Handling Political Horror

As I write this, the so-called “Big Beautiful Bill” has just passed. Anyone who doesn’t see the pain and death that will come of this is so far out of touch with reality that it’s easy to wonder if they might ever be reached and brought out of their level of delusion (back to the normal level of delusion, we might say in Buddhism!).

A concentration camp has just been built in the Everglades in a matter of days, where prisoners are served one meal a day of maggot-ridden food, with little protection from the elements, and no contact with legal representation. With due process suspended, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), which has become one of the most well-funded militaries in the world, can simply kidnap anyone they like and place them in what will soon likely be death camps (and may already be by the time this is published) . The “border czar” Tom Homan has openly said ICE will kidnap people based on their appearance, now plainly stating the racism that any honest and well-informed person already knew was motivating these mass kidnappings and torture. Further, this rapid construction has shown us that housing for the unhoused could, in fact, be built rapidly, should the people in power choose to do so; they simply do not.

The nearly 250-year experiment with representative democracy called the United States of America—deeply flawed from its inception, as it was built by enslaving African populations, eradicating Native ones, subjugating women, and persecuting sexual and gender minorities—may be coming to an end as we, indisputably, are in a full-on constitutional crisis. The Trump administration is consolidating power under the presidential office, which Robert Paxton identifies as the fourth of five stages of historical development of fascist movements.[1] Curtis Yarvin’s blueprint has directed the architects of Republican policy on how to dismantle democracy and replace it with authoritarian rule.

How can we possibly stay sane when surrounded by this nightmare?

It’s easy to feel powerless. It’s easy to feel despondent. But that feeling of powerlessness, that despondency, can only buttress the growing power of our fascist government. Inculcating these moods among any populace that might otherwise challenge them is a goal of theirs. The hurry of the administration to force a torrent of new policies is meant in part to overwhelm us, leaving us drifting or even numbing us into compliance. If we want to survive, if we want to stop and redirect the current trajectory of the US government,[2] we need to find ways to feel neither powerless nor despondent. The only way out will be through mass noncompliance: for example, general strikes. So we need to find ways to regain a sense of power and to lift ourselves out of despondency.

Within the activist community, the mantra has long been that if you are feeling like you are drowning in the flood of social ills, the best thing you can do is to find some local group, or pick some cause, and get involved. It does not need to consume your entire life, but it does need to be a firm commitment. There’s nothing that kindles hope like taking concrete action and seeing it directly improve lives in your community. In my personal experience, participating directly in mutual aid can be more fulfilling than participating in national protests, even those of record-breaking size.

Many might feel reticent about getting involved in activism or building community because of certain ideas about what that has to look like. It can mean getting to know your neighbors face-to-face. It can mean going to meetings in person. It can mean facing off against the police. But it does not need to. Many of the ideas around what activism and community look like are inaccessible to those of us who are disabled. I, myself, have a great deal of trouble spending much time in person among allistics. So activism and building community can mean participating in online groups. It can mean spreading news or thoughts through social media. Someone who can’t show up, even online, whether because of disability, or because they are kept ceaselessly working at jobs just to keep themselves and anyone they care for alive, or for any other reason should not be considered somehow “sidelined,” and especially should not denigrated for what someone with rigid ideas around activism could perceive as not participating. Building community, building a robust activist movement, must include everyone who could become a safe potential ally. The critical thing is to offer each other love, support, and resources when we can, and to take care of those who need it. And everyone needs it.

Hey, Cattasallā, isn’t this a Buddhist blog? Are there Buddhisty things we can do?

Of course!

First, we need to recognize that anger is corrosive and sorrow is a burden. Anger might provide motivation, but it is unstable. Actions taken out of anger are unlikely to be wise ones, and perceptions boiling with anger are unlikely to be clear and accurate ones. So we need to free ourselves from these negative emotions, but not in a way that denies their presence or suppresses them. We don’t want to smother the real, hard feelings with toxic positivity. We want to embrace the hurt, but expand around it to find joy.

Underlying the anger of many, if not most, angry activists is compassion. This anger is always detrimental in the long term, but compassion often underlies severity. We would do well to release the anger and find the compassion. Note that this does not mean pity, nor does it mean clouding the mind with sentimentality. It means finding the part within us that does not want ourselves or others to suffer. This forms a steadier base for sustained, effective action than anger.

We can see through sorrow by simply being present. I don’t have the standing to tell anyone in a war zone to try to find happiness by being present. For that, I would direct the reader to Venerable Thích Nhất Hạnh, who watched his loved ones get tortured and killed during the Vietnam war. What I can say, from my current state of privilege (which is more precarious than many might think looking at me, but undeniably an advantage I have and continue to have), that when I start to feel overwhelmed by the news, I can look at what is happening to me, right here, right now. Right now I am sitting at my computer, writing this sentence with love. I am doing what I enjoy most. And it’s a pleasant morning. My windows are open, and birds are chirping. Somewhere in my home, the cat I serve is doing her cat business...probably committing a crime of some sort.

When I take this moment to recognize that right here, right now, things are fine for me, that does not mean ignoring the hardship others face. It means taking the time to recharge, to rest, so I can continue working towards the good. (And as an autistic, I do tend to need more time to recharge and rest than most people.)

We need to remember Audre Lorde, who introduced the idea of self-care to activists: “Caring for myself is not self-indulgence. It is self-preservation, and that is an act of political warfare.” After quoting Lorde, Danielle Powell goes on to observe that “it is a gentle reminder that helps quiet the voice of guilt that tries to convince us that self-love is selfish...Next, she makes a significant clarification about self-care; it is essential for the sustainability of our existence.”[3]

Even in the darkest times, people still found joy. People still found love. People still found community. Whatever terrible things are on the horizon, or even happening to us now, we can, too.

[1] Robert Paxton’s scheme of five stages of development of fascism can be found in “The Five Stages of Fascism,” Vol 17 No. 1 (Mar 1998) of The Journal of Modern History.

They are, in brief:

1. Loss of faith in democratic governance, leading to the creation of fascist movement. To some degree, this is present in any democratic country, and has been since the proto-fascist Ku Klux Klan inspired European fascism.
2. In the face of an advancing progressive, leftist movement, and frustration with political gridlock as centrist liberals and conservatives are in stalemate, conservatives turn to fascists in order to halt the march of freedom and preserve their wealth. This is often done with compliance of centrist liberals who are also concerned with maintaining their wealth. Thus, fascist movements become rooted in the political system, with conservatives believing they can use fascist power to strengthen their hand but will be able to control the fascists and prevent them from seizing total power. This was the 2016 election in the USA, during a period of growing union organization and the ongoing expansion of civil rights that had started in the 20^th century, as well as the dismantling of white cishet male privilege (albeit still quite gradually). Indeed, GamerGate and the patriarchal reaction to the #MeToo movement helped push fascism into the public discourse. Some current thinkers trace the current fascist thrust to GamerGate, in fact.
3. The fascists are able to gain control of the government. This is usually done through democratic means, again with the support of conservatives, and liberal elites either in compliance or raising nothing but the most potentially ineffectual forms of protest, such as angry letters to newspapers or candlelight vigils. Often liberals have not yet learned, despite the clear patterns from history, that fascism cannot be defeated in the “marketplace of ideas,” because fascists are playing a different game from what we would regard as “civil debate.” They are dishonest and lack principles besides a few core values of hate, which they intend to impose on society through violence.
4. Once in control, they consolidate power as swiftly as they can, eliminating any barriers to their total, unopposed rule, such as the legislative or judicial checks present in most democratic societies today. This is what began in the USA with the 2025 inauguration and the immediate implementation of the Yarvinist strategies embodied in Project 2025 (from which the Trump campaign had dishonestly distanced themselves).
5. The final stage is either entropy or radicalization, according to Paxton. The fascist regime might transition to a different, more routine, form of authoritarianism (Paxton’s example is fascist Italy), or becomes increasingly extreme, carrying out mass extermination, unfettered by any resistance (Paxton’s example is Nazi Germany).

[2] Not that the pre-Trump trajectory was all that great, either. It was also in dire need of course correction, and it is what set the conditions for fascism to flourish as much as it has.

[3] Slate has an interesting history of the concept of self-care, and its trajectory from revolutionary movements, to commodification and being put in the service of capital by an industry built around “wellness,” and back to the activist world.

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