How The Resistance Wins

Photo by Clay Banks on Unsplash

How will our resistance function and win?

Neither I, nor The Saners (our group) invented the approach. We simply read about it, studied it, and learned it. We are followers and proponents of nonviolent noncooperation. This is the strategy that is morally-sound and that effectively enables ordinary people to change society dramatically for the better.

We need this now. We need to execute this strategy to the best of our ability. Perfection is not possible or necessary. But competence and determination is.

We have an advantage. Pioneers preceded us, blazing a path and showing us the way. Unlike Gandhi and King, we do not need to simultaneously invent and execute our strategy. True, we need to adapt tactics to our current time and situation. But we have some very solid, proven examples and principles to guide us.

And that’s why so many movements in recent decades were started and promoted by rather ordinary people—not towering historical figures of the magnitude of Gandhi and King. We need to be caring and competent, but we are not required to be geniuses.

We can do this. We can disempower fascists and plutocrats. We can take control and stabilize the Earth’s damaged environment. We can replace a cruel heartless civilization with a kind caring one.

In fact, we have begun. The resistance is here, it’s growing and it is worldwide.

We Need To Understand What We Are Doing

First of all, we are not seizing power. We are redirecting the power we have, the power we have always had.

We—people with no official power or authority—do all the work. We have the power of creation. We produce the food, the shelter, the medicine. We produce everything needed for human survival and wellbeing.

Our opponents, the people in power, only have the power of violence and destruction and lies. Now, this is a significant power—one that we must grapple with and overcome. But it is a negative power. Because of this, we have an advantage.

They need us and we do not need them.

As we start to redirect our power, away from obeying and supporting the ridiculous dominance of a cruel elite, and towards helping ourselves and good people everywhere live better lives, free from the rat race setup by our opponents, everything changes.

But getting from here to there is a hazardous journey. Our opponents will do everything in their power to abuse us, to stop us, and even to kill us. But this is important to remember: they will do this whether we resist or not. Our job is to minimize the evil they do and to maximize the good we do.

Weakening Our Opponents and Strengthening Ourselves

Our opponents use lies, largely in the form of a false narrative and a wholly nonsensical ideology to maintain control. They also use enforcers, armed people like military and National Guards and police.

We offer an honest alternative to their false narrative and cruel ideologies. You can’t defeat something with nothing. We have something powerful and genuine and TRUE to offer. It is a realizable vision of a better world, with less work, no servitude, no elites and time to live fully as complete human beings.

So, a positive vision is our offering and our target. And we now see through the lies of their false narrative and absurd ideologies.

But how do we overcome the threats, the power, the violence of our opponents?

Well, the enforcers—armed people protecting the fascists and plutocrats and empowering them to abuse us—are us, and our loved ones, and our friends, and relatives. It is WE that enforce the will of our opponents. Now, some enforcers are simply hypnotized beyond reaching. But many others still care about their families and friends and acquaintances and even amiable strangers.

We need to win those people back. We need to persuade those we know and, especially those with whom we are close, to side with US and to NOT enforce the will of fascists and plutocrats. Remind them that formal authority means little, and that conscience and morality is everything.

I intend to reach out and befriend my local police. And not just pretending to do this. I will look for and find the humanity in each individual. Of course, some will be more reachable than others. But every enforcer we win over reduces the pain we will feel later, and will speed our victory.
This is very, very important. You may think that this can’t work, but even people who appear to be the most hateful and cruel can—more often than you think—be reached.

A person who operated water canon against civil rights marchers—when he saw them kneel to pray and then rise to continue marching after being pummeled by the gushing water—broke down in tears and refused to continue operating his weapon.

These things happen. They happen in every successful movement. But we need to do our part—befriend our potential armed foes—now, in advance.

The Joys and Dangers of Coalitions

We must not be afraid to work as a coalition and we must be open to less-than-perfect partners. Hey, in World War II, the Allies welcomed Stalin into their coalition. And, putting it mildly, Stalin was a problematic character. But he was very helpful in defeating Hitler.

Coalition partners do not share all the same views. That’s what makes them a coalition. That means strains and division is possible, even probable. But we must hold together to achieve our common aims.

In the current case, we want to oust a tyrant. But many of us want to go further.

The Saners want the tyrant gone, but we do not want to restore plutocracy. We want to change both our government and economic systems. Neither should serve a privileged elite. These institutions must serve the interests and wellbeing of The People. After so much unnecessary suffering, and the permanent damage to our Earth’s biosphere, we don’t want a return to the terrible world we had.

We want and will hold out for something much better. And we must be prepared to oppose unnecessary compromises of the wellbeing of The People or the health of our planet. But for now, we will work with a variety of coalition partners, including some rather odious ones.

The most dangerous—but potentially very helpful in the short run—are angry plutocrats who want to stop the fascists because the plutocrats are losing money due to the tariffs. They want the fascists to take a back seat to plutocracy. And they want The People to take a back seat to both.
THAT we won’t go along with—together (if necessary, but alone if that’s how things develop) we will oust the criminal reich.

Celebrate NOW

Life is short. Work (for profit, producing “commodities” and other crap) is waste. Hatred is stupidity.

Let’s live. When we protest—and protests will now be frequent and bigger each time—do so with confidence and joy. Remind everyone that, at the people who create, WE have the power and the advantage. WE are the essential workers, and the elites are simply an obsolete drag preventing everyone from living the good life.

At protests, we must build confidence. We must not only condemn evil, but promote the beautiful world we will create. We must not only reject fear, but we must celebrate life—take control of the moment—and express joy and kindness.

The protests are actions to take down the cruelty of the elites, but also a time to discover, experience and express the joy of living as free human beings in the momentary prototype of a new, better, loving and sane civilization.