Tag / antifascist

by Edward Champion

The One Way to Hurt the MAGA Cult: Cut the Bastards Off

There is one guaranteed way to inflict a lot of damage to the MAGA Cult right now and it involves cutting the bastards off. Start doing it today. They don’t deserve to break bread with you during the holidays.

After four days of being hit with death threats, pledges of violence directed towards me, one incident of doxxing, and outright hate from hundreds of MAGA cultists, I’ve noticed that they have started to make attempts to cozy up with me this weekend — as if telling me only a few days ago “Why don’t you kill yourself, you bald Commie?” (one of dozens of threats) never happened. These monsters are trying to squirm their way into our good graces and pretend as if everything is normal.

Well, I am here to say: FUCK NO.

We live in a new nation. A nation in which there is now a permanent divide between those who support democracy and those who want to kill off the rest of us.

Cut the bastards off.

Cut the bastards off. Even family and close friends who voted for Trump. Cut them off. All of these evil motherfuckers. Cut them off even if they share your blood. Do not go home for the holidays. That’s one thing you can do this month. Say no to Thanksgiving. Have a fun time with your true friends and family. (If you need Thanksgiving recipes, I’m happy to share. Email me.) Say no to FOX News-Watching Uncle Harry’s Turkey Day fiesta and Aunt Matilda’s covertly misogynistic Xmas party. Leave the fascists off your invite lists. Cut them out of your life. Tell them that they are not welcome because they do not stand for basic humanity. Cut them off because they stand for hate, violence, and intimidation.

Cut the bastards off.

Let them suffer the crippling loneliness of social isolation and of not having your majestic presence in their life. Because it will hurt them. It will hurt them when they are not invited to your wedding or your baby shower. It will hurt them when they fully understand that they are missing out on the most amazing moments of your life. They are not deserving of that. So cut the bastards off.

Cut the bastards off. Let them know that you fully understand that they do not love you. Because if they did love you, they would never have voted for a maniac who has made everything extremely unsafe for you and so many others. Let them understand that their vote had far more of a consequence than they understood.

This is one real act of protest you can do right now. The MAGA cultists may be full of bluster and arrogance as they take their weirdly spiteful victory lap, but they will feel pain if you ostracize and condemn them and you tell them that they are no longer a part of your life. I mean, remember the pain you felt when you came out to your right-wing parents and they told you that you were no longer welcome? Well, payback’s a bitch, isn’t it? Cut the bastards off. Because their only purpose in life is to cause pain and spawn hate. They literally have nothing else. So cut the bastards off.

Do not socialize with them. Do not be friends with them. If you have doubts, remember that they will soon sell you out to save their skin. So cut the bastards off.

Do not get into a relationship with them. Close your legs if they want to take you home. Before you go on a date with them, ask them who they voted for (along with some followup questions to determine if they are lying through their teeth) and if they say Trump, immediately block them and do not associate with them. Let them suffer in the same way that they are making us suffer. Cut them off and watch them from afar on social media as they are reduced to a puling and braying mess. In the same way that you are probably quietly feeling right now.

Cut the bastards off. These mouthbreathing motherfuckers are unworthy of you. You’re special. They’re not. They mindlessly bob their heads up and down and sputter a 24/7 froth of dehumanizing hate. So cut the bastards off.

A bartender cuts off a drunk who has one too many at a bar, right? Well, why should fascism any different? Cut the bastards off. They’ve had too much of Trump’s repugnant swill and I’m telling you that they are never ever coming back.

Cut these evil fuckwits off. Tell them that they no longer exist in your universe.

Cut the bastards off. Let them feel the wincing pain of standing on the side of hate. Let them know that they signed up for a new world in which high school boys are now telling high school girls, “Your body, my choice.” That’s unacceptable and unthinkable to anyone with a moral compass. So why would you want these sociopaths in your life? Cut the bastards off.

Let them know that suicide hotlines for LGBTQIA people have hit unprecedented levels and that they made this happen. And there is no coming back from that. It shows that your moral values and theirs do not align, even if they profess to be Christian.

Cut the bastards off. They stood against human rights. They signed up for unhinged harassment and violence, even after they won everything. Would we have done that? Fuck no. So cut the bastards off. Cut the bastards off because make no mistake: win or lose, the MAGA cult will always call for our dehumanization. So cut the bastards off.

Boycott their businesses. Why should they get to profit in any way when they have just ensured that prices next year will be higher than any inflation falsely ascribed to Biden? Cut them off before the tariffs and the boycotts from other nations kick in. Don’t buy any book written by a fascist. Do not support them. Do not show up to their events. Cancel your subscriptions to the Washington Post and The New York Times. Delete your X account. Cut the bastards off.

Cut the bastards off. By cutting them off, you will condemn them to a life in which they will only hear the tedious mantras of fascism and white supremacy. You will deny them the very civility that we believe in, but that is completely beyond them. And they will not have our humor, our kindness, our creativity, or our smarts. They will lose access to all of that and it will slowly destroy them. And they deserve it. So cut the bastards off. If they voted for Trump after being “on the fence,” they will swiftly understand that they are dead to us and that they are doomed and that they crossed a line which is unforgivable.

Cut the bastards off.

Unfortunately, you will have to consort with some of them. Particularly the fascists at your workplace. Well, give them nothing but the bare minimum. Cut the bastards off. Say nothing about your lives. Because they will use any and all details as weapons against you. But you can also cut them off without them actually knowing that you have cut them off by significantly reducing how much you are willing to share about yourself. Because they’re not very bright.

Cut the bastards off.

You do not need this drama in your life right now. You do not need additional people who will prevent you from being who you are. Because being authentic is going to be very difficult starting next year — especially when the arrests start. So why should they get even a second of what makes you special?

Cut the bastards off. I know it’s going to be difficult. I know you’re going to have to say no to a lot of people you presently love. But if you do this now, you’ll save yourself a lot of hurt in the long run when they start ratting you out. If you cut them off right now — while we have ten weeks until the Orange Monster becomes President — then you’ll get the pain out of the way now and save yourself a truly unsettling plot twist of Cousin Jim reporting you to the New Gestapo.

Cut the bastards off. Because we need you strong so that we can all fight and resist. We need you to be you. We need you to be authentic. And we will listen to you and provide a supportive ear. Because we’ve also cut the bastards off. It wasn’t easy for us either and we know how awful this is. But unfortunately this is what American life has come down to.

So cut the bastards off. Because we need you alive. And cutting them off will improve your probability of survival.

by Edward Champion

Journal: Early Signs of Fascism in America

It has been two days since the election results and the early signs of conformity can be seen from every vantage point.

It has been only two days since the horrific election results were announced and, even in a “safe” blue spot like New York City, I have noticed an increased conformity. Everyone is now on their best behavior. Which, of course, is exactly what the Republicans want. This is why Jeff Bezos and Mark Zuckerburg showed great pusillanimity in praising Donald Trump after his victory. They fear being punished by Trump’s new tariffs, which are estimated to remove $78 billion of spending power each year from Americans. I have already heard sussurations among international friends about boycotts being organized against America. There is talk of other countries punishing us much in the manner in which we froze assets in Russia. We are about to be dropped into the worst economic quagmire since the Great Depression. And frankly we deserve it. I’m deeply ashamed to be an American right now.

Out of morbid curiosity, I listened to Bill Burr’s podcast and he made no mention of Trump. He, like Bezos and Zuckerburg, knows where his bread is buttered. And he has become a gutless and timid shell of his former self. His jokes were remarkably inauthentic and he desperately tried to pad out his show with laughter. Presumably he — like many other prominent entertainers — has been informed by his manager to not talk politics. Only two days in and the more robust truth tellers are already turning into Trump sycophants. I’m sure we will see many more disappointments. My money is on Jon Stewart to be one of the first to sell out. He did, after all, defend that vile racist Tony Hinchcliffe.

Now I was already a polite fellow, but even I have found myself doubling and even tripling down on courtesy, adding a few more thank yous even when I have already effusively expressed gratitude. After all, we have no idea who will start ratting us out once Trump’s version of a Gestapo becomes a reality. People don’t really trust each other anymore and there is an increased nervous edge to people’s laughter. I have attempted to crack jokes, but my comedic instincts seem to have desiccated. Because the thought of what is about to come is just too chilling. The thought of having to tone down my exuberant loudmouth qualities for four years in order to increase my probability of not being shot under a fascist regime is a complete affront to who I am as a human being. I am also getting my passport renewed while it is still possible.

The streets have become lonelier and emptier. People are hiding in their apartments. The liquor store in my neighborhood seems the only place where you can listen to the ribald honesty and goodhearted camaraderie that flowed like limitless wine at the start of this week, but that is now as rare as plutonium deposits. The frightening thing is that we are all falling into these new routines with a distressing ease. It seems we’re fated to accept our new fascist world faster than the Germans did after Hitler became Chancellor in 1933. In 2016, there were protests against Trump the next day. But not this time. Everyone walks with a forlorn face and an unshakable fear. Nobody is having a good time and you can feel a palpable anxiety exuding from nearly everyone. It’s much stronger than the dread I recall in November 2004, when George W. Bush was re-elected.

I have to hand it to Donald Trump. He has destroyed the spirit of life in America overnight. He has turned us all into people trying to save their own skin. And his incorrigible cult has continued to lie and gaslight and fabricate reality in the comments on my TikTok posts — this even when I was reporting nothing but objective facts. I did make a good faith effort to try and get through to one such MAGA cultist today, only to be received by a corpulent and pustulant face of unrepentant rage, screaming at me for “fearmongering,” despite the fact that I had quoted from Project 2025 and directly from the Orange Menace himself.

I spent much of the last two days working the phones, calling two dozen friends to remind them that I love them and that I have their backs. A few were reluctant to talk altogether, but they did text me back. The bravest among my coterie broached the question of personal retaliation. Nobody’s ever going to say this on social media, but it seems to be on everyone’s minds. My friends all agreed with me that, if it comes to it, they would rather be shot in the head than capitulate to Trump and his fascism. That’s how I knew I could trust them. But then I’ve known all these amazing people a very long time.

I have found it impossible to read or write new pages of my audio drama. Yesterday, I slipped and succumbed to binge drinking for the first time in two and a half years. But I am now sober and thankfully my worst solecism was calling a friend and not remembering the conversation we had. She was extremely kind and understanding. Yeah, I need to stay off the sauce. But I am human and deeply worried and frightened about the future.

Living seemed so easy only a few days ago. I had a happy life and a creative routine in which I pumped out five good clean pages each day. But I have been plagued by the worst depression I have felt in ten years: in large part because I cannot determine how I can possibly be myself or be social with others in this hideous new order. I have no idea what “living” is going to be like once that monster takes office again. If I can’t be lively and outspoken, then how can I be me? Will I have to flee this country? Will I have to hide people in my apartment? How quickly will they detain me? Is there a single woman in Canada who can pluck me from this nightmare, whisk me away to Toronto, and marry me? I mean, the girl I was seeing just broke up with me: amicable, no hard feelings between us. So I’m now available again. Are these pragmatic considerations or paranoia?

It is a deeply soul-destroying time to be a thinker. I’ve never really considered myself an intellectual, but I feel that the very bedrock of ideas has been permanently sullied by a populace that would rather hear the sweet white supremacist lies that Donny whispers into their ears. I fear for the intelligentsia, the academics, the librarians, and all the other guardians of thought and knowledge. I can imagine books being burned. I can imagine professors being beaten to death by MAGA thugs in classrooms. This has all happened before. Just read any book about the Holocaust. What’s particularly sickening is that Trump has silenced nearly everyone and created a system where sycophancy is the only way to make it to tomorrow. The fascists have the White House, the Supreme Court, the Senate, and, unless there is a miracle, the House of Representatives. For the first time in a long time, I truly have no idea what our future will be. I am a solitary stranger in a nation that I once loved with all my heart. Contrary to President Biden’s speech today, I cannot see the great American experiment continuing. We are a nation lost, with a spirit that feels as if has been permanently asphyxiated.