Did ‘the Resistance’ Help or Hurt the Left?

I would like to hear your perspective on whether any of the strategies or tactics against Trump and Trumpism have maybe been counterproductive? Because I wonder if, you know, calling him and the movement “fascist, sexist, racist,” has, sort of, alienated people who, might otherwise be brought into the progressive fold. So do you think there have been any sort of missteps over the last 10 years? That’s the least of our problems. They are racist. They are authoritarian, they are misogynist. They are homophobic. And tiptoeing around it protects them and not the targets of the hatred and discrimination. I just get so tired of the idea that progressives have gone too far in asserting that, like, every human being deserves human rights, when people are being shot in the streets of Minneapolis. We are facing such horrific brutality that politeness is not really the problem to start with. I think we got into this situation, in part, by a lot of people in the mainstream thinking it was more important to be nice and polite than call things by their true names. This is really extreme stuff. If we need to use extreme language to describe it, let’s be truthful, let’s be accurate and let’s be bold. And there’s a wonderful historian, scholar of nonviolence named George Lakey, who says polarization is good. That’s when you have clarity. Sometimes people have to pick sides. You do not get authoritarians to behave better by being meek and gentle and polite. You get it by being strong. You got me all worked up. I feel like it probably didn’t take that much.