Harry Lewis

And before the bean soup brigade turns up, yes I know that some people cannot do things in person but if this message does not apply to you then that is perfectly okay!

Hi Bluesky! Hope everyone is doing well. This is a friendly reminder that if you haven’t hopped offline lately to connect with other people in your area doing good work you absolutely should! The fastest way to get angry and scared is to isolate yourself. Build community offline too!

Congratulations also go out to our fantastic Burlington County elected officials. Grateful we have such a strong team of commissioners and legislators representing us and looking forward to rounding out the team with a win for Anthony Angelozzi in November!

Wanted to wish everyone who won in last night’s primaries a hearty congratulations - @mikiesherrill.bsky.social will be a fierce advocate for New Jersey families and I know she’ll be able to stand up to the authoritarian excesses of Trump when she’s our next Governor.

Leave it to a Canadian to misrepresent the American electoral system as if there have not been and are not currently elections happening all over the country for very powerful political offices SMH

I won’t say who I voted for for governor (sent my mail-in ballot back last month) but there is lots of good info out there about all six of the candidates. And as always, a good rule of thumb is to be skeptical about every candidate. None of them are deities with all the answers. Be judicious!

Hi Bluesky! Hope everybody is well. I’ve been staying off of here because the doom and gloom and constant bickering just isn’t good for my mental health - but I’m popping in with a reminder to my NJ friends to vote in the primary! Early voting is open through Sunday and Election Day is Tuesday.

Also this is further proof that the evil authoritarian dictator Trump white people have been losing their minds over is so all powerful that he got outplayed diplomatically by a little known Senator who went over his head. Trump was and continues to be a paper tiger.

I really need every single person who told his family that this man was dead to write them an apology for inflicting deep psychological trauma on them for the purpose of clicks. And the conspiracies are already starting on here and getting boosted by the algorithm.

History tells us where we’ve been, how we got through before, and how we get through now. And it lets us get through to make something even better than we could’ve imagined. So that’s where I am: clear minded, purposeful, and peaceful knowing what we have to do. ✌🏻

And that’s how I see it. Things in America have been horrible and violent and extrajudicial since its founding. Hell, the same people who white liberals talk about “following their values” owned other human beings as property and treated them as 3/5 of a person. It’s always been bad.

I saw a good comment on a TikTok about Bush Jr’s use of Guantanamo as an extrajudicial prison for US citizens suspected of crimes where somebody said “Well, that might be bad but Trump is WAY worse.” And the creator just replied, “I don’t care. The point of precedent is to show us where to go.”

That’s right: the administration who everyone is insisting is completely unlike any administration who has ever come before it is citing existing US law to justify their bigoted decision.

It’s almost like none of this is really all that new at all.

I can’t find it now but I was struck by, in a post talking about the State Department’s rationale for deporting international students, amidst all of the hysteria from white liberals about the unprecedented nature of this, someone made a minor note that the law he’s citing is from 1952.

I take my strength and inspiration from the people who, in the face of horrific state-sanctioned oppression, were unable and unwilling to leave and stood up for themselves and their neighbors. This moment calls for nothing less.

I refuse to give up or give in. I’ll fight to make it better.

It’s been four months of the Trump administration and white liberals are finally coming to grips with a government that has, for its entire existence, wielded its power to bring the hammer down on non-white American citizens, no longer protecting them. Less than 100 days and they’re fleeing.

Through the abolishment of slavery, freed Black Americans would routinely be captured and sold into slavery, even with their papers on them. Andrew Jackson used the military to eradicate the Cherokee people. Roosevelt took Japanese Americans out of their homes and put them in camps. This is America.

I don’t say that to be snarky but I’m struck by how many people are acting as if they don’t recognize the US anymore - a government that can essentially disappear people off the street based on their ethnicity and perceived political affiliation.

History echoes. It’s not new.

Hi Bluesky! Hope everybody’s doing well.

Want to pop in and say that I saw a TikTok just now where a white woman talked about how she is fleeing the United States for Italy because she “doesn’t recognize this country anymore”.

I’m not sure what country she’s been living in.

Well she’s very precious and lucky to have you!

Oh Ellie’s so cute!!!

I’d say goodnight to you too but unfortunately only one of us uses our real names and has a picture so I can’t return the favor :(

This isn’t an airport. No need to announce your departure.

I’m a very proud dork.

Then you would know all of those things happened during Reconstruction and slavery too, like when the Nazis took notes from Jim Crow laws to develop their own fascist policies

Yeah I would go out on limb and say that they’ve known the US government as fascist for about 250 years now

Saying that nothing could have prepared us for Trump when segregation was legal less than sixty years ago is an absolutely wild statement to make

Is slavery not on that list?

It’s yet another reminder that when we react out of fear or anger we’re setting ourselves up to fail - we’ve got to listen to the experts and not give into the algorithm of panic. We take hits as they come in real time, not before they happen. That’s how we get through this.

In times like this is more important than ever not to whip ourselves into a frenzy over things that haven’t happened yet. All that post did was scare people who, like the poster, don’t understand the steps involved in legal review. And it wasted energy that could’ve been put to something productive.