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Why Aren't We Fighting Back? [1]

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Date: 2023-05-27  

With each passing day I grow increasingly alarmed at what seems like an inexorable march towards real authoritarianism. But what concerns me even more is the fact that as democrats we are not pushing back with the same vigor as our opponents are pushing their agenda.

This is no time for decorum, no time for civility. This is trench warfare and we aren't even digging fox holes. We should be fighting fire with fire and ferocity. We are seeing books banned from schools on the strength of a single right wing parent's complaint. So why are we not doing the same thing? If they want to ban "Maus" or "The Hill We Climb", we should formally seek the banning of Bill Bennet's "The Book Of Virtues". We should formally complain of the discomfort that we fear if our children should read from the Bible.

I realize that as civilized and educated human beings, the notion of book banning is onerous to most of us, myself included. But only when the right wing extremists see that they and their own ideology are just as vulnerable as ours, will they back off. Only when we take a case to the courts will we gain leverage. In fact we can't really lose. If we have to litigate the banning of a right wing book and the courts rule against us, we will then have the ammunition to have our own books reinstated. If on the other hand we should prevail, then we will at least be able to remove such harmful materials and force upon our opponents the realization that they too are vulnerable.

And let us not stop there. We need to bring the heat to business entities that enable right wing extremism. If our opponents want to shoot at beer cans, then why are we not recruiting our own celebrities and influencers to publicly burn the products of the companies that contribute to the likes of Marjory Taylor Green, Lauren Boebert, Matt Gaetz, Paul Gozar etc.? We need to realize that at the end of the day there are more of us than there are of them. We have it within our ranks, the ability to bring greater pain than they can, if only we will deign to use it.

When companies realize they will lose more money catering to right wing snowflake sensibilities than they do to ours they will make the choice to stop supporting white supremacy, racism, anti-Semitism, anti-LGBT etc. It's important to realize that they care about one thing and one thing only; profits, pure and simple. We should force upon them the calculus that right wing extremism is more expensive than progressive ideology. They may not be able to show the kind of courage that Disney showed, particularly as corporate businessmen tend more often than not to be essentially bullies and cowards at heart. But we can use that to our advantage as the fear of a loss of profits is their greatest fear of all.

We must acknowledge that the rise of right wing extremism is not merely corrosive, it is a real and serious threat to all Americans. Canvassing neighborhoods is all well and good, but it's no replacement for real and substantive action. We must make them feel the pain that they wish to inflict on us. Only when they realize that they are more vulnerable than we are will we have any chance at all of forcing them back under the rocks from which they have crawled.

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[1] Url: https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2023/5/27/2171747/-Why-Aren-t-We-Fighting-Back

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