Numbers matter. If they didn’t matter, wanna-be authoritarians wouldn’t be censoring labor statistics that don’t show them in favorable terms. The “flood the zone” strategy the Trump administration has been implementing is causing harm on a scale that is truly difficult to enumerate but all those numbers matter too. 

As the good folks at Stroika point out, the authoritarian playbook is a playbook for a reason. This is, in fact, precedented. And that means we can learn from what has worked previously. 

Power is more important than the truth and no one know that better than survivors of sexual assault.

All these things are connected. The vision for the world that emerges when these individual events are put together is one of isolationism, stalled progress, rabid racism and sexism, a fallen democracy and country, destroyed from within. There is an acute danger of normalcy amidst fascism, of shrugging while there are people intentionally starved and bombed in faraway lands and locked up without due process on our own soil.

In 1980, James Baldwin wrote in The Nation: “The children are always ours, every single one of them, all over the globe; and I am beginning to suspect that whoever is incapable of recognizing this may be incapable of morality.” Are the more than 50,000 children killed or injured in Gaza not also ours? 

Finding hope at this moment is hard but absolutely necessary. We must contest every harm and every loss. We must cede nothing. 

If you want to know what a society values, look at what they spend their money on. As we write this week’s update, the US Senate passed a monstrosity of a budget that strips healthcare and food assistance from the most vulnerable people in our society, cuts science funding and kills our ability to solve our most pressing challenges, gives rich people a huge tax break, and funds gestapo and literal concentration camps on US soil and abroad.

As our US government institutions increasingly fail to keep us safe, many individuals and civil society groups are organizing and stepping up to protect each other. That’s heartening and much needed at a time when the slide into authoritarianism is more rapid in the US than most experts anticipated. Life may seem “normal” in your corner of the world, with the daily grind of work and life, brunch, kiddo playdates, concerts, etc. That normalcy is deceiving and dangerous, as dissidents from other authoritarian regimes warn us.

Violence is escalating in the US and across the world, from targeted assassinations of Minnesota legislators and their family members to violence against peaceful protesters (including violence perpetrated by law enforcement groups), to escalation of war in the Middle East, Sudan, and Ukraine. It is tempting to look away, but we need to remember that turning away is a privilege and many do not have that option. 

What does everyday bravery look like? How can we take strength and inspiration from ordinary people doing incredibly brave things?

Authoritarianism is rapidly spreading in the US and globally. As scientists who are deeply concerned about the onslaught of attacks on science, we must learn how to navigate a world where multiple things can be true

At times, the world feels unlovable. The people who are taking a wrecking ball to our institutions do not love the world, they only love themselves. But to love, even in the face of a purposely cruel and violent world, is revolutionary and an act of resistance. 

“We are not in Kansas anymore, folks - we’re in an authoritarian fever dream with bad spray tans and worse policies. But guess what? Resistance isn’t a one-day protest. Its a daily sabotage of the unjust.

Be petty. Be loud. Be ungovernable”

“Every moment is an organizing opportunity, every person a potential activist, every minute a chance to change the world” - Dolores Huerta, co-founder of the National Farmworkers Union.

The Imperial need for control is so desperate because it is so unnatural. Tyranny requires constant effort. It breaks, it leaks. Authority is brittle. Oppression is the mask of fear.

“We recognize that science is inherently political. Science is defined as a set of human practices relating to knowledge that arises from, is shaped by, and helps reproduce the social systems in which it is embedded. Thus, science is not an objective good or neutral tool; it interpenetrates with all other social phenomena such as class, race, sex, gender, geography, and culture. Science throughout history is practiced unequally, benefits few, excludes many, and is inextricable from its human consequences. To defend “science,” we must first ask: Science for whom? By what means? Toward what ends?” 

The urgency of the moment cannot be overstated. Thousands of people have been laid off from the Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS), the Centers for Disease Control (CDC), and the Food and Drug Administration (FDA). The impacts of losing entire programs and core functionality of remaining programs will be felt for years to come and the most vulnerable members of our society will pay the price. 

“Part of how they make you obey is by making obedience seem peaceful, while resistance is violence. But really, either choice is about violence, one way or another.” ― Charlie Jane Anders, The City in the Middle of the Nigh

“Who has the right to have rights?” wrote Mahmoud Khalil in his letter from a Louisiana ICE detention center last week. That question has been top of mind as more information and footage is shared from ICE detention centers in the US and abroad. And just like that, the U.S. has concentration camps again.

This past week was a doozy.  As Rebecca Solnit put it, “People are rising up. I feel a groundswell. There is a lot going on. There's a whole lot going on. And that's just what I can see, and I know that a whole lot of us are organizing, resisting, and not cooperating in a whole lot of ways we can't see yet. I'm horrified by what the Trumpists are doing and by the moral ugliness of it; but I'm moved and exhilarated by what a whole lot of the rest of us are doing, and the moral beauty of it. The horror and the wonder can coexist, just as the worst and best of us do.”

We are witnessing attacks on science and evidence-based policymaking in the U.S. at a scale we have not experienced in our lifetimes. We, former and current members of the 500 Women Scientists leadership team, are gathering in support of our community across the world in this critical moment.