Thread by @gwensnyderPHL

Let's be real clear that, as @Antifagator points out, the "#resistance-averse leftists" in question here are real.

They're the Intercept "Russiagate" bullshitters, the Jacobin faux-intellectuals, and the dirtbags.

They thought admitting Trump's fascism would hurt Bernie's odds.

https://twitter.com/chrislhayes/status/1309166939139461124

They thought that because they'd centered (and still center) reactionary bullshit class reductionism politics that are basically an excuse not to think about structural racism, xenophobia, misogyny, or ableism except as secondary outgrowths of class oppression.

Without understanding each of those phenomenons as components of a broad web of intersecting oppressions, you can't understand fascism.

Fascism is about leaning into all that shit simultaneously.

You can't see fascism except as a historical footnote if you don't see that.

You can't account for or explain fascism with a class reductionist lens.

The tools don't exist.

They couldn't see it, and they didn't want to.

They didn't want to because it would mean having to admit that these oppressions aren't just derivatives of class oppression.

Their entire vision of leftism was and is built around the idea that leftism is supposed to be an elite (them) ushering a herd of angry, economically fucked-over white men to the polls for their candidate without ever bulding actual movement or challenging them.

Their vision was to do basically what Trump has done-- tell white racist dudes what they want to hear, then get their people office and do what they want.

They undermined decades of work to creare an inclusive left by throwing open the doors to racist misogynists and telling them that they could do whatever they wanted and be as racist/misogynist/ableist as they wanted, that just as long as they were mad about class it was fine.

They used Gamergate-style tactics to brigade, ridicule, and undermine the reputation and work of dedicated intersectional leftists that made Bernie's success possible in the first place.

They converted the popular "left" into an entity incapable of even perceiving Trump's fascism at EXACTLY the moment we needed the left united in naming it for what it is and supporting/defending dedicated antifascist movement in the US.

I don't think Hayes is especially attuned to these dynamics or centering the most telling acts of fascism in his thread, but we need to be clear that there have been repeated missed moments for broad-based popular resistance to Trump's fascism.

There were PLENTY of deeply frustrating dynamics present in white women's #resistance, but there was also an opportunity to educate and radicalize and use that moment to move newly-agitated folks towards meaningful antifascist resistance.

Instead of doing that work, class reductionists scoffed in deep misogyny at the beginner analysis of those women and used it to maintain their sense of superiority.

Then, they used it as an excuse to dismiss feminism-focused organizing in general.

They mocked women experiencing pain at Trump's open embrace of misogyny and rape culture during #resistance uprising.

They mocked Black people experiencing pain at Trump's open embrace of deadly racism during the uprisings.

They believe a class lens is the only viable lens, so they dismissed oppressed people viewing fascism through the lens of their own experience as silly liberals instead of understanding that these lenses are all valid and work best *together.*

You can see misogyny through a lens of feminism.

You can see racism through a lens of antiracism.

You can see class oppression through the lens of class politics.

You can ONLY see fascism if you combine those lenses.

That's the real issue with folks not seeing Trump's fascism.

You have to look through a bunch of different lenses to correctly identify fascism.

If you only have access or care about one lens, you simply cannot see it.

That's what's so destructive about any "left" (or any) analysis that is so centered on one single lens that it denigrates all the others and treats them as unimportant.

It makes it impossible to detect fascism until it's fully metastasized.

And by then, it may be too late.

We had the information we needed to understand Trump as a fascist, or at least a proto-fascist, back in 2016.

Plenty of people named it.

We were treated as silly and alarmist.

Four years isn't a lot of time, but it's a whole lot more time than the two months we have now.

If there's momentum and drive, it's enough time to educate folks on a largescale, train them, build relationships, identify leaders, create sophisticated networks & contingency plans.

Antifascists have that, but it's small scale.

The misogynist, racist, ableist class-analysis-only attitude that took over the left alienated broad swaths of folks who could have been brought to some level of meaningful antifascist engagement by the left.

The electoral-or-bust attitude that the class reductionists push-- actively mocking issue work, protest, and mutual aid organizing-- alienated the popular "left" from exactly the kind of antifascist organizing work that needed to be done.

We now have a popular "left" that had nothing but contempt for both antifascists and the kind of real, meaningful community organizing needed to counter Trump.

The popular left is supposed to be a vehicle that can introduce people to deeper antifascist work in emergencies like these.

Instead, class reductionists turned it into a reactionary vehicle actively working to delude people into underestimating the threat of Trumpian fascism.

It is a fucking grievous sin.

People are dying and will die because of it.

We are radically, inexcusably unprepared to counter the likely totalitarian fascist coup coming down the river.

Liberals are finally scared enough to listen to antifascists, but there isn't enough time to recruit and educate and train the folks we could have if the popular left had done its job and operated as a gentle introduction to the politics that guide antifascist work.

That's on class reductionists, not antifascists.

They took a left that could have done that work and made it a left that celebrated rather than countered misogyny, racism, and ableism.

It's hard to understate the damage they did.