Meanwhile, university libraries in some states are being ordered to delete research collections focused on “race relations” or “gender studies<\/a>.” Federal funding for climate, weather, and ocean research is being eviscerated<\/a>. The nonsensical tariff rollercoaster continues to jeopardize the livelihoods of farmers and business people who rely on predictable markets for their goods and their investments. And the list goes on.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I’ve been asked what I think we should do about all this. Here’s what I think.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n Trumpists knew what to do on January 6 2021, even if they were deluded, misled, and\/or stupidly violent. Non-Trumpists, for the most part, aren’t deluded and know how not to be stupid or violent, so in theory should be able to do better. April 5 was a start<\/a>. Like the spring of 1968 in France, our times are ripe for a mass movement that not only crosses class lines — from universities to farmers, unionized workers, and state employees getting screwed by tariffs and closures, the families of people being deported, et al. — but that attains a level of global solidarity that’s rarely been seen. <\/p>\n\n\n\n If you don’t think it’s time for a general strike, it’s because you aren’t connecting the dots. The slogan for April 5 was “Hands off!<\/a>” The slogan going forward should be something like “Connect the dots. Take back the world.” <\/p>\n\n\n\n Some of the people doing that connecting of dots include Heather Cox Richardson<\/a>, Rebecca Solnit<\/a>, Olga Lautman<\/a>, Anand Giridharadas<\/a>, Timothy Snyder<\/a>, Robert Reich<\/a>, Ruth Ben-Ghiat<\/a>, Christina Pagel<\/a>, and the others I cite in my Trump 2.0 Critical Resource list<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Naomi Klein’s and Astra Taylor’s analysis, published as “The Rise of End Times Fascism<\/a>” in today’s Guardian<\/em>, is directly on point (click below). Here’s an excerpt of it:<\/p>\n\n\n\n Alive to our era of genuine existential danger \u2013 from climate breakdown to nuclear war to sky-rocketing inequality and unregulated AI \u2013 but financially and ideologically committed to deepening those threats, contemporary far-right movements lack any credible vision for a hopeful future. The average voter is offered only remixes of a bygone past, alongside the sadistic pleasures of dominance over an ever-expanding assemblage of dehumanized others.<\/p>\n\n\n\n And so we have the Trump administration\u2019s dedication to releasing its steady stream of real and AI-generated propaganda designed solely for these pornographic purposes. Footage of shackled immigrants being loaded on to deportation flights, set to the sounds of clanking chains and locking cuffs, which the official White House X account labeled \u201cASMR\u201d, a reference to audio designed to calm the nervous system. Or the same account sharing news of the detention of Mahmoud Khalil, a US permanent resident who was active in Columbia University\u2019s pro-Palestinian encampment, with the gloating words: \u201cSHALOM, MAHMOUD.\u201d Or any number of homeland security secretary Kristi Noem\u2019s sadism-chic photo ops (atop a horse at the US-Mexican border, in front of a crowded prison cell in El Salvador, slinging a machine gun while arresting immigrants in Arizona \u2026). <\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/a><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The horror story unfolding around us continues. A typical day (let’s say, yesterday) may include President Trump (1) again accusing Ukrainian president Zelensky of “starting” a war against Russia (after Trump’s attempted shakedown of that country for its resources, despite the fact that Ukraine gave up its nukes in exchange for security guarantees from the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":99,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"advanced_seo_description":"","jetpack_seo_html_title":"","jetpack_seo_noindex":false,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[691215],"tags":[711235,103309,711236,395,123663,659205],"class_list":["post-14054","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-politics_postpolitics","tag-astra-taylor","tag-far-right","tag-movement-building","tag-naomi-klein","tag-politics","tag-trumpism"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p4IC4a-3EG","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":13156,"url":"https:\/\/blog.uvm.edu\/aivakhiv\/2023\/02\/24\/a-year-of-full-scale-war-in-ukraine\/","url_meta":{"origin":14054,"position":0},"title":"A year of full-scale war in Ukraine","author":"Adrian J Ivakhiv","date":"February 24, 2023","format":false,"excerpt":"My reflections on a year of full-scale war in Ukraine can be read here. Among them: Like Ukrainians in general, whose resistance to the Russian onslaught has been remarkable, President Volodymyr Zelensky has done wonders in so many ways. But one thing neither he nor his western supporters have succeeded\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Politics"","block_context":{"text":"Politics","link":"https:\/\/blog.uvm.edu\/aivakhiv\/category\/politics_postpolitics\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":12364,"url":"https:\/\/blog.uvm.edu\/aivakhiv\/2022\/02\/26\/invasion-of-ukraine\/","url_meta":{"origin":14054,"position":1},"title":"Invasion of Ukraine","author":"Adrian J Ivakhiv","date":"February 26, 2022","format":false,"excerpt":"Readers of this blog may know that I have longstanding research as well as personal\/family connections in Ukraine and that I have sometimes run a parallel blog on issues related to that country. (Called \"UKR-TAZ: A Ukrainian Temporary Autonomous Zone,\" the blog is found here.) I recently began posting to\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Politics"","block_context":{"text":"Politics","link":"https:\/\/blog.uvm.edu\/aivakhiv\/category\/politics_postpolitics\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.uvm.edu\/aivakhiv\/files\/2022\/02\/Screen-Shot-2022-03-11-at-7.29.23-AM.png?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.uvm.edu\/aivakhiv\/files\/2022\/02\/Screen-Shot-2022-03-11-at-7.29.23-AM.png?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.uvm.edu\/aivakhiv\/files\/2022\/02\/Screen-Shot-2022-03-11-at-7.29.23-AM.png?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.uvm.edu\/aivakhiv\/files\/2022\/02\/Screen-Shot-2022-03-11-at-7.29.23-AM.png?resize=700%2C400&ssl=1 2x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.uvm.edu\/aivakhiv\/files\/2022\/02\/Screen-Shot-2022-03-11-at-7.29.23-AM.png?resize=1050%2C600&ssl=1 3x"},"classes":[]},{"id":13986,"url":"https:\/\/blog.uvm.edu\/aivakhiv\/2025\/03\/09\/the-fossil-fuel-shakedown-of-ukraine\/","url_meta":{"origin":14054,"position":2},"title":"The fossil-fuel shakedown of Ukraine","author":"Adrian J Ivakhiv","date":"March 9, 2025","format":false,"excerpt":"I highly recommend Antonia Juhasz's Rolling Stone cover story \"Is Trump's 'Minerals Deal' a Fossil Fuel Shakedown?\" In a Facebook post, Juhasz notes that Ukrainian president Zelensky \"is on his way to Saudi Arabia next week, being forced into a corner by the unholy alliance of Putin and Trump and\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Politics"","block_context":{"text":"Politics","link":"https:\/\/blog.uvm.edu\/aivakhiv\/category\/politics_postpolitics\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":12409,"url":"https:\/\/blog.uvm.edu\/aivakhiv\/2022\/03\/11\/info-war-peace-theories-turning-to-ashes\/","url_meta":{"origin":14054,"position":3},"title":"Info war & peace, theories turning to ashes","author":"Adrian J Ivakhiv","date":"March 11, 2022","format":false,"excerpt":"This is being cross-posted (in modified form) from UKR-TAZ, where it is part of a series examining the Russian invasion of Ukraine. The invasion of Ukraine continues to horrify, with casualties mounting and humanitarian corridors failing to materialize. But one of its more interesting dimensions, from the perspective of media\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Media ecology"","block_context":{"text":"Media ecology","link":"https:\/\/blog.uvm.edu\/aivakhiv\/category\/media_ecology\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/img.youtube.com\/vi\/M-x-ujiB-oE\/0.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":12651,"url":"https:\/\/blog.uvm.edu\/aivakhiv\/2022\/07\/10\/klimat\/","url_meta":{"origin":14054,"position":4},"title":"Klimat","author":"Adrian J Ivakhiv","date":"July 10, 2022","format":false,"excerpt":"I've just posted a piece called \"Understanding Russia\" over at UKR-TAZ, in which I look at some proximate and deeper causes of continued Russian support for the invasion of Ukraine. It's mainly a review of some recent literature. The part that may be of greatest interest to readers of Immanence\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Politics"","block_context":{"text":"Politics","link":"https:\/\/blog.uvm.edu\/aivakhiv\/category\/politics_postpolitics\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":13955,"url":"https:\/\/blog.uvm.edu\/aivakhiv\/2025\/03\/06\/end-of-the-interregnum-or-just-the-beginning-of-its-end\/","url_meta":{"origin":14054,"position":5},"title":"End of the Interregnum, or just the beginning of its end?","author":"Adrian J Ivakhiv","date":"March 6, 2025","format":false,"excerpt":"It\u2019s looking increasingly likely that the last 35 years or so will come to be seen as an Interregnum between two world orders: the Cold War order, which emerged from the ashes of World War Two, and whatever it is that is beginning to envelop us now. The question is\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Manifestos & auguries"","block_context":{"text":"Manifestos & auguries","link":"https:\/\/blog.uvm.edu\/aivakhiv\/category\/manifestos-and-auguries\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.uvm.edu\/aivakhiv\/files\/2025\/03\/image-2.png?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.uvm.edu\/aivakhiv\/files\/2025\/03\/image-2.png?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.uvm.edu\/aivakhiv\/files\/2025\/03\/image-2.png?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.uvm.edu\/aivakhiv\/files\/2025\/03\/image-2.png?resize=700%2C400&ssl=1 2x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.uvm.edu\/aivakhiv\/files\/2025\/03\/image-2.png?resize=1050%2C600&ssl=1 3x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.uvm.edu\/aivakhiv\/files\/2025\/03\/image-2.png?resize=1400%2C800&ssl=1 4x"},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.uvm.edu\/aivakhiv\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14054","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.uvm.edu\/aivakhiv\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.uvm.edu\/aivakhiv\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.uvm.edu\/aivakhiv\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/99"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.uvm.edu\/aivakhiv\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14054"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/blog.uvm.edu\/aivakhiv\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14054\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":14059,"href":"https:\/\/blog.uvm.edu\/aivakhiv\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14054\/revisions\/14059"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.uvm.edu\/aivakhiv\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14054"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.uvm.edu\/aivakhiv\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14054"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.uvm.edu\/aivakhiv\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14054"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}\n
The governing ideology of the far right in our age of escalating disasters has become a monstrous, supremacist survivalism.
It is terrifying in its wickedness, yes. But it also opens up powerful possibilities for resistance. To bet against the future on this scale — to bank on your bunker — is to betray, on the most basic level, our duties to one another, to the children we love, and to every other life form with whom we share a planetary home. This is a belief system that is genocidal at its core and treasonous to the wonder and beauty of this world. We are convinced that the more people understand the extent to which the right has succumbed to the Armageddon complex, the more they will be willing to fight back, realizing that absolutely everything is now on the line.
Our opponents know full well that we are entering an age of emergency, but have responded by embracing lethal yet self-serving delusions. Having bought into various apartheid fantasies of bunkered safety, they are choosing to let the Earth burn. Our task is to build a wide and deep movement, as spiritual as it is political, strong enough to stop these unhinged traitors. A movement rooted in a steadfast commitment to one another, across our many differences and divides, and to this miraculous, singular planet.”\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n![\"May](\"https:\/\/scontent.fyvr1-1.fna.fbcdn.net\/v\/t39.30808-6\/490546394_10171016514080593_6730107402910841747_n.jpg?stp=cp6_dst-jpg_tt6&_nc_cat=104&ccb=1-7&_nc_sid=127cfc&_nc_ohc=5-b0PvgF9WwQ7kNvwHENd7e&_nc_oc=AdmH6VrNAkAYruTIlGxkBVyls-J6tDEf0LsLrZTaQ4e_yVodSAuzVeJtsLsHU5td0tsPrbbtTklo_rNuqkzd9O9e&_nc_zt=23&_nc_ht=scontent.fyvr1-1.fna&_nc_gid=6DY7RGaIWyRFkQm2n1hOUw&oh=00_AfEuixUfN1MdPY2eKNh2rH0ke_NoukhuQEDPaPrfdqOidA&oe=68043A67\")
<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n