G+ Community: Saving Science & Tech from Trump
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As I write these words late in the evening of 8 November 2016, Donald Trump has become the president-elect of the United States.
In 1933, a man named Adolf Hitler, who by all accounts was far more intelligent, refined, educated, and self-controlled than one Donald J. Trump, was appointed chancellor of Germany, a country that at the time was among the world’s leaders in arts and science. Within a few years, he dragged Germany into a maelstrom of racism, death, and horror, with few German fingers raised to stop him.
Luckily, though he was on the path to do so, Hitler never obtained operational nuclear weapons. Nor for that matter was he known to brag about committing sexual assault. He was many horrible things, but he was not an ignoramus.
On the other hand, Hitler’s supporters and Trump’s supporters are very much one of a kind, and history teaches clearly that giving any quarter to such monsters is the fastest route to total annihilation.
We will in coming hours and days hear much talk — as did the citizens of 1933 Germany — about “coming together” for the sake of our country.
When it comes to a President Trump, I reject such calls, and I assert that all ethical Americans should do the same.
To “come together” with such an ignorant and lying man and his minions — a man who is a proponent of sexual assault, of torture, of deep-seated racism and antisemitism — a man who mocks the disabled, who doesn’t believe in science, and who encourages mindless violence and restrictions on freedom of speech — is to lend tacit if not active approval to such abominable attitudes and behaviors. This is a binary decision — there is no middle ground. You either accept the evil and join it — or you fight against it body and soul.
There is a long list of villains — some knowing, some “merely” complicit — who have enabled the rise of the ultimate, perverted horror of a President-Elect Trump.
These include (in no particular order and merely to mention a few): FBI Director James Comey, Vladimir Putin, Julian Assange, news organizations like those of CNN and CBS who played crucial roles in Trump’s rise, Bernie Sanders and his followers along with third-party candidates, and yes, we of the Internet and social media, who provided the means for echo chamber exacerbation of racism and fake news to multiply without bounds in the name of profits.
There is no coming together with the likes of a President Trump and his storm troopers, any more than there can be a coming together with a pit full of lethal cobras, spiders, and rabid hyenas.
All legal means must be employed to stop the damage that a President Trump could and would do to this country and the world. This may include both vast civil disobedience and the leveraging of the technology that we control toward limiting the ability of a President Trump and his appointees to destroy what’s great about the United States of America and the rest of this planet.
A hideous monster like a President Trump, combined with a totally GOP-controlled Congress and likely multiple Supreme Court nominations, empowered by USA military and nuclear capabilities, could easily make Hitler’s Reich look like a playground by comparison.
I had hoped — in fact I had already planned and publicly noted — my intentions to move away from political content postings after this election. I realize now that this will be impossible. I apologize for raising your hopes about this unnecessarily.
I am no longer a young man. I do not intend to sit by for the time I have remaining while simply pontificating about the niceties of technology and tech policy while this country is dragged down into a nightmare that would likely even terrify Adolf Hitler himself.
I will be endeavoring to use any and all legal means available — political, technical, and more — to accomplish as effective as possible a figurative “neutering” of a President Trump and all individuals associated with him, to limit the damage that he and his Deplorables can do to this already great nation.
There cannot be “business as usual” in the face of the existential threat represented by Trump.
I welcome you to join me in this effort.
But if you feel that you will be offended or otherwise upset by my use of my various venues and lists for such purposes — which will now likely be escalating dramatically — I urge you to unfollow or unsubscribe from me now.
We are faced with a form of total war. This war must be fought via legal and peaceful means, so long as we ourselves and our fellow Americans are not threatened with illegal actions or violence by a President Trump or his thugs.
Together, we shall ultimately prevail against the epitome of ignorance and evil that is Donald J. Trump.
–Lauren–
I have consulted to Google, but I am not currently doing so — my opinions expressed here are mine alone.
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The correct term is “Internet” NOT “internet” — please don’t fall into the trap of using the latter. It’s just plain wrong!