Jared Yates Sexton Profile picture
Oct 4, 2020 7 tweets 2 min read Read on X
When powers begin to fade they lose the ability to better living conditions, respond to crises, or even provide the basic necessities of life.

They collapse in on themselves and offer nothing but lies about reality and violence to enforce the propaganda.
This path that we’re on, with Trumpism, fascism, and the dying myths of American exceptionalism and white supremacy, is a road to death.

We’re experiencing societal rot right now and this moment should be warning enough that we’d better right our course in a hurry.
Our failure to address the pandemic, economic inequality, the rise of paramilitary extremism, the creep of managed democracies, one natural disaster after another, the existential threat of climate change...these are portents.

This farce with Trump is late-stage Americanism.
I say it every day. Trump isn’t the disease, he’s a symptom.

We’ve been bleeding from white supremacy and hegemonic ambitions for so long now. This moment is us staggering around, grasping and gnashing our teeth.

Something has to change. In a hurry.
As the Soviet Union decayed, all that was left were shows of impotent military force, societal oppression, and corrupt leaders who lied about reality.

When it finally fell, its citizens expressed a strange sentiment of simultaneous shock and inevitability.
This business with Trump’s illness, his shifting condition, the shoddy propaganda, this is late-stage Americanism.

This is a farce and if it continues it’ll either collapse into dust or rage into fascism. We can find something better, more real, more human.

It’s not too late.
An election is a start, but not the end.

Ask yourself what you want. What America should be. What America could be.

Whatever happens with Trump and November, this isn’t over. We have to work toward something else, something better, or else that collapse will find us.

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More from @JYSexton

May 8
Trump should be punished for his crimes.

But the circus around his trial is more about avoiding talking about actual problems and instead believing our institutions are fundamentally sound and Trump isn’t a symptom of a much larger disease.

jaredyatessexton.substack.com/p/decline-and-…
Image
The Trump Hush Money Trial is a perfect tabloid storm. But nothing coming out of the trial will matter electorally.

And even if Trump were to go to jail, the Right Wing authoritarian movement won’t just dissipate. It’s comforting fantasy and entertainment.
For 8 years now we’ve watched as one person after another told us Mueller or Comey or Smith would get Trump and fix this for us.

And what it’s hidden is that Trump is a front for a much, much bigger problem that goes way beyond him.
Read 8 tweets
May 8
Apple has unintentionally made one of the most fitting and revealing advertisements of the modern era.

My god. This horror perfectly encapsulates the feeling of life as the powerful wreak escalatingly careless and clueless destruction.
That nobody at Apple looked at this nightmare and vetoed it is everything you need to know. They were just in a hurry to sell some dumb, barely updated version of an old product and thought people would enjoy the visuals. And they gave us a perfect discordant horror show image.
The most frightening thing about about our crisis is that the powerful are increasingly clueless while more powerful and wealthy than ever. That’s what nepotism and rigged markets will get you.

And they’re the ones with their hands on the hydraulic press.
Read 4 tweets
May 4
The thing that so many people are resistant to deal with is that the protests aren’t just about Gaza anymore but also state violence and what confrontations over power will look like as our crisis worsens.

And how that and Gaza and all our other major issues are tied together.
We’ve been conditioned to segment all issues, to separate them, but the truth is that the very force that enables indiscriminate brutality around the world is what keeps women from controlling their bodies, people of color from voting, and what keeps oppression rolling.
What our politics have been reduced to is arguing over whether to accelerate fascism or keep the status quo that is riven through with authoritarianism and getting worse.

What we’re watching now is a confrontation over whether that frame will be allowed to change.
Read 7 tweets
May 3
You’ll notice that Congress is a complete traffic jam, a black hole of legislation, until it’s time to pass a weapons deal, approve a new war, pump money into a market as it’s about to collapse, fund law enforcement, or restrict the people’s rights.
There’s a reason for that.

Neoliberalism transferred trillions from the working and middle classes to the rich, allowing the elite to co-opt our government and turn the state into its own piggy bank and enforcer.
The Neoliberal consensus has plunged us into a deep, deep crisis, and it’s past time to pay attention. Representative government has been effectively stolen, and until that changes it’s only going to get worse.
Read 4 tweets
Apr 28
Every single protester I’ve talked to has been impressively informed. Like, jaw-droppingly so.

On the other hand, takes like this are not only lazy but indictments of a political class that has continually performed “principles” and are now projecting their own guilt. Image
I cannot believe how many people are piling onto this “the protesters are doing this because it’s trendy” bullshit.

They’re literally risking their education, their careers, they’re being assaulted and having sniper rifles trained on them.

What is wrong with you?
The truth is that the cynicism of centrist liberals is such a heavy burden as they’re navigating a political landscape with real consequences. They don’t want to change anything while appearing on the “right side” of morality.

And so they have to play these awful games.
Read 5 tweets
Apr 25
If we’re going to defeat rising authoritarianism it’s going to take a democratic movement that demands a better future.

People always ask me what they can do, so I put together an explainer. History tells us how we win. It’s time to pay attention. Image
Authoritarianism tells us we are powerless and alone. That the battle is already lost.

But it’s brittle. Vulnerable. There are so many of us and we are now living in a time where we can band together and defeat this thing and realize the world we deserve. Image
Our system, by design, is intended to make us feel powerless. But that’s to curb the power of democratic, collective action.

It’s on us to recognize that fact and to create something together that breaks the hold of authoritarian rule by the wealthy. And we can do it. Image
Read 4 tweets

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