One way we know for a fact that it’s a cult is because the most embarrassing things Trump does, he doubles down on and his flock immediately turns it into a ritual which they use as a form of worship for Dear Leader and a demonstration of solidarity with each other. This one’s a doozy, not least of which is because many of them are homophobic right wing Christians who are dancing along to a gay pick-up song from the 1970s and they either don’t know or don’t care.
According to this AP story, a lot of women are having to carry around pepper spray on campus these days for fear of being assaulted:
It’s a response to an emboldened fringe of right-wing “manosphere” influencers who have seized on Republican Donald Trump ’s presidential win to justify and amplify misogynistic derision and threats online. Many have appropriated a 1960s abortion rights rallying cry, declaring “Your body, my choice” at women online and on college campuses.
For many women, the words represent a worrying harbinger of what might lie ahead as some men perceive the election results as a rebuke of reproductive rights and women’s rights.
[…]
Isabelle Frances-Wright, director of technology and society at the Institute for Strategic Dialogue, a think tank focusing on polarization and extremism, said she had seen a “very large uptick in a number of types of misogynistic rhetoric immediately after the election,” including some “extremely violent misogyny.”
There was a local story of a Trump parade here in LA with the big blue flags and young guys screaming this “your body my choice” out the windows. Very nice.
The phrase was used right afte the election by the Neo Nazi Nick Fuentes and apparently it got 35 million views on X within 24 hours. The bros really like it. It’s all over women’s comment sections on Tik Tok, and young kids are hurling it in girls faces in middle school.
Online declarations for women to “Get back in the kitchen” or to “Repeal the 19th,” a reference to the constitutional amendment that gave women the right to vote, have spread rapidly. In the days surrounding the election, the extremism think tank found that the top 10 posts on X calling for repeal of the 19th Amendment received more than 4 million views collectively. […]
Anonymous rape threats have been left on the TikTok videos of women denouncing the election results. And on the far-flung reaches of the web, 4chan forums have called for “rape squads” and the adoption of policies in “The Handmaid’s Tale,” a dystopian book and TV series depicting the dehumanization and brutalization of women.
The article points out that a number of mass shootings were inspired by 4Chan threats.
Apparently, all these young men feel they’ve been discriminated against by women (I guess they got turned down for dates?) and are fearful of losing their place at the top of society’s hierarchy. Donald Trump and his “bro” campaign made them feel vindicated. They’re lashing out at women because it makes them feel powerful again. Great.
He’s the richest man in the world due to his entrepreneurial talents. Is it possible that he’s also incredibly stupid? It sure looks like it. Every single item on that list other than Epstein’s sex island is 100% prime bullshit.
Be a shame if anything happened to it:
Texas Governor Greg Abbott has threatened a children’s hospital with “consequences” after a doctor posted a viral TikTok telling patients they’re not legally obligated to tell a hospital their citizenship status.
On November 1, a new executive order went into effect requiring Texas hospitals that accept Medicaid or Children’s Health Insurance Plan to ask patients if they’re US citizens. The question now appears on intake forms at hospitals across the state, the San Antonio Express-News reports.
Dr. Tony Pastor, a cardiologist at Texas Children’s Hospital and assistant professor at Baylor College of Medicine, went on to post a TikTok on November 11 telling patients they’re not obligated to answer the question. The video went viral, garnering more than one million views.
As a result, the Republican governor said on Wednesday the hospital’s state funding could be at risk.
“Hey Texas Children’s Hospital & Baylor College of Medicine this doctor is putting your Medicaid & Medicare funding at risk,” Abbott wrote on X, sharing a link to an Express-News article that reports on Pastor’s video.
“ou [sic] better think twice & have crystal clear records,” he added. “There will be consequences for failing to follow the law in the Order.”
Pastor told his followers in the viral TikTok, which appears to be deleted as of Thursday, that “people do not actually have to answer the question. So my proposal to everyone who’s seeing this is, just know that you do not have to answer this question,” Pastor said.
The cardiologist posted another TikTok earlier this week expanding on his argument.“This new law that’s asking hospitals for immigration status is under the guise of trying to get data on how much money we’re spending on undocumented patients,” he said. Pastor also said he’s “going to keep advocating for our patients because that’s why we went to medical school, and not to be ICE deportation people,” according to local outlet KFOXTV.
The hospital quickly capitulated releasing a statement saying that they will comply with the order. But the doctor is right. Patients are not obligated to answer the question to receive care.
Basically, the state has devised a bogus rationale to require hospitals to gather the names of undocumented people seeking care for the purpose of deportation. They know it, the hospital knows it and the patients know it. The patients are not obligated to give that information but either they will avoid seeking necessary medical and will die or they’ll reluctantly give the information if they have no choice. Just as has happened with abortion in Texas, doctors are put in a position of violating their oath or risking their own freedom or the hospital’s funding.
That this whole thing played out on social media with rhetoric that seems like it was lifted from a script about the mafia makes the whole thing even more surreal. Republican leaders are now routinely threatening citizens, institutions and businesses right out in the open and everyone is running for cover.
Hoookay…
I’m just going to leave this here:
It’s going to be a long four years.
Everybody’s rushing to kiss the ring:
Corporate America is unleashing an unorthodox campaign to influence Donald Trump’s agenda in the weeks leading up to his second inauguration, a period that is emerging as a key stretch for shaping the next administration.
To break into the unusual circle of influence that surrounds Trump, chief executives are discussing whether to try to secure an appearance on Joe Rogan’s podcast. They are buying the Trump family’s cryptocurrency token and emailing tips about spending cuts to Vivek Ramaswamy. Some lobbyists are instructing companies to scrub their websites and corporate policies of language that favors Democrats and instead tout GOP-friendly issues such as job creation.
The moves are part of an effort by corporate interests to more strongly align with the Republican Party after drifting away from it in recent years.
[…]
Despite the populist influx among his base, Trump still cares deeply about markets and businesses, and he remains more accessible than most high-profile politicians. The most recognizable chief executives don’t require a go-between to reach the president-elect: Leave a message with one of his assistants and Trump will call back people whose names he recognizes directly, multiple corporate advisers said.
Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg dined with Trump at Mar-a-Lago on Wednesday, Trump adviser Stephen Miller told Fox News. (A Meta adviser confirmed the meeting.) And Coinbase Global CEO Brian Armstrong and a team from Ripple Labs have each spoken with Trump in recent days, according to people familiar with the matter.
I guess it’s all “if you can’t beat ’em join ’em” now, a distincly different vibe than 2016. Elon seemsto have given Trump some cachet he didn’t have before.
Watching this display of The Emperor Has No Clothes is going to be very disheartening.
Thanksgiving is over (even if leftovers may not be). It’s time to pick ourselves up, dust ourselves off, and get to resisting what’s coming. Spocko has gotten after that message with both ears.
False narratives that sold half the country on Trumpism were not born yesterday. It took time, billions of oligarch money, and repetition, repetition, repetition. Propaganda succeeded, among other things, in convincing people that illegal immigration (a misdemeanor, first offense) was a “crisis” best dealt with by a career criminal with 34 felony convictions, dozens of other grand jury indictments (including for inciting an insurrection and theft of state secrets), and a civil penalty for sexual assault. Courts liquidated Donald Trump’s charitable foundation as a fraud, dismantled his “university” as a fraud as well, and banned him from doing business in the state of New York.
How the hell could Americans hire that guy as chief executive of the United States of America? A second time?
The answer, says Andrea Pitzer of the new Next Comes What podcast, is simple: propaganda works. Pitzer, author of “One Long Night: A Global History of Concentration Camps,” studied the rise of concentration camps as a means of controlling large groups of “undesirables” with a small number of guards. The invention of barbed wire and automatic weapons helped the practice along. Take note. Trump 2.0 plans to erect them on the southern border.
I just finished Episode 3. Looping back to Episode 1: How We Survive This Mess. Good holiday weekend listening. Gear up.
(h/t JS)
Olivia Troye is now a regular guest on cable news networks not in the grip of the MAGA cult. Her experiences as Homeland Security and Counterterrorism advisor to Vice President Mike Pence during the Tump administration left her both changed and politcally homeless. Troye’s Thanksgiving message reminded me of another story of political transformation I once witnessed.
View on Threads
Troye writes:
I’m especially grateful for the incredible gift of finding a new tribe. Taking a stand has often left me in political no-man’s land, but in that space, I’ve discovered something profound—a community of people like you. Your support, courage, and shared belief in doing what’s right have reminded me that I’m not alone. Together, we are building something stronger than partisanship: a tribe rooted in shared values, integrity, and hope for the future. Thank you for being my tribe.
Gratitude is a powerful force, but its true strength lies in its ability to inspire us to be better—for ourselves, one another, and the country we love.
That’s something we can all be thankful for.
Before MAGA came the T-party. Many on the right erupted into into paroxysms of rage at the election in 2008 of the country’s first Black president. Before Trumpism and red hats, the T-party cosplayed as revolutionary war soldiers. They pretended their loud protests had to do with tax policy and not white freakout at having to share power with people designated untouchables by European settlers 400 years ago.
The party’s reactionary turn unnerved a couple of local activists who, like Troye, began moving away from the county Republican Party. A few years later, the former chapter chair of Republican Women decided to run for county commission as an independent. It was a district in which Democrats failed to field a candidate. We offered to help.
At the end of her first monthly meeting with us, she stood, and through tears expressed gratitude for our help and her welcome. And great relief.
“Y’all are actually doing something!” she said with some surprise. (We had not spent our meeting badmouthing Republicans.) We had our own goals, plans for action, and a positive agenda. Like Troye, she and her husband had found a new tribe. That break took guts. Today they are friends.
Half the country just chose to align themselves with the tribe my friends left a decade ago. The sadness in that is profound. But there is hope too. Not everyone on the right is there for Trumpism. Some are there out of political muscle memory. Welcome them when they turn.
Last Wednesday I wrote about Democrats fear of fighting back. I linked to a video from my friend Cliff Schecter. We’ve been talking about what fighting back looks like. I’m going to share some examples here next week with specifics. Today Cliff shares an example, Gavin Newsom.
Yes we were all horrified by Trump’s win. But at some point we get back up and fight. Newsom’s response has been chef’s kiss. No Trump congratulations. You accept the results, but rip him to cameras, point out it was a puny win, he’s no king and still an asshole. You call a special legislative session to bolster legal defenses and garner media coverage of your message!
You go to D.C., meet with Democratic reps and President Biden–not Trump. You know it’ll piss him off and he doesn’t deserve the photo op. The coup de gras? Newsom’s using a Trump threat to justify harming Apartheid Man-Baby’s business, which should help kick the inevitable Musk vs. Trump clash into gear. Watch the video for that one and all the rest, as we learn to fight the tyrants.
And be sure after you watch to SUBSCRIBE to Cliff’s Edge, which is quickly becoming a leading resistance outlet on Youtube we’ll need over the next four years!
I know I did this last week but all this footage came over the Xitter yesterday (pretty much the only feeds I follow there anymore…) and I enjoyed them so much I’m doing it again:
Enjoy the rest of your long weekend folks!