In Times Like These, Neutrality Is Not Acceptable— You're With Them Or You're Against Them

Which Protest Are You Going To Be Part of Today?

Moral ambiguity and the Republican Party

Yesterday, John Pavlovitz looked at who has blood on their hands— even if just figuratively at this point. Do you know people who are still hung-ho about the Trump Regime still? I do… even after “his absolute disregard for the Constitution, throwing our nation into perpetual chaos; his rejection of the rule of Law, stripping elemental rights from tens of millions of Americans; his unthinkable, unspeakable treatment of human beings rounded up like animals and jailed without probable cause; his capricious and violent crusade against federal workers, universities, law firms, public school teachers, medical professionals, and journalists. The people we love, live alongside; those we work and study shoulder to shoulder with; those we have invited into our hearts and homes. They are as responsible for all of this as he is, as those in his Cabinet are. The war crimes in Gaza and Ukraine. The medical relief, ripped from the poorest of the world. The scalding panic felt by immigrants, both documented and undocumented. They are culpable for all of it. The literal and figurative blood is on their hands.”

They could have so easily stopped this.

They could have allowed their humanity to come to bear back in the fall, when it was clear that he was cognitively shattered, that his singular goal was a fascist dictatorship, that his agenda would consist solely of retribution against those who sought legal and moral accountability for him.

Instead, our childhood friends, our favorite uncles, and our next-door neighbors ignored revered journalists, Constitutional scholars, renowned economists, and past presidents.

They shunned their responsibility as Americans, they rejected the teachings of their faith tradition, and they abandoned any kind of moral footing by enabling the ascension of a felon-rapist-scumbag mobster who lacks a single noble impulse. Through whatever combination of racism, misogyny, prejudice, intellectual ignorance, and plain old hatred, they willfully coronated him.

And now, they either fully endorse this most vicious and vile season in our nation’s history, or enable it by their cowardice and silence.

And as a result, this senseless waste of life, this asinine global trade war, this stupid squandering of prosperity, this sociopathic predation against citizens and immigrants— they are collaborators on all of it.

And in light of this, they do not deserve proximity with those of us who are hourly pushing back against the criminality, exposing the atrocities, caring for those under duress. They are nothing but barriers to healing and obstacles to justice.

I’m not sure America can even survive the damage we’ve sustained in such a short time. Despite our best efforts, it may not be possible (at least in our lifetimes) to stop the bleeding, reverse course, and repair all that has been damaged since January 20th.

But if any of this is going to happen: if we are going to salvage our Republic from this massive wrecking ball of cruelty, it is going to be necessary for the good people of this nation to sever ties with those still loyal to him. We need to withhold our friendship, exclude them from our holiday gatherings, cut personal and professional ties, and practically speaking, marginalize them.

If we truly believe in bending the arc of the moral universe toward justice at this place and time, his supporters need to become pariahs. They should not be welcome where good people gather. They need to be held accountable for unleashing this hell on the rest of us.

I’m not speaking about those who have or will come to their senses; those with the humility and empathy to admit their errors; those who will be visible and vocal in their resistance to this Administration. While it would have been far better for their souls to have been accessed much earlier, later is still better than never.

But as far as his cheerleaders, champions, kindred spirits, sycophants, and disciples— they are proving themselves unreachable with reason, impervious to compassion, and mortally allergic to anything that reasonable human beings value.

As in other times of historic fascist regimes, there is no ambiguity left now.

The lines are starkly drawn, the factions clearly defined, the opposing values unmistakable.

On one side of this battle for the soul of our nation, the safety of its people, and the welfare of the planet, is the sprawling interdependent community of those committed to healing, kindness, and the common good.

And on the other side stands this historically unredeemable would-be king and those who regardless of the story they tell themselves, still inexplicably stand alongside him.

Compromise is not an option, and because of that many of us are going to need to lean into our convictions and move away from people we know, love, and once respected.

Sadly and tragically, that’s just how this has to be.

After WWII which Germans were judged to have had blood on their hands and which were judged to have been at least relatively— if there can be such a thing— innocent? After  the Allied victory, in the rubble of a destroyed continent, the Americans and British— if not the Russians— sought to distinguish between those who had orchestrated horror and those who had merely lived alongside it— or silently enabled it. Of course, at Nuremberg, the architects of genocide and global war— men like Göring, Kaltenbrunner, Ribbentrop— stood trial for crimes against humanity and were held accountable. High-ranking SS officers, the commanders of the Einsatzgruppen, and the heads of the Gestapo were condemned for their direct roles in murder and repression. Industrialists who profited from slave labor— executives from IG Farben, Krupp, and Flick— were put in the dock, even though in too many cases their wealth did shield them from judgment.

But most did escape any kind of meaningful scrutiny. Millions of Germans who had voted for Hitler, who cheered as the Nazis marched into Austria, Czechoslovakia, Poland, Holland, Paris, who turned in their neighbors, who worked in the bureaucratic machinery of the regime— most of them were never held accountable. Some simply returned to civilian life. Others were quietly reintegrated into the new West German government or business class. Denazification was uneven and often superficial.

"Resistance Becomes Duty" by Nancy Ohanian

And yet: morally, their hands were not clean. Were they all monsters? They were teachers, dentists, grocers, clergy. True, they were not always cruel. But they were complicit. And so too, today, are those who continue to support Trump and his movement— not out of ignorance, but in full view of what it is, and what it does. This moment, right now, is a test of moral clarity. A test of memory. A test of accountability.And when history looks back at this chapter— on Gaza, on January 6th, on the forced births, on the dismantling of democratic institutions— it will ask again: Who knew? Who watched? Who cheered? Who did nothing? Whose hands are clean?

Why did they miss today’s 50501 protests, (50 protests, ro states) building on the momentum of the April 5 “Hands Off” rallies which drew millions? Writing for the Washington Post, Kim Bellware and Emma Uber reported that Hunter Dunn, a spokesperson for 50501 said “We are trying to protect our democracy against the rise of authoritarianism under the Trump administration... We have registered Democrats, registered Independents and registered Republicans all marching because they all believe in America, because they all believe in a fair government that puts people before profits.”