Live from the RNC, plus Launching the New Anti-Authoritarian Podcast, with Chris Walker (Truthout) and Sue Hyde (22nd Century Initiative)

The following transcript was automatically generated and may contain minor inaccuracies.

[00:00:00] Josh Elstro: Welcome to Block and Build, a podcast by Convergence magazine. I’m producer at Convergence, Josh Elstro, sitting in this week for Cayden Mak, who is on a well earned vacation and will return next week. On this show, we’re building a roadmap for people and organizations trying to unite anti fascist forces in order to build the influence of a progressive trend while blocking the rise of authoritarianism in the United States.

[00:00:23] And this week we saw about a lifetime’s worth of news, so let’s see if we can fit it into just a few minutes of headlines. Starting, of course, we are all aware of the assassination attempt on former President Donald Trump at a campaign rally stop in western Pennsylvania. What remains unclear are the motives of the 20 year old shooter and lots of confusion around security failures, which led to the shooting.

[00:00:46] Aside from the gunman, one attendee was killed and two others critically wounded. GOP politicians have been quick to own and weaponize language and terminology around political violence. On Tuesday, a protester affiliated with anti war activist Code Pink was arrested outside the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee.

[00:01:06] House Representative for Wisconsin and former Navy SEAL Derek Van Orden claimed that the 24 year old woman, Quote, assaulted him. Witnesses of the event claimed the congressman was indeed the physical aggressor. Nevertheless, the congressman took to Twitter to claim, quote, Republicans have been intimidated and targeted for years, including the attempted assassination of president Trump, and we will no longer stand by and allow lawlessness.

[00:01:30] There’s no place for political violence in this country. And I’ve repeatedly called for people who choose this path to be prosecuted to the greatest extent of the law. End quote. The city of Milwaukee also welcomed 4, 500 outside law enforcement officers to this week’s RNC. On Tuesday, five of them were involved in the killing of an unhoused man who was wielding a knife at another man in the street over a mile away from the convention center.

[00:01:55] A friend of the deceased on the scene hours later told a HuffPost reporter, he was just a homeless guy trying to get by like everybody else. Why are cops from Ohio way out here? Had that been Milwaukee PD, that man would be alive right now. I know that because they know him. They would have used nonlethal force.

[00:02:13] End quote. Also this week, more senior Democrats are questioning President Biden’s fitness for his reelection campaign with Nancy Pelosi joining the charge and being reported to have privately told Biden that polls are showing he can’t win and that he will cost Dems the house. This problem is further burdened.

[00:02:32] By Biden having tested positive for COVID Wednesday night with his official Twitter or X account posting simply, I’m sick. And speaking of Twitter or X, we unfortunately have to talk a bit about Elon Musk. As he announced he’s moving the headquarters for SpaceX and X from California to Texas, citing the new law that bars school districts from requiring staff to disclose students gender IDs as, quote, the last straw.

[00:03:01] He also, according to the AP, is moving his residence from California to Texas, where conveniently, there is no personal income tax. Musk also announced this week he’s committing 45 million a month to the Trump campaign. Finally, we learned that GOP nominee for Vice President is none other than surrogate of fascist billionaire Peter Thiel and Appalachian valor stealing grifter J.

[00:03:26] D. Vance. Congratulations to Middletown, Ohio’s favored son. Godspeed.

[00:03:40] It’s a lot. Take a breath if you need to, and hopefully you can hang with us because I’m very excited. Later in the show, we are joined by Deputy Director of the 22nd Century Initiative and co host of Convergence’s newest show, the anti authoritarian podcast, Sue Hyde. But first, we’re going to check in with news writer for Truthout.

[00:04:02] org, Chris Walker, who has been On the ground all week reporting in Milwaukee on the RNC here to tell us a little bit more about what’s going on there. is Chris Walker. Thanks for joining us. Well, 

[00:04:14] Chris Walker: thank you for having me. 

[00:04:15] Josh Elstro: So, uh, I do want to preface, we are recording this, uh, early Thursday evening, which is a few hours before Trump’s formal acceptance of the nomination speech.

[00:04:24] So we don’t know anything wild that’s going to come out of that. Uh, But given that context, like what has just been the general mood, the vibe in Milwaukee around the convention right now, you mentioned before we started recording sort of like the zones you have access to, like, what are you seeing there?

[00:04:43] Chris Walker: So there, there were two different zones. In the RNC, one is called the hard zone, and that’s the spot where you need, uh, special credentials to get in, special permissions, that kind of thing. And then there’s a soft zone, which kind of encompasses all of downtown right now on the, uh, western side of the Milwaukee River there.

[00:05:01] And in that area, um, the regular folk can come in, but there’s some extra security too. Um, they’re checking vehicles that try to cross into that side. And, um, making sure, you know, there’s a lot of security. So if you don’t look the right way, I guess you’re, you’re going to. Get a little bit of extra attention from the police presence there.

[00:05:22] Um, as far as what we’re seeing on the ground there, um, right now, it really does feel like the downtown has been taken over by Republicans. So there are a lot of them, um, in that soft zone as well as, uh, I mean, obviously in the hard zone as well, but in the soft zone, um, they have some special events that are going on there.

[00:05:43] Um, some special, um, events. Round tables. I went to a Moms for Liberty round table while I was down there and that was And, um, just a lot of people, um, mingling about, um, actually they’re, they’re seeing kind of the good parts of the city, um, that, uh, Donald Trump has railed against as being horrible. And I think that they’re kind of living a dichotomy of, oh, this, this city is a big urban city and blah, blah, blah.

[00:06:12] And while at the same time seeing this is pretty horrible. Remarkable. This is a really great city after all. 

[00:06:19] Josh Elstro: Right. Right. Yeah. I’ve seen some of the, like, you know, tweets people are sharing of like, look at this great meal I’m having, you know, with everybody in downtown Milwaukee. Right. I hear you. Right.

[00:06:28] Um, I want to talk a little bit about something you published before the convention started. Um, we’ve been talking a lot on this show about. Project 2025 and the looming threat of that. Um, but Trump recently, he made some loose attempts to distance himself from the heritage heritage foundation who wrote project 2025 and his affiliation with them, can you tell us, uh, what did he say, uh, and kind of what’s the state of that?

[00:06:55] Chris Walker: So yes, with project 2025, he’s, he said he has no affiliation with them. He doesn’t know anything about what they’re doing. He actually kind of. Um, insulted them a little bit in his truth social post. I believe it was earlier this month and it was just kind of remarkable because, uh, after he did that video from two years ago, resurfaced showing that, you know, he’s lauding heritage foundation for about to start this new project and that project he’s talking about.

[00:07:25] And he’s just giving them the greatest praise in the world about, Oh, it’s going to be such a great thing. And it’s going to be, and he says to some extent that it’s going to shape his own policies in some way. 

[00:07:36] Josh Elstro: I mean, it seems to me it’s, this is the same old bluster of like, ah, I’m just going to rail about this thing for five minutes and then forget about it.

[00:07:44] You know? Exactly. Exactly. 

[00:07:47] Chris Walker: The other thing is that at the RNC, heritage is everywhere. I mean, I mentioned that Moms4Liberty. Uh, round table that I went to, it was sponsored in part by the Heritage Foundation. When you enter the airport, uh, uh, the General Mitchell Airport in, in, in Southside Milwaukee, it, there are giant columns saying the Heritage Foundation welcomes you to the RMC.

[00:08:08] So it’s kind of hard for him to hide away from this, but, uh, I guess a lot of his supporters are buying it. 

[00:08:14] Josh Elstro: Right, right. And actually, let’s loop back to just Moms4Liberty is something that, uh, I live in the Midwest. I’m familiar with them. So, uh, just could you briefly tell a little bit more about kind of who they are and what they do?

[00:08:28] Chris Walker: Sure. So Moms4Liberty is an ultra conservative group. They’ve been labeled by the Southern Poverty Law Center as an extreme group. And what they generally do is they try to take over school boards and try to enforce their own agendas. So, um, the other thing that they’d like to do is really bring down other agendas that are supposed to be to help students to be more inclusive.

[00:08:53] Um, so they tear down policies meant to help LGBTQ students. Um, they take away, uh, lessons on racial equality or even history lessons on, uh, you know, Things as much as slavery or racial inequality during Jim Crow era, and even some things about the civil rights movement have been really downplayed because of their actions.

[00:09:15] Josh Elstro: Mm hmm. Yeah, um, and I invited that just because, uh, Again, uh, you talk about the Heritage Foundation, you see it everywhere at the RNC, um, where, what are like some of the talking points straight out of Project 2025 that I’m sure you’re hearing as you’re like watching speeches this week and um, other, other things that are happening around the RNC?

[00:09:38] Chris Walker: When it’s, when it’s on television, what I’m seeing is it’s very subdued, but it’s there if you’d look for it. It’s things like, we’re going to make sure girls in sports are gonna be, uh, given a fair shot, and we’re gonna make sure that our kids aren’t, um, stuck with this woke agenda, that kind of thing. But, um, you know, it goes even further when, when, um, when I was at this Moms for Liberty event, for example, um, Scott Walker was one of the people at the roundtable, former governor of Wisconsin, and he’s talking about how, um, Uh, with, with the new Trump agenda, he didn’t necessarily say Project 2025, but it’s a heritage event, so it’s kind of implicit.

[00:10:13] He said it was, um, you know, we’re going to go after the Title IX protections that the Biden administration, uh, tried to, uh, force us to follow. And, and it’s, and those regulations are just meant to, you know, keep kids safe and, and make sure that they’re, um, uh, re uh, given the proper respect and safe learning environment that they deserve.

[00:10:33] Every child deserves. 

[00:10:34] Josh Elstro: I, I hear you saying it’s, you know, we, we’re seeing this sort of palatable version of these things being made for TV to make them seem, you know, they go down a little easier in some of this language that you say they’re being couched in, but, uh, that leads me to, uh, we, we felt like, you know, we were reading your stuff and it’s like, It seems like when J.

[00:10:53] D. Vance was announced as the vice president pick, um, a lot of talk about like, Oh, this is what he used to say. This is who he is, but like not a lot of reporting on what he actually said in his, uh, VP speech at the RNC. So, uh, do you mind, could you give us a few of the key takeaways that you caught or maybe some of the things that like he didn’t say as we’re talking about the way this language is being made more digestible for a wider audience?

[00:11:18] Chris Walker: So that was one thing that really caught my eye when I was watching J. D. Vance was, um, a lot of just general statements. Uh, we want to make America great again, that kind of stuff where not a lot of details are stated. And one of the things that really caught my attention was no mention of anything about reproductive health care, no mention of anything about his abortion stance, which he’s been doing.

[00:11:44] Come out and said that he is 100 percent against abortion and, um, he’s for, uh, a nationwide abortion ban, um, that didn’t come out on, on, um, I believe Wednesday evening and he, um, if you, if you’re, um, I was just talking to some people just up and down the street, you know, just saying, getting their impression about, What was going on with his speech?

[00:12:06] And I said, what did you think? Did you see it? And some people were, were just like, yeah, I thought he was an okay guy. He had, he had an okay speech. And I’m like, well, what do you think about these things that weren’t in his speech? And they’re like, well, I had no idea about this. I had no idea this guy was like this.

[00:12:21] And it is something, uh, maybe strategic almost with Trump’s picking him, is that he encapsulates all this MAGA, anti government stuff. abortion, anti reproductive rights stuff, but he doesn’t talk about it as much. And he, a lot of people don’t really know who he is. Like one in two voters has in a recent poll have no opinion about him because they don’t know anything about him.

[00:12:45] So with him on the stage last night, he definitely, um, I feel like he did the job, he got the job done of sounding like a great vice presidential candidate to the average viewer who doesn’t know anything about him. Without having to talk about any of his, uh, extremist views. 

[00:13:03] Josh Elstro: Right, right. Or, you know, who paid for his Senate campaign in Ohio.

[00:13:08] Absolutely. I live in Ohio, so we followed it very closely. You know, a lot of his financing comes from folks like Peter Thiel, um, you know, the Silicon Valley folks. It’s a very interesting far right conservative project that they’re building. 

[00:13:22] Chris Walker: Yeah, and he’s, he’s, he’s put in this economic populism. Like he’s the every man.

[00:13:26] He’s the, he’s the guy who came from nothing and he’s now living the American dream. Well, the American dream is very much easier to achieve when you have, um, a financier like Peter, Peter Thiel. 

[00:13:37] Josh Elstro: Right. And so, Moving on though, you also published earlier this week about some of the protests going on outside the 

[00:13:44] Scot Nakagawa: RNC.

[00:13:45] Absolutely. Um, 

[00:13:45] Josh Elstro: it’s another thing, like, I didn’t see anywhere sort of in my media ecosphere. No, there were people protesting and it’s, it’s interesting because we’ve seen the past nine months, um, you know, the, the campus protests and people, you know, protesting in solidarity with Palestine against like Netanyahu’s genocide that is being co signed President Biden and the Democrats.

[00:14:09] So we sort of have this vision of like, well, they’re the ones in power. So they’re ones being protested. But what, what did it look like on the ground in Milwaukee? Uh, just cause it feels like it’s been a while since we’ve seen people out protesting the GOP. 

[00:14:23] Chris Walker: Yeah. So there definitely was a very large protest on the first day of the RNC during the, um, uh, noon hour and a little bit afterward.

[00:14:32] Actually, they started early in the evening with a list of speakers from a number of different. They call themselves the coalition to march on the RNC. And, um, you know, it was labor unions, abortion and right groups, uh, student groups, immigrant rights organizations, and yes, uh, groups demanding an end to the genocide in, uh, Gaza right 

[00:14:51] Scot Nakagawa: now.

[00:14:52] Chris Walker: So what we saw there was, uh, through the reporting I did, we saw people really galvanized towards trying to get the RNC to notice them and to really hear And there was actually a fight with the, uh, a little bit of a legal back and forth with the, uh, city over their proposed March route. The original one was going to take, uh, that the city was approving, was going to take them to, uh, locations that would get nowhere near, uh, that hard zone where most of the Republicans were kind of staying secluded in.

[00:15:25] And it actually was kind of limited in where they could go even in the soft zone with this protest. So the, the coalition with help, with, with, with help from the ACLU sued the city, I think the city, Kind of backed off from that. And there was a compromise route. It did take them further into the soft zone.

[00:15:41] Um, and just on the edges of where that hard zone starts. 

[00:15:45] Scot Nakagawa: Um, 

[00:15:45] Chris Walker: there was a couple thousand, maybe 3, 000 to 3, 000 people involved in this march, uh, they walked along, uh, a parade route that goes right by the river and right through the soft zone there. And as I’m watching them do the protest, it is, uh, they’re chanting, they’re being loud, they’re, they’re, they’re, they’re getting attention, um, and people from restaurants nearby.

[00:16:07] Uh, office buildings up in the air. And yes, some, some of the Republicans even walking around in the soft zone about to do their shopping. Um, they, you know, turn their heads and they’re watching this happen. And, you know, I doubt that the Republicans who were in the street, you know, are going to agree with what was being said during the march, but at least they, the march happened.

[00:16:26] It was seen, um, it was, it was a really spectacular scene to seeing people just from everywhere take note. 

[00:16:33] Josh Elstro: Mm hmm. Yeah. Um, and you also, you wrote a little bit about kind of like who’s showing up to protests. Like where were you seeing people come from? Was it a lot of like Milwaukee based organizations?

[00:16:45] Uh, did you get a sense people were organizing and traveling for the event? 

[00:16:50] Chris Walker: You know, it was a lot of, uh, all of the, all of the above. So there were a lot of Milwaukee based organizations, um, uh, and, um, there were a lot of Midwest based organizations. Organizations. I live in Madison, and some of the groups actually followed me.

[00:17:03] I mean, they didn’t literally follow me, but that came in from Madison too. Um, I spoke to a, a woman from Minnesota, um, um, and, uh, she came with her, uh, group and, um, I spoke to a student from Tampa, Florida who came with her organization and someone from New York. So really a, a lot of, um, a lot of national organizations, but a lot of Milwaukee based ones as well.

[00:17:28] Josh Elstro: Yeah, and do you recall any of like the bigger national orgs that were able to show up? 

[00:17:33] Chris Walker: So yeah, some of the, uh, organizations that did show up from the, from the national side were Freedom Road Socialist Organization, uh, Code Pink was a very large presence there. Uh, Students for a Democratic Society, um, Legalization for All, um, And, and various others.

[00:17:55] I mean, it was just a really, there were more than 120 organizations that took part in this whole thing altogether. 

[00:18:01] Josh Elstro: Wow. Yeah. Um, no, really glad you were able to be there. Um, and we want to reiterate, yeah, that, uh, you’re there writing, uh, for Truthout, uh, who is a sort of a movement media partner, um, and like this sort of independent reporting on the ground.

[00:18:17] Yeah. It doesn’t happen with people’s support, so I just wanted to tell people, uh, you can find Chris’s writing at truthout. org, and I want to thank you for joining us today, but if people, uh, want to connect with you, or they need to find you, is there anywhere else on the web they should be looking for you?

[00:18:34] Chris Walker: They can follow my writing on, uh, X, uh, at, on, uh, my screen name there is at that Chris Walker. And, um, that’s most of my handles for most social media I have. 

[00:18:45] Josh Elstro: Great. And it’s still okay to call it Twitter on our shows. Oh, good. Thank you. No, thanks again, Chris. Really appreciate you taking the time to do it.

[00:18:55] My pleasure.

[00:19:00] This week We’re really excited to be launching the anti authoritarian podcast here at Convergence along with our friends, the 22nd Century Initiative, who have put the show together and are hosting it with host Scott Nakagawa and co host Sue Hyde. And to talk a little bit about that show, I’m now joined by Deputy Director for 22nd Century Initiative and like I said, co host of that show, Sue Hyde.

[00:19:26] So Sue, thanks so much for joining me today. 

[00:19:29] Sue Hyde: Nice to be here, Josh. 

[00:19:30] Josh Elstro: Alright, so first and foremost, uh, I’ve got to give full disclosure to our audience that you and I have been hanging out working on this show quite a bit the past six to eight months or so, as I’m also the producer for that show. But, uh, it is very much a project of 22nd Century Initiative.

[00:19:46] Cause I first came on board. It was about a year ago. Somebody forwarded a proposal to me, um, through our team, uh, that you all had put together. It was very thorough. I literally, all I saw was the name. I looked at you and Scott’s bios. I said, I’m in, this looks great. So if you could though, tell our listeners briefly about.

[00:20:05] Uh, what is 22nd Century Initiative and why did you all feel the need to develop this podcast at this moment? 

[00:20:13] Sue Hyde: The 22nd Century Initiative is a relatively new, uh, organization in the ecosystem of, uh, social movements in the United States. It was founded by Scott Nakagawa and the late Irva Shivad. After the January 6th insurrection at the Capitol, and they were so concerned by that event and what it meant, that they began conversations with, uh, colleagues and, and, uh, fellow travelers in the movement, and they realized that there was a space that needed to be filled.

[00:21:00] The space that they saw. and wanted to fill was an organization that would be devoted to building and strengthening, uh, and, uh, creating an identity of a pro democracy movement in the United States. That is our mission. Uh, that’s what we do. And, um, our work is very much dedicated to the memory of Irv Shivad who passed away in May.

[00:21:36] Uh, two years ago. 

[00:21:38] Josh Elstro: Um, and let’s, let’s talk a little bit about, like, how the podcast, uh, came out of that. Uh, why did you feel like this was the format of how you need to communicate this message right now? And who is it? We hope to reach, uh, in our production of this show. 

[00:21:57] Sue Hyde: Well, the podcast project is new to us, uh, very new to me and to Scott Nakagawa and to our colleagues at the 22nd Century Initiative.

[00:22:10] We launched it because we wanted to create a space and a format for our colleagues and our friends and our, our Um, co conspirators in the pro democracy movement to talk with us and And to talk with other interested people about how we got here in the United States in 2024, facing an authoritarian incursion against democracy.

[00:22:46] And we wanted to talk about solutions to that, not just how we got here and why we got here. But what we can do about it and, and that is really, uh, the point of the podcast. 

[00:22:59] Josh Elstro: Yeah. And we’re going to talk a little bit more about sort of what’s going on inside the podcast in a minute, but I want to invite you to talk about like, what was your catalyst into fighting authoritarianism?

[00:23:10] Because I think what I love so much about it is you and Scott go back. in this fight so far, way before any of us had it on our radar. I mean, when I was a child, you know, back in the eighties, the nineties, um, can you tell me a little bit about that? 

[00:23:26] Sue Hyde: Absolutely. Uh, first I want to talk a little bit personally though, Josh, um, I, I grew up in a very small town in west central Illinois.

[00:23:37] Uh, and I went to high school at Beardstown High School in Beardstown, Illinois, where there was a dress code that required girl students to wear a dress or skirt to school every day. And, uh, Me and two of my friends were really annoyed by that kind of authoritarian, uh, demand on us relative to what we might choose to wear to school.

[00:24:11] And one day, all three of us showed up in jeans, and we were expelled from school for three days, our parents were notified, we were told never to do this again, and I thought, Okay, I get it. The only way to really win against authoritarian dictates like this is to resist them, and to do it not alone, but with other people.

[00:24:45] So, fast forward, I was on the staff of the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force, um, Uh, I was there from 1987, uh, to 2018, uh, and, um, in the early 1990s, uh, we at the task force saw the need for an organizing project that would be focused on, um, uh, As we called it then, Fighting the Right. It was called Fight the Right Project.

[00:25:21] Scott Nakagawa, Robert Bray, our communications director, Karen Bullock Jordan, one of our staff people, joined together to visit seven different states that were facing the possibility of, uh, ballot questions that would restrict or, uh, outlaw, uh, any anti discrimination laws related to lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer people.

[00:25:56] And through that work, we developed relationships with Uh, folks who were facing this challenge, um, and developed actually a, a pretty good manual called the Fight the Right Manual that we published and distributed, uh, around the country. So, that was, that was how I came to know Scott Nakagawa, um, and, uh, just to note that we were doing that work, uh, when Irvi Shivad was the Executive Director of the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force.

[00:26:33] It was, as far as we know, the first time that any, uh, LGBTQ organization had taken up the work to better prepare our communities for the future. who were facing, uh, these, these very restrictive, uh, and nasty ballot questions. 

[00:26:54] Josh Elstro: Right. And like, I’d, I’d really love to like reaffirm the context of the moment that for people my age and younger, it’s like, we’re used to growing up.

[00:27:02] It’s like, we still have a lot of Uh, push back to the LGBTQ community, where obviously it’s the week of the RNC. We’ve seen it, right? Um, but I mean we’re talking the height of like the AIDS crisis, crisis the Reagan era of him just like ignoring it and you know, uh, like I just want to say that to just sort of like point out like this sort of like OG bona fides of what you and Scott were doing, uh, at that time in history, uh, it’s really incredible that you all like started in that moment in that environment and are still here today, you know, carrying the fight.

[00:27:37] So, 

[00:27:38] Sue Hyde: well, well, thank you, Josh. And, uh, to me, it is actually, I’m proud of the work we did. But it is a sad commentary on this country’s, uh, social, cultural, and political atmosphere that we are still in. in the fight on this, and I just feel like, wow, really? Again? I know, right? 

[00:28:09] Josh Elstro: Uh, well, let’s, let’s talk a little bit more about the show itself, though.

[00:28:14] Um, what I, I saw, you know, as, as, you know, we were putting together your, your, A roster of guests is kind of incredible in the diversity of expertise and type of work. Um, it sort of runs the gamut from people doing historical analysis of kind of looking back at how we got here, you know, looking at like where you all started fighting in the eighties.

[00:28:39] And this project the right has had to build to this moment of Trump ism. Um, and then we also have people who joined and they’re talking about the media and tech landscape that made that possible. Um, other people that are talking about maybe like regional projects, community projects they’re doing to fight back against authoritarianism.

[00:28:57] So my question is like, how did you narrow? down the focus or choose who it is you’re going to talk to to help educate people on authoritarianism and how we resist it. 

[00:29:10] Sue Hyde: Well, we, we were looking for, and we invited, and we interviewed, um, people, people who, uh, maybe do or don’t identify with the pro democracy movement, but whose work and whose analysis and, and whose wisdoms can be applied not just to their specific topic area of interest or issue area of interest, but can be applied more broadly to to pro democracy organizing.

[00:29:51] So, you know, we’re, we’re speaking to folks who, for example, work to, uh, dissuade, uh, white people from becoming engaged in the authoritarian movement. Uh, and those lessons about speaking Speaking with white neighbors, white co workers, white folks in your, in your church community are important not just for the people who are involved in that organization, but for all of us who must, must be in touch with and in conversation with the people who are around us, the people in our community, uh, the people we see every day, the people we interact with at the grocery store or, or wherever at the PTA meetings.

[00:30:52] So, uh, we were, we were looking for, uh, a roster of guests that would both, would both have political analysis, but would also have advice and counsel about what you can do. in your own community. 

[00:31:12] Josh Elstro: Yeah, and that’s something that, uh, I think is really hard for a lot of us right now. Um, because I, I did mention, you know, it’s like, we also have some episodes where people are talking about the media and tech landscape and how that’s aligning folks to sort of have a one track mind of like, oh, I fell into the, uh, algorithm of the MAGA authoritarian movement, and like, that’s something that 20, 30 years ago, like, didn’t necessarily exist, you know?

[00:31:40] It’s been a project that the right’s building, where somebody can just have this funnel where they live in a whole different world, right? And you know, 30, 40 years ago, it’s like, maybe you hear some crazy conspiracy, you go tell your friends, and they’re like, what are you talking about? Whereas now they have a reinforcement pipeline, which is another thing that I think, I think It’s covered pretty well throughout the show that I, and I hope people will check it out, but we’re in this moment where, uh, again, talking about media, uh, there’s this heightened sense of like, Everything all at once carrying the weight of the world and like especially like this week again We’ve got the RNC somebody tried to assassinate Trump Joe Biden might drop out It’s just like all these things mounting and in the background.

[00:32:22] There’s this, you know Genocide being carried out by Benjamin Netanyahu in Palestine being backed by Biden and the Democrats, like, it’s so much to carry. It feels so overwhelming. And like, I’ve only been in this since like, the 03 Iraq war, you know, I’ve been like, I show up to the protests, etc, etc. And thinking about your story, and you and Scott’s like, how do you basically the question is, how do you keep going?

[00:32:48] You know, like, can you give us something? Because what I see is I’m gonna sit with you and Scott and I see the resilience that you show up with day to day. I’m just like, how do I carry that? And how do I pass that on? So yeah, what is it that keeps us going? And, uh, how do we handle like the deluge of bad news?

[00:33:04] Sue Hyde: Well, it’s uh, it is pretty overwhelming right now, uh, and I am grateful that, uh, Biden’s decision is way above my pay grade. Right. 

[00:33:16] Josh Elstro: We don’t need to weigh in on that. We don’t need to weigh in on that. It might change by the time we publish this interview. 

[00:33:23] Sue Hyde: It, that could happen, that could happen. But you know, I think, you know, I, I have two kids.

[00:33:31] My, my, my girlfriend, gal pal wife and I have two children. And when we decided, uh, that we wanted to be parents, um, one of, one of the things that I realized was that I, I am working for a world that I want to leave for them. I want a feminist multiracial democracy in which people, not corporations, not oligarchs, not bought and sold politicians or bought and sold justices on the Supreme Court.

[00:34:21] I want a world where We people are making the decisions about how we will be living, how we will protect our freedoms, how we can access health care, how we can earn enough to support our families so we don’t have to have three jobs all at once, uh, where labor unions are thriving, where people are not struggling in a daily way to live.

[00:34:58] And I think, I think we all have our own reasons for wanting that, but much of it is about the people we love. And for me, this is the work of love. Uh, and I hope that’s true actually for all of us, Josh, uh, because we, we, we can’t, we can’t be, I cannot be motivated by dislike of people with whom I don’t agree.

[00:35:35] I have to be motivated by the love and the faith that I have in humanity and the world that I want to leave. I’m 71. I’m not proud of the world that, that my kids are currently facing, and I want it to be different. And, uh, I will say that the climate crisis is Our generation’s mess and we had better figure out how to deal with that and clean it up because that is, I think, the most existential crisis that we face and to do the cleanup, to do that work, we need a feminist and multiracial democracy in this country.

[00:36:30] Josh Elstro: Yeah. I just want to express, basically, just gratitude for everything you just said. It’s like, that’s, couldn’t have said it better myself. Um, and it’s just like, very, um, I mean, that gives me hope. Just hearing other people, right, like, who operate. I think the most important thing I heard you say for myself was operating from a place of love.

[00:36:52] Uh, I think I heard people recently talk about this. Maybe it was when I was at rising majority Congress a few weeks ago, you know, having conversations about like our, we’re sort of operating from this first principle of love. And like, if we hold that, it’s like, that’s where the hope can maybe grow out of.

[00:37:06] Right. Um, I want to ask like one more question that, uh, you know, as we talk about, this is the anti authoritarian podcast, but I feel like we talk about an alternative to that being multi racial democracy. Um, how do you see those two things intertwined? Is there a simple way somebody can kind of understand that dichotomy?

[00:37:33] Sue Hyde: Is it a dichotomy? 

[00:37:35] Josh Elstro: Or, or the as sort of, it sounds like we’re kind of talking about them as like sort of opposite poles, right? 

[00:37:42] Sue Hyde: Well, I think, I think that the the building of a feminist multiracial democracy is, in essence, a resistance to an authoritarian white Christian nationalist movement in this country.

[00:38:04] And so, I guess we could have called it The Feminist Multiracial Democracy Podcast. I think that’s kind of what I was thinking. But it does seem a little awkward. And so we chose anti authoritarian because that is our analysis at the 22nd Century Initiative. That we are facing an authoritarian, white Christian nationalist movement that would strip us of any of the remaining freedoms that we have, uh, and would, um, elevate and, uh, make, make the authority in the country white Christian men.

[00:38:53] That is what Project 2025 is about. Uh, that is what, uh, Some of the discussions in the upcoming presidential election will be about and That is exactly what I do not want. And so 

[00:39:11] Josh Elstro: Well, if we talk about the genesis of, um, 22nd Century Initiative being the January 6th insurrection, it’s like, at the end of the day, that’s what that was about as well, right?

[00:39:20] Sue Hyde: Absolutely. Absolutely. You know, it’s like, 

[00:39:23] Josh Elstro: you’ll hear people say, Oh, no, it was about this, it was about that. At the end of the day, right? 

[00:39:28] Sue Hyde: Yeah, at the end of the day. That, that was about an effort to, um, seize, uh, the government through a violent coup. I always have the, I always have the, the inclination to call it a coup, a coup, a violent coup, and to install their chosen leader, um, and forego all of the democratic processes that led to his loss and the other guys win.

[00:40:03] Um, And so, yeah, the genesis of 22nd Century Initiative was the shock and, uh, dismay that that brought on, um, and here we are. At the Anti Authoritarian Podcast, we could, we could parenthetically say, the feminist podcast. multiracial democracy 

[00:40:28] Josh Elstro: podcast. I’m with you. I get, I get it. It rolls off the tongue a little easier, but that is, uh, I think at the end of the day, what we’re fighting for.

[00:40:37] But, uh, let’s go ahead and set up. We’re going to run a segment from the first episode. And, uh, so Uh, the guest featured is, uh, Suzanne Farr, who I believe just turned 85, uh, a few months ago, if I recall from when we recorded the interview. And her wisdom, her experience shared in that interview, uh, it left me and, uh, our, another one of our producers, Tony is on the call.

[00:41:03] I remember us both just being stunned coming out of that. interview, but for listeners who are unfamiliar with her, uh, could you tell us a little bit about Suzanne and why you chose to speak to her, uh, first so that we can help set up this clip? 

[00:41:18] Sue Hyde: Suzanne Farr is A thought leader. I like to think of Suzanne as a sage.

[00:41:27] Um, Suzanne decades ago predicted that this is the struggle that we would be in for the knowable future. She predicted that in the mid 1980s, and she has been studying, um, we could use many words here. She has been studying right wing movements. She has been studying white Christian nationalism. She has been studying authoritarianism.

[00:42:04] She’s been writing about it. And most importantly, Suzanne has been organizing her entire life. and has great insight and wisdom as to how we can do that more effectively. So I hope everybody listens to Suzanne Farr. 

[00:42:24] Josh Elstro: Yeah, and, uh, we’re gonna run, uh, sort of the first segment of that interview, which I think you, you set that up very well.

[00:42:31] So Sue, thanks again, uh, for joining me to talk about the podcast. 

[00:42:36] Sue Hyde: You’re welcome. Glad to, glad to have done it, Josh. 

[00:42:39] Josh Elstro: All right. So here is Sue, along with her co host Scott Nakagawa, in conversation with Suzanne Farr. This is the upcoming first episode of the Anti Authoritarian Podcast. I want to remind folks, you can subscribe now, wherever you get your podcasts.

[00:42:55] You can hear the trailer right now, and this full episode will be available next Thursday, July 10th. Twenty fifth, so go ahead and take a listen. 

[00:43:06] Scot Nakagawa: We often talk about the rise of authoritarian movements and the takeover of one of our two political parties as a 60 year process. But Suzanne, you were a frontline activist through all of those years.

[00:43:18] And one of the most astute and compassionate observers of the progress of authoritarian movements. And I don’t just say that because you’re my friend. You are also someone who has helped thousands of social justice activists better understand threats to democracy in what Dr. King termed mutual interdependence.

[00:43:34] The web of mutuality in which the fates of all of us are deeply intertwined. Thanks for joining us, Suzanne. 

[00:43:41] Suzanne Pharr: Thanks for having me here. 

[00:43:44] Scot Nakagawa: In this podcast, we’re going to be talking a lot about the authoritarian movement strategies and how they have evolved over time. But it’s equally, if not more important for us to know what we are for.

[00:43:55] Suzanne, you have been involved in social movements for a long time now. How did we get to this moment in which democracy in the U. S. is so threatened? 

[00:44:04] Suzanne Pharr: That’s a very, very big question because it covers a very long time that some of us that we work with. Some, according to a generation, according to other, other things of when they came into movement work, think that it maybe happened just recently, maybe in the last 10 years or the last 15 years.

[00:44:25] What we, what we know is that it has been going for about 60 years at a very steady speed, and then accelerated. It’s not that there wasn’t something before that last 60 years before it started, but most of it, most of us, I think, I think it started around the time of Goldwater running for president and started moving, moving on then.

[00:44:51] I would have to say that great numbers of us failed to recognize that it was happening, that we did, we didn’t realize clearly or fully that this was a long, long term effort of a takeover and a transformation of the country. I think we recognized there was a threat, you know, we knew, we knew many pieces, we knew, for example, that when people started attacking women and queers, you know, around late 70s, 1980s, there was something in the air, you know, it’s, there was something, something odd.

[00:45:36] Be beginning to put that together with abortion, beginning to put that together with women’s rights. You know, those kinds of things that are so, so alive and vigorous now. We knew were threats, but it was hard in some cases, I think, to get the attention of the con country. So the, the real attention, I believe, has become probably the clearest since.

[00:46:00] September, the great September 11th attack that seemed in some way have opened the eyes of a lots of, lots of people in, in odd kinds of ways, not because of the attack, but what, how the country responded to the attack. And so, with that eye opening, instead of having 20 people, Who were studying this or watching this writing about this?

[00:46:26] You suddenly had a number of people who were able to to bring it bring it forward And we began to as as people began to give notice to it all of us began to gather that it was Indeed a threat a threat to democracy. 

[00:46:41] Scot Nakagawa: So suzanne You said that you know many people over the course of those six years didn’t notice.

[00:46:46] Why do you think that is? I 

[00:46:49] Suzanne Pharr: think they were busy enjoying You What Reagan was doing, which is an unfortunate, fortunate statement to have to have to make. I think there was not the attention because the attention was going elsewhere. I mean, there were other causes, but attention, much of the attention was drawn through the activities of Reagan.

[00:47:10] My partner and I were talking about this this morning that say there was a ladder. He took out the rungs of the ladder for every institution that he could, that offered justice. Thank you very much. You know, it began, you know, right, right away with an attack on unions, you know, led, led from that eventually to the racialization of every issue that you can imagine.

[00:47:36] This is the same, same time that he’s working on economics. He’s working on the political sector and he’s working on economics at the same, same time. And so we’re seeing a radical change in how we live. And I think, I think we were distracted by that. And so it is conservatism. At work rather than what was actually at work, which is what we now call authoritarianism.

[00:48:02] Sue Hyde: Susan, I’m, I’m glad you mentioned the Reagan administration because, um, in my mind that was a pivotal time politically for the, I’m gonna call it the white Christian, uh, movement to ascend to a kind of political power. I’m not really sure they ever had before the Reagan administration, and, uh, it was also a Petri dish of anti LGBTQ poison, and I know you’ve thought a lot about this, and I’m curious if you could speak about the Authoritarian movement’s intense focus on LGBTQ people and communities.

[00:48:52] What, what are they getting out of this? What are they mobilizing? What’s behind it? 

[00:48:58] Suzanne Pharr: I think they’re mobilizing a number of things. And I’m thinking about, you know, as Reagan, Reagan first came in, with him came the evangelicals, came the moral majority. And I feel like those groups, those people, were very manipulated by right wing leadership to bring them from their beliefs around religion and church and practice to believing that that was being threatened by what they were seeing that appeared new to them, you know, the liberation that appeared new to them.

[00:49:38] And so, Reagan and others were able to, able to build on that, you know, to make that, that grow into a political base, uh, that fear and that, that antagonism. I think the other thing in that is always think back to Hitler. You know, and the persecution of gay men, and it, and that takes me to the whole idea of the strong man, what we witness now in our politics, you know, that search, search for the strong authoritative leader, not only in this country, but in other countries that are moving toward authoritarianism.

[00:50:16] And I mean, Reagan, Reagan was that strong man. But at the beginning of that, I believe, I don’t think. And the time before that, we were really having that person as president. I think that, that grew. And so gender, not, not just queerness, but gender became the issue where the attack was, because what was moving in gender was homosexuality as it was, as we, the language we use then, and basically gender freedom for women and equality.

[00:50:53] It’s hard to have a strong man. with those components out there in the world. And so there had to be some attack on that. And then that use that to build a base, build that base on fear. Build that base, build that base on threat, particularly build that base on if these people have freedom, you are going to lose something.

[00:51:16] It’s not just you’re going to have a sense that it’s illegal, it’s not just you’re going to have a sense that it’s immoral, you’re going to lose something from them. And I think, certainly, those who are leading it were of the strongman kind of, kind of leadership, seeking that through, you know, authoritarianism.

[00:51:32] And I think where we failed, Was that we should have focus, focus in on what was being liberated in that, which, you know, in the way of gender, and also to see that the strongman, how authoritarianism, authoritarianism is, um, builds, as far as I’m concerned, its earliest base. It’s the family. That strong man structure of the family that has to be fought for, maintained, or else we lose control of everything.

[00:52:05] So that becomes the structure that is built and is replicated into political leadership. So queers became just a money pool for them, you know, for the building of fear and the building of confusion and the building of anguish and uncertainty. And always that sense. That, you know, that you’re going to lose something if other people, if other people gain freedom, you’re going to lose something.

[00:52:34] And in the political specter of that, what you’re going to lose is authority. But on the ground, you’re going to lose control. You know, you’re going to lose control of your families, you’re going to lose control of these women. Women are going to be able to do whatever they want to. Who are we going to get to work?

[00:52:49] Who’s going to take care of our houses? Who’s going to take care of our children? Who are, who are, who’s going to maintain this? And of, and of queers. I think the, it’s fascinating to me that prior to the 30s, there was a fair amount of freedom for queers, a lot of joy, joyousness, you know, and that, that joyness, joy, that sense of we can seek freedom and have pleasure in ways that are not, not considered the way to have that pleasure was embraced strongly by people, I think, in the 20s, and then people were trained to be terrified of 30s.

[00:53:32] To me, it’s a very complicated thing, but I always think about, if we’re going to make change, we have to think about the family and how we rethink it. And not only rethink it, we’ve got to reshape it, but, you know, broaden it extraordinarily. And also still use it within the structure. Of, of how, how we live in society.

[00:53:59] Sue Hyde: And the AIDS crisis raised, they weren’t new questions, but many, many very pertinent questions about families, family structures, who is included in families, who is not included in families, uh, who gets, who gets to decide where a person will be buried or in what way. Gosh, it was, it was, uh, really quite a.

[00:54:27] It was quite a struggle for many, many people, uh, both people who were dying and people who were taking care of people who were dying, uh, as to, as to where, where did they fit in, in their, in their family of origin? Where did they fit in, in their chosen family? 

[00:54:49] Suzanne Pharr: You know, what’s interesting to me, Sue, is that gave us more opportunity.

[00:54:55] To examine family and anything else I can think of in that period and the marriage effort denied us a lot of that opportunity to examine family because in the AIDS, in the AIDS crisis, you saw all the configurations of family people who became family in the most intense ways. You know, after that, we, we use the word family within the queer movement over and over and over.

[00:55:21] You know, our joy for it, our wish for it, our hope for it, our protection of it. But once we decided that marriage was the, you know, signature issue for the queer community, it became more talking about what was already there. That you marry, that you may have children or not have children, you have divorces like everybody else.

[00:55:45] It sort of clamped in the idea of family even more so, I think. Instead of Busting it open. I mean, on some level, it opened it up. And that, you know, everyone who sees me with my partner at the doctor’s office asks me, do I want my wife to come in? And I say, I don’t have a wife. I don’t believe in marriage, but here is my 35 year long partner.

[00:56:12] It’s shocking to me, but they have made progress. That they asked me. So, you know, I’m like, I’m standing on one hand. This is great. They asked me, is this my wife? We’ve gone somewhere. And then I think, Suzanne, are you sure? You don’t think that’s great? But it is that, that recognition and that effort is there.

[00:56:34] It’s a little like the effort toward pronouns being there, you know, is a good thing. Does it get us where we want to go is another question. 

[00:56:44] Scot Nakagawa: It’s quite a pivot, isn’t it, from you should never get married to why aren’t you married? It really speaks to what you’re talking about, which is that the same gender marriage struggle really didn’t challenge the rigid and kind of authoritarian structure of families, right?

[00:57:00] And didn’t get to that really, that nut of what I think, um, some people call systemic authoritarianism. So not political authoritarianism, like a takeover, but systemic authoritarianism in the way that authoritarianism organizes our daily lives and the ways in which we normalize that. 

[00:57:18] Suzanne Pharr: It’s a systemic authoritarianism that maintains the other authoritarianism.

[00:57:27] You know, it’s, it’s what makes people ready to accept what they’re hearing that holds the higher authority, authority in it. 

[00:57:38] Scot Nakagawa: Mm hmm. It is sort of the original, um, authoritarian arrangement that we all learn of, right? Mm hmm. One in which the children are incompetent to make decisions, and so the adults must decide for us, that makes authoritarianism actually appealing to a lot of people.

[00:57:52] And, you know, you were in the battered women’s movement, which, by the way, for our audience, was one of the most underrated Mass social movements of our time, but the battered women’s movement Which started out as a liberation movement according to the story You told me many times Suzanne and then evolved a part of it at least into a kind of a law and order movement largely as a result of succumbing to this sort of authoritarian idea, right, that in a vulnerable situation where people are being harmed, where, um, people feel they are in danger, that they are willing to accept one form of authoritarianism over another in order to be able to be safe, and in our very, um, increasingly, you know, toxic and, um, you know, conflict filled time, it seems to be a direction a number of people are going in.

[00:58:40] So, what lessons can we learn from the Battered Women’s Movement that would be helpful to us now, in terms of that pivot and where the movement has gone since its early days as an anti violence movement led by women bent on liberation? 

[00:58:54] Suzanne Pharr: I would like to note that some of our most brilliant analysis and writing has come from women who were part of that movement.

[00:59:03] Particularly the, the The writings of black women in the 90s and up to, uh, in this century has been extraordinary because of, one, the organizing from within that movement, which was tough. You know, to have, from 1977 or so, to gain recognition and then to be able to have any kind of power in the movement.

[00:59:26] But it is, it, it’s the leadership of black women that led, led the movement to know that this turn to the police was really, really wrong and a bad move. And that, that was helpful. So I think there’s something to be said about who leads, who’s listened to. Who’s messages are there at the center of what, what you’re talking about.

[00:59:53] And, you know, we always said we, we listen most to those who experience, experience the violence, but we didn’t necessarily listen to the most, who had the largest numbers experiencing that violence and support that leadership happening. But when that happened, you know, this is a significant change. The other thing that happened to the, um, the movement, Was we’re going to go back to what you said, you know that it was in the beginning It was a very much based not in not in money and not in, you know Even having a place but figuring out how to make a woman safe how to move her from one safe house to another how to Create a shelter, you know how to create a hotline that they could they could call very much based from people’s work on the ground and then Finally organized in a coalition, and that coalition, I think, was significantly important because there’s representatives of women from every state coming together and we’re, you know, sharing ideas in conferences, sharing ideas in workshops.

[01:00:57] But then there’s always this issue of money, and I think this is true of organizations now, when you’re that sort of community based, you know, kind of free organization, and then you try, you know, to get your Get your property, get your pay, you know, salaries, get your whatever. It becomes more conservative because people, one, are seeking ways to get that money, you know, not to be too far out on the line with feminism, not to be too far on the line with this.

[01:01:31] And I think the same thing is happening in our non profits now, or has happened, that the battle for money has made them more conservative and less, less out on the, they’re out on the, more out on the front lines when it comes to protests. But not out on the front lines when it comes to strategy. And I think that’s, that’s where we, we really have, we really have a problem that, that we’ve got to find that place where we don’t worry.

[01:02:02] All the time about our funders, and we don’t work all the time about our competition with each other, but instead that we have collective, collective work to take on the right, which we, many of us have been doing for years, but we need a very broad base of people who are linked in some way, connected in some way, have some degree of shared values, maybe, maybe not all the same strategies, maybe not all the same tactic, tactics, but.

[01:02:32] Okay. You know, and some sort of real connection with one another that they have a common, common threatening issue that becomes more and more, you know, I want to say a life and death issue, but. It’s a little bit, a little bit heavy, but it is. That’s 

[01:02:50] Scot Nakagawa: why. A little bit heavy, yes. 

[01:02:53] Suzanne Pharr: Yeah. You know, ever since I started working, working on the, you know, watching the Rite, studying the Rite, writing about the Rite.

[01:03:04] People are like, Suzanne, you are awfully dark. 

[01:03:09] Scot Nakagawa: Oh, they don’t know the half. 

[01:03:13] Suzanne Pharr: I run with Scott Nakagawa. What do you expect? 

[01:03:17] Scot Nakagawa: I did not teach you that. You taught me that.

[01:03:23] Josh Elstro: Once again, the Anti Authoritarian Podcast is available to subscribe to now. The trailer is live wherever you get your podcast. There are links to all those locations in the show notes. My thanks again to Chris Walker from Truthout for joining me, as well as Sue Hyde from the Anti Authoritarian Podcast and the 22nd Century Initiative.

[01:03:42] This show is published by Convergence, a magazine for Radical Insights. I’m Josh Elstro, and I could not have gotten this episode out this week without support from our print editor, Marcy Rine. Thank you so much. Caden Mock will be back next week for a preview of The Return of Edgemonicon with William Lawrence.

[01:04:01] If you have something to say, please drop us a line. You can send an email. We will consider running on an upcoming Mailbag episode, perhaps? That address is Mailbag at ConvergenceMag. com. If you’d like to support the work we do at Convergence, bringing our movements together to strategize, struggle, and And when in this crucial historical moment, you can become a member at convergencemag.

[01:04:22] com slash donate. Even a few bucks a month goes a long way to making sure our independent small team can continue to build a map for our movements. Stay compassionate. Stay kind. We’ll talk again next week.