion I mean look my my brilliant co-author here Tony has hit this on the
head a 100 times and that is if you can’t feel the weight of fism today
especially with project 2025 if the media can’t recognize if academics and
intellectuals don’t see the alarming signals here laid out unobtrusively with
no attempt to cover up the end of democracy I mean look the leading political pundits and political figures
in this country align themselves with Victor Orban you got a guy who claims he wants to be a dictator you’ve got white
supremacy now driving the police collectively the Forefront of right Supremacy may be in America’s police
forces you’ve got the emess militarization of everyday life and you’ve got an ethic that drives this
country now that says that all that matters is consumption self-interest and hating the other it’s all pretty clear I
think but the real problem is why is it invisible to most people as Tony has suggested I wanted to end with a section
of your book and just any new thoughts that you have off of it you wrote in the
section politics of disposability quote one source of Hope comes from the words
of James baldman which were written in another time of Crisis he writes not everything that is faced can be changed
but nothing can be changed until it is faced the urgency of the times demands that we remove the blinders before it is
too late and face the impending fascist threat the Urgent question of what kind
of world we want to live in is no longer rhetorical it is a vital call to action
Collective resistance is no longer an option waiting to unfold it is a
necessity with no time to spare end quote it was deeply moving to me it was deeply inspiring to me and folks that
are listening should get the book should read and sit with it and come to their own conclusions on what it means for
them but just in in the time that’s passed since you first wrote those words I was wondering whether you had any more
Reflections on it we live in a time of danger and urgency and it seems to me that we can either act or we can become
complacent but these are dangerous times s and under such circumstances it isn’t
should we resist it’s that we have no option but resistance and I think we see a number of movements doing that and I’m
just hoping that they can come together and be more successful than they have been because what’s at stake is not just
simply the question of whether we’re going to be fascist or not what’s it sake is the future itself to add to that
point an environmental crisis right unfolding in front of us this is urgent stuff and when you have both political
parties that have really dropped the ball on climate change and one that has led the way in denialism you know there’s
[Music]
venues like truth out counterpunch salon.com and the nice thing about these venues is that it’s free information to
everybody you don’t have to pay for subscription so you know we’re trying to do our part in terms of democratizing access to information so I think that
these are invaluable resources for people to help them fight back and and educate themselves absolutely and Henry
Tony’s absolutely right we got to find those alternative spaces that basically are engaged with courage and commitment
and passion uh to really provide information in dialogue for people in which they can both understand the
threat that we face and what it might mean to do something about it common dreams rise up times alternate I mean
there’s a whole range of options out there you know refuse fascism we’ve got to do more to be able to publicize these
sites so people realize there’s something Beyond The New York Times and it’s certainly something Beyond Fox News
absolutely I want to thank you both for coming back on for sharing your expertise your perspective and your
commitment to refusing fashion thanks so much for having us thanks
thanks for listening to refuse fascism got thoughts or questions off this episode we want to hear them ideas for
topics or guests yes please send them to us have a skill you think could help we
want to know all about it connect with us on social media at refuse find us on
Facebook Twitter Instagram threads Mason blue sky at refuse fascism find us over
on the YouTubes if that’s your Jam we have all the episodes up there too you
can find us at refusefascism and be sure to subscribe or leave a voicemail see the show notes
for the voicemail button if you want to reach me personally love to hear from you find me over on Twitter at Sam B
Goldman drop me a line at Samantha Goldman refusefascism.org or on Tik Tok
at Sam Goldman RF if you appreciate the show and want to help us reach more
listeners to understand and act to stop the fascist threat please become a
patron whether you can give $2 or $20 a month it all makes a difference in
producing and promoting this independent all volunteer weekly show and if you
needed extra incentive to join we’ll be having our next patreon only virtual
event Sunday April 28th at 5:00 p.m. eastern time on the zoom our patrons
voted on having a book discussion and based on polling we will be discussing profit song by Paul Lynch so you have
time to read it and chat with us about it if you haven’t read it already sign
up today at patreon.com refusefascism and for those who are
already patrons of the show thank you thank you you can find a link to
register to join us for that zoom on our patreon page if you’re not in a position
to give monthly but still want to support this show visit
refusefascism.org and hit the Donate button to make a one-time gift thanks to
Richie Marini Lena Thorne and Mark ticklin thanks so much for helping make this episode happen given my illness for
helping produce this episode thanks to incredible volunteers we have transcripts available for each show so
be sure to visit refusefascism.org and sign up to get them in your inbox until
next time in the name of humanity we refuse to accept a fascist
ZNetwork is funded solely through the generosity of its readers.
Donate
