Hell no! Working in this daily, phone calls, and bipartisan meetings all matter of things to slow this roll until we can get a wedge in and displace this harm. And still know deeply the one spirtual presence that keeps me sane. It is quite a balancing act in my consciousness and I am rolling. Thank you Marianne.
OK, I know no one likes to talk about taxes because we all think we’re going to go to jail if we don’t pay our taxes. But why can’t Americans unite and hold back their taxes and force this horrific funding of cruelty to stop? A lot of the folks who are marching and protesting and feeling hopeless just wrote a check to their government. Or they got what they think is a “refund… “Which was actually their money to begin with. Anyway, if we keep handing it over, why would they do anything different?
I agree! Why are we funding this regime with our tax money? The IRS has been deliberately undermined and used as a source for our data. I live in California near the fire areas and we have been given a filing extension. I’m in no hurry to write my checks to the treasury.
Once again, Marianne, thank you for your crystal clear view of what’s happening - and how NONE OF US can be complacent at this time!!!! Coincidentally, I viewed an exhibit in NYC today on Anne Frank documenting the rise of Nazism in Germany that led to the tragedy of the Holocaust. It is uncanny how clearly the steps of the Musk/Trump administration are following Hitler’s playbook. And how we simply cannot afford to believe that “it can’t happen here” because it’s happening! Take action, call your Congresspeople, demand action. Remain vigilant and pray for a miracle. Thank you once again for the light you shine in this darkness! Much love 💕
you wonder if it is time for people to start dressing up on tik tok and enacting what 'lack of due process' means in skits of not more than 3 mins. Yes, hard to imagine how anyone is thinking about anything else! it was heartening to see the speech from Cory Booker but will that be enough to get people acting/ to a 'normal' state of mind?
Hanna Arendt is a women I referred to in a writing I did about dehumanisation a couple of years ago. Never ever I believed that could be so actually in this lifetime….and all this happens right now infront of our eyes…🙈😢💔🙏🙏
It sounds like the gloves are off … It’s time to push back with every breath we take … with every fiber of our being … And now that the gloves are off, leave them off!!!! … If not … We will loose this democracy for certain!!!!!
Excellent; well said, MW. Our existence as a free people is in peril like never before, and we must now all stand, look evil in the eyes and shout at it an emphatic Hell, No!!! It will not stand. We have the power to undo its dictates, send it packing and reclaim our country, freedoms, dignity and decency.
I agree deeply with everything Marianne says here - especially the urgent call to resist complacency in the face of authoritarianism. But I want to gently push back on one point: not all nations that fell under authoritarian rule did so because their people were “spineless.”
As someone who comes from Iran and watched from afar as the Islamic Republic took power, I saw how many Iranians, deeply dissatisfied with the Shah’s regime, pushed for change - but never expected it to be overtaken by such an oppressive force. Khomeini stepped into a moment of unrest, seized control, and transformed the country into the repressive regime we know today.
Many believed it wouldn’t last. And yet, it did. Women were stripped of their rights, religion was weaponized, and dissent was brutally silenced. Over time, the oppression deepened, leaving the people with fewer and fewer options to resist.
The Iranian people weren’t spineless - they were blindsided, and then systematically disempowered. That’s what makes the parallels we’re seeing now so chilling. We can’t afford to look away or hope it just passes. We must act - while we still can.
Hell No! Joined the Santa Cruz Welcoming Network for asylum seekers and undocumented immigrants in California. Volunteered to create an educational legal document for our families to know their rights and protect themselves from the wrongs. Am connecting families with job opportunities in our area. Feels so good to make a difference. Trying to lead by example. It’s my way of screaming as no one around me wants to discuss it. Hopefully they will wake up. The rest of the country is! Finally. There has been a shift. I’m more hopeful.
“Civil disobedience is not our problem. Our problem is civil obedience. Our problem is that people all over the world have obeyed the dictates of leaders…and millions have been killed because of this obedience…Our problem is that people are obedient allover the world in the face of poverty and starvation and stupidity, and war, and cruelty. Our problem is that people are obedient while the jails are full of petty thieves… (and) the grand thieves are running the country. That’s our problem.”
Thank you for writing such an excellent piece. And thank you for giving me another picket sign with "Hell No!" (I've been painting large picket signs on cardboard.)
Thank you so much, Marianne, for sharing your thoughts and insights on what's going on in the US - and in the world. I only wish, more people around the world were able to read your texts and listen to your speeches, to be inspired by you, and prompted to action... Have you ever thought of creating a channel on the Insight Timer and sharing your views there, too? By doing so, you might reach people worldwide who are not yet acquainted with you. People to whom learning of you and your teachings might make such a difference. Ultimately, they might make the difference that is needed right now. - Anyway. THANK YOU! May God bless you!
Agree wholeheartedly that it would be of gr8 benefit to everyone if Marianne’s perspective & commentary were more accessible to foreign audiences.
Progressive values are more embraced in the EU & progressive thinkers are more revered across the pond.
There also seems to be (based on the Euro progressives I follow) a real hunger to understand what’s going on here.
Our own left is so weak & ineffectual…we’d all totally benefit from some cross-pollination. Glad 2 c she’s giving talks in the UK & Ireland this spring.
I wish you were right, Jean, but I'm not so sure that we (Germans in particular and Europeans in general) really get it. While I hear a lot of judgment on what has been going on in the US these past months - as if what has happened there could never (again) happen over here -, the latest parliamentary elections for the Bundestag in February resulted in the (extreme) right-wing parties gaining voters to an appalling extent. Ranting about the political development in the US won't save us in Europe when we do not stop ignoring the beam in our own eyes.
Do you think that—seeing what’s happening to America—there’s been any kind of mass awakening in Europe to the severity of threats to liberal democracies everywhere?
Has seeing our fall into autocracy helped strengthen convictions & the will to fight fascism there?
¨Plainclothes officers in Boston abruptly detained a Turkish Tufts University student earlier this month. Six agents with their faces covered approached Rümeysa Öztürk as she was leaving her home in Somerville, Massachusetts. They seized the 30-year-old Fulbright scholar’s phone and handcuffed her, a video of the incident shows.¨
Defeating complacent docility will only be temporary. We must recover and awaken them. They DO want to be happy, just like us. I don't know how to love them. I do know how to WANT to know how. I WANT to know how! I will settle for temporary if it is the best that we can do, for now.
Hell no! Working in this daily, phone calls, and bipartisan meetings all matter of things to slow this roll until we can get a wedge in and displace this harm. And still know deeply the one spirtual presence that keeps me sane. It is quite a balancing act in my consciousness and I am rolling. Thank you Marianne.
OK, I know no one likes to talk about taxes because we all think we’re going to go to jail if we don’t pay our taxes. But why can’t Americans unite and hold back their taxes and force this horrific funding of cruelty to stop? A lot of the folks who are marching and protesting and feeling hopeless just wrote a check to their government. Or they got what they think is a “refund… “Which was actually their money to begin with. Anyway, if we keep handing it over, why would they do anything different?
forwardparty.com
I agree! Why are we funding this regime with our tax money? The IRS has been deliberately undermined and used as a source for our data. I live in California near the fire areas and we have been given a filing extension. I’m in no hurry to write my checks to the treasury.
Once again, Marianne, thank you for your crystal clear view of what’s happening - and how NONE OF US can be complacent at this time!!!! Coincidentally, I viewed an exhibit in NYC today on Anne Frank documenting the rise of Nazism in Germany that led to the tragedy of the Holocaust. It is uncanny how clearly the steps of the Musk/Trump administration are following Hitler’s playbook. And how we simply cannot afford to believe that “it can’t happen here” because it’s happening! Take action, call your Congresspeople, demand action. Remain vigilant and pray for a miracle. Thank you once again for the light you shine in this darkness! Much love 💕
Funny, I was reading about about Anne Frank few minutes ago:)
Find out more about Anne Frank and the Second World War:
https://www.annefrank.org/en/anne-frank/go-in-depth/
https://www.annefrank.org/en/anne-frank/who-was-anne-frank/
https://www.annefrank.org/en/anne-frank/go-in-depth/typical-day-secret-annex/
you wonder if it is time for people to start dressing up on tik tok and enacting what 'lack of due process' means in skits of not more than 3 mins. Yes, hard to imagine how anyone is thinking about anything else! it was heartening to see the speech from Cory Booker but will that be enough to get people acting/ to a 'normal' state of mind?
I particularly liked his: 'Constitution of INTERdependence'.
Hanna Arendt is a women I referred to in a writing I did about dehumanisation a couple of years ago. Never ever I believed that could be so actually in this lifetime….and all this happens right now infront of our eyes…🙈😢💔🙏🙏
We need to stand up and together, NOW💪💪
I will be on the streets on the 5th!!! We will stand up for what is right! Love is stronger than fear.
It sounds like the gloves are off … It’s time to push back with every breath we take … with every fiber of our being … And now that the gloves are off, leave them off!!!! … If not … We will loose this democracy for certain!!!!!
Excellent; well said, MW. Our existence as a free people is in peril like never before, and we must now all stand, look evil in the eyes and shout at it an emphatic Hell, No!!! It will not stand. We have the power to undo its dictates, send it packing and reclaim our country, freedoms, dignity and decency.
I agree deeply with everything Marianne says here - especially the urgent call to resist complacency in the face of authoritarianism. But I want to gently push back on one point: not all nations that fell under authoritarian rule did so because their people were “spineless.”
As someone who comes from Iran and watched from afar as the Islamic Republic took power, I saw how many Iranians, deeply dissatisfied with the Shah’s regime, pushed for change - but never expected it to be overtaken by such an oppressive force. Khomeini stepped into a moment of unrest, seized control, and transformed the country into the repressive regime we know today.
Many believed it wouldn’t last. And yet, it did. Women were stripped of their rights, religion was weaponized, and dissent was brutally silenced. Over time, the oppression deepened, leaving the people with fewer and fewer options to resist.
The Iranian people weren’t spineless - they were blindsided, and then systematically disempowered. That’s what makes the parallels we’re seeing now so chilling. We can’t afford to look away or hope it just passes. We must act - while we still can.
Hell No! Joined the Santa Cruz Welcoming Network for asylum seekers and undocumented immigrants in California. Volunteered to create an educational legal document for our families to know their rights and protect themselves from the wrongs. Am connecting families with job opportunities in our area. Feels so good to make a difference. Trying to lead by example. It’s my way of screaming as no one around me wants to discuss it. Hopefully they will wake up. The rest of the country is! Finally. There has been a shift. I’m more hopeful.
Howard Zinn on civil disobedience :
“Civil disobedience is not our problem. Our problem is civil obedience. Our problem is that people all over the world have obeyed the dictates of leaders…and millions have been killed because of this obedience…Our problem is that people are obedient allover the world in the face of poverty and starvation and stupidity, and war, and cruelty. Our problem is that people are obedient while the jails are full of petty thieves… (and) the grand thieves are running the country. That’s our problem.”
Matt Damon from Howard Zinn's speech:
The Problem is Civil Obedience 5:05 min
https://youtu.be/S2li9E_94MA
Thank you for writing such an excellent piece. And thank you for giving me another picket sign with "Hell No!" (I've been painting large picket signs on cardboard.)
Thank you so much, Marianne, for sharing your thoughts and insights on what's going on in the US - and in the world. I only wish, more people around the world were able to read your texts and listen to your speeches, to be inspired by you, and prompted to action... Have you ever thought of creating a channel on the Insight Timer and sharing your views there, too? By doing so, you might reach people worldwide who are not yet acquainted with you. People to whom learning of you and your teachings might make such a difference. Ultimately, they might make the difference that is needed right now. - Anyway. THANK YOU! May God bless you!
Agree wholeheartedly that it would be of gr8 benefit to everyone if Marianne’s perspective & commentary were more accessible to foreign audiences.
Progressive values are more embraced in the EU & progressive thinkers are more revered across the pond.
There also seems to be (based on the Euro progressives I follow) a real hunger to understand what’s going on here.
Our own left is so weak & ineffectual…we’d all totally benefit from some cross-pollination. Glad 2 c she’s giving talks in the UK & Ireland this spring.
I wish you were right, Jean, but I'm not so sure that we (Germans in particular and Europeans in general) really get it. While I hear a lot of judgment on what has been going on in the US these past months - as if what has happened there could never (again) happen over here -, the latest parliamentary elections for the Bundestag in February resulted in the (extreme) right-wing parties gaining voters to an appalling extent. Ranting about the political development in the US won't save us in Europe when we do not stop ignoring the beam in our own eyes.
Do you think that—seeing what’s happening to America—there’s been any kind of mass awakening in Europe to the severity of threats to liberal democracies everywhere?
Has seeing our fall into autocracy helped strengthen convictions & the will to fight fascism there?
¨Plainclothes officers in Boston abruptly detained a Turkish Tufts University student earlier this month. Six agents with their faces covered approached Rümeysa Öztürk as she was leaving her home in Somerville, Massachusetts. They seized the 30-year-old Fulbright scholar’s phone and handcuffed her, a video of the incident shows.¨
https://www.instagram.com/reel/DHtevlePipb/?utm_source=ig_embed&ig_rid=25fa559e-cf86-4375-8f7b-a8f40b4986f2
the majority of the citizens of America are not screaming, or wanting to, at all.
TWO CARTEL PARTIES have been encouraging docility. The silence of their operatives has been deafening.
Defeating complacent docility will only be temporary. We must recover and awaken them. They DO want to be happy, just like us. I don't know how to love them. I do know how to WANT to know how. I WANT to know how! I will settle for temporary if it is the best that we can do, for now.
Marianne I’m part of a group of Raging Grannies and we will be singing loudly at the April 5 rally.
I’m visualizing a sign with your quote on it: “Meditate in the morning, kick ass in the afternoon.”
I made a sign that says “Not Today, Satan!”
What wisdom can the Sermon On The Mount's admonition to "resist not evil" bring to bear on our present opportunity?
Feel the love of Gaia enfolding us. We are Her flowers. There is only One of us. We ARE struggling together, in Truth.