November 6, 2024, 2:30pm
It’s an ugly day, and I’m finding it hard to face what’s next. The clarity is jarring and immense, and the fear, grief, and rage are feeling larger than I can hold. I’m reminding myself continually that I cannot and should not hold it alone. It’s important to get together — it’s time to activate your communities: your book club, your running group, your knitting circle, your group texts.
We have to draw those bonds of community tighter. We don’t have time to wait four years. Soon enough, pundits will fling blame and dissect what they think happened, but I doubt that there’s “one weird trick” that might have saved us from this fate. The smartest people I’m reading are saying that many Americans looked at what the right offered and said “yes.” What this means is that whatever is coming, many people want it, many people are eager for it.
I’m as guilty as anyone of hoping someone else will fix this, but we should all know that there isn’t someone else. There’s only us.
To quote Kwame Ture, it’s the “height of bourgeois propaganda” to think that your “responsibility is limited to a one-day vote. Politics is every day, every minute.” Get your book club and your communities involved. Let’s start inviting each other into community organizations, mutual aid groups, unions, and political organizations working for something brighter. It’s time for solidarity and collective action.
What are the groups you’re involved with? Who are the talented organizers in your community who are already building? Where are people in your community gathering to help and care for each other? Wherever you are, someone has already begun the work.
Nationally, I’m looking to Labor Notes, Writers Against The War on Gaza, and the DIY HRT Directory for the next steps. What organizations are you connected to and working with? Share them with us here so that we can compile them and connect people, but most of all, share them with your book club, the people who you know share not just your taste in books, but your values too.
Let’s get together.