During the course of the liberation struggle, victories, even on limited issues, should be celebrated. Those who have earned the victory should be recognized. Celebrations with vigilance should also help to keep up the morale needed for future stages of the struggle.
Gene Sharp, From Dictatorship to Democracy: A Conceptual Framework for Liberation
I’m not one to post to personally talk politics online, but it feels so incredibly disheartening that I’m not in a position to really be able to help much other than boosting resources and donating as much as I’m able to those who have been completely wronged by what’s supposedly the country that’s the forefront of freedom.
My heartaches to people have been completely fucked by the latest election, especially outside of America such as the Ukrainians and Gazans who’s lives and cultures shouldn’t be eradicated on the whim of an orange blob of a bastard and his sycophantic goons who sit around doing nothing but suck the working class dry and cause chaos through meaningless outcries against basic human rights.
Though definitely not enough to soothe any restless minds especially those directly affected in America, I’ve been personally started rereading the works of Dr Gene Sharp.
Dr Sharp is a really important figure in Political sciences and has made countless incredibly well thought out strategies and measures for those who want to fight against the loss of democracy.
Those works are also available as free pdf’s for people who don’t have the means to afford them, I know that some can just be found online through searching them/ using The Commons (which I’ve linked an example below)
An example of a free pdf. This one is specifically 198 methods of nonviolent action, and may be useful as not many people know the full extent of what can be done to create/ inspire change
The Commons is an online library for the change makers of the world and for those interested in social change, activism, organising, advocac
Also want to end off this post with a quote that’s currently getting me through this situation which may inspire some hope in others
“Dictatorships are never as strong as they think they are, and people are never as weak as they think they are” ~Gene Sharp
(Also just in case anyone wants to also donate, I’ve personally donated to the IRC, they not only just give aid to anyone who’s struggling and in need due to war, conflict and natural disasters but are directly involved in doing so while also spreading awareness of important issues around the world and the voices of those who may stay silent other wise ^^)
The International Rescue Committee (IRC) responds to the world’s worst humanitarian crises and helps people to survive and rebuild their liv
Nonviolent struggle, or nonviolent action, includes three categories of methods, specific means of acting. One, the methods of nonviolent protest, that are symbolic activities, such as marching down the street or displaying certain colors. But this technique, if it has only that, wouldn’t be worth much. It also includes the much more powerful methods of noncooperation, such as social boycotts, economic boycotts, labor strikes, political boycotts, civil disobedience. And thirdly, the methods of nonviolent intervention and disruption, such as sit-ins, fasts and the creation of new institutions.
Gene Sharp obituary notice on Democracy Now, https://www.democracynow.org/2018/1/31/headlines
Gene Sharp, a preacher’s son whose own gospel of nonviolent struggle inspired velvet revolutions that toppled dictators on four continents, died Jan. 28 at his home in Boston. He was 90.
His strategy was adopted by insurgents in the Baltics, Serbia, Ukraine, Burma (now Myanmar) and Egypt, during the Arab Spring turmoil. The Occupy Wall Street movement and other “occupy” demonstrations to protest economic inequality in the United States also drew from the Sharp manual.
Dr. Sharp became an intellectual father of peaceful resistance and the founder of an academic discipline devoted to his lifetime cause, one that synthesizes the philosophies espoused by Einstein, Gandhi, Tolstoy, Thomas Hobbes, Henry David Thoreau and the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.
His philosophy could be reduced to two axioms:
First, autocracies are vulnerable to being undermined because “dictators are never as strong as they tell you they are,” he said in Mr. Arrow’s film, “and people are never as weak as they think they are.”
Second, while limited violence against dictatorial governments may sometimes be inevitable, violence provokes more violence, a strategy that gives dictators an advantage.
October 5, 2000: Flashback to Yugoslavia, West's first color revolution victim (x)
The manual for this kind of coup was written by US scholar Gene Sharp. But it was the former Otpor activists who spread it across the world. In 2004, Popovic founded CANVAS (Center for Applied NonViolent Action and Strategies) and began traveling the world peddling his revolutionary methods to whoever was Uncle Sam’s next target.
A 2011 documentary about the revolution business followed Otpor/CANVAS activity to North Africa during that year’s 'Arab Spring' uprisings.
Wherever they go, these agents of chaos infect the target country’s politics, manipulating genuine local activists into becoming the agents of their people’s demise. While they preach democracy, their dirty tricks are effectively destroying its credibility in the long term. That’s fine with them, however; the objective is not democracy but obedience. Besides, they won’t stick around to see the consequences - there is always the next revolution to plan and execute.
And they always mobilize the young, known for their excess of emotion and shortage of wisdom. They sing the seductive song of “bringing down a dictator” (there’s even a documentary! With a celebrity narrator!) to people who think that will solve all of their problems.
Before the dust from the 'revolution' clears, however, the CANVAS consultants have moved off to the next target, leaving their duped students to watch in horror as their countries descend into strife or chaos. If they are extremely lucky, they end up replacing one corrupt regime with another, only this time beholden to foreign masters.
Gene Sharp was an American political scientist. He was the founder of the Albert Einstein Institution, a non-profit organization dedicated to advancing the stud...
