Books, best weapons in the world.

[flamingsword]

So I’m reading Methodology of the Oppressed and I think I finally get why authoritarians need to be horrible to everyone and reinforce the structures of oppression and horizontal aggression. The very existence of, for instance queer people or trans people, who come from every level of society, explodes their pyramidal model of power, and democratizes it into a flat plane in which they have to conceive of their “lessers” as having the same power and being worthy of as much respect as them. It threatens to restructure their entire worldview.

And that terrifies them.

Because they don’t abandon worldviews that they see evidence against, they punish the evidence. They silence people, discredit, give cishet rich white men credit for what was done by the non-hegemonic “Other”. They imprison, run CIA operations against, and murder in the name of defending a way of life that is built on the lie that some people are better than others.

So if you are part of the Other, and you are living your life where anyone can see you? You are destroying the worldview that power and respect are finite and limited to the very few. If you demand respect and refuse to participate in your being treated as less than? You are destroying capitalism, hegemonic power, and the pyramid structure of power in the minds of those who see you.

You are mightier than those who oppress you would have you know.

Comments

[sabotabby]

Yeeep. The idea of queer and trans people fucks with their entire worldview.

[flamingsword]

I should make a shirt with my pronouns on it, for increased visibility, to further spread my rebellion.

[princessofgeeks]

SO MUCH THIS

[flamingsword]

Yeah-huh. It’s going to be a big thing for me, now that one of the mysteries of my life has been as neatly explained as anything ever is. The fallout of this realization might be large in terms of my understanding of other people.