If the speed with which the #TrumpRussia investigation snowballs is in inverse proportion to the disaster the Trump White House can inflict upon our nation, it will only be due to #TheResistance movement. Many polls report that women account for 80% of #TheResistance with Washington Post noting: “The women’s march was the largest protest in U.S. history.” Women are used to spearheading (and doing a lot of schlepping for) political grassroots movements and campaigns. They are also used to having their work co-opted. While ALL men are more than welcome to step up and take equal part, and this is not about pulling rank, credit must be given where it is due. Award-winning investigative journalist Victoria Brownworth (@VABVOX) posted a brilliant Twitter thread properly crediting women as leaders of #TheResistance — and why it matters:
“#TheResistance centers women, POC, LGBT, immigrants. We are not your afterthought or footnote or virtue signals. WE ARE REAL PEOPLE.”
“We’ve been told repeatedly that the woman who centered us & our concerns after TWO HUNDRED AND SEVENTY NINE YEARS was wrong to do so.”
“279 YEARS we waited. She always had 50% women, 40% POC in her staff. THAT would have been our Cabinet, our EO’s, our VOICES BEING HEARD.”
“OUR loss has been the one that should be written about. OUR economic CRISIS–not coal–is what should be the focus of town halls.”
Understanding, celebrating and participating in #TheResistance is more important than ever as 2018 midterms loom and, once again, we see older white males declaring themselves progressives, yet willing to negotiate on a woman’s right to choose.
Conversely, Hillary Clinton, our first ever female Presidential nominee and popular vote winner, is subjected to a ridiculous double standard even now with pundits like Josh Barro, Matt Yglesias and many more telling her politely, or impolitely, to STFU rather than be part of the fight. In light of women like Hillary Clinton taking action where certain men talk and self-aggrandize, Clinton once again stepped up to the plate by launching “Onward Together,” a political action committee dedicated to helping progressives, particularly women, run for office and to funding #TheResistance:
“Resist, insist, persist, enlist.”
Victoria Brownworth, politics editor @TheRealCurve, expresses the journey and significance of #TheResistance and those who created it better than I ever could. Please read her twitter thread below in its entirety. It is well worth your time.
Her words provide enlightening context that often gets buried by a majority male corporate media pundit class. For example, look at how many articles The New York Times (of all places) posts about “understanding” the Trump voter, while Hillary voters (the majority), including so many women and men of color and LGBTQ get ignored – again.
Here is @VABVOX ‘s profound thread:
#TheResistance is not a white male movement. I’ve said this before & likely will need to reiterate it often over the next four years.
1/ pic.twitter.com/0OUdZTbebD— Victoria Brownworth (@VABVOX) May 13, 2017
Two threads this morning by 2 men I respect @armandodkos & @AlGiordano point to this fact, if more obliquely than I shall. But read them.
3/— Victoria Brownworth (@VABVOX) May 13, 2017
As a middle-aged, 30yrs in the trenches of activism & journalism WOMAN, I embrace those men who get it because my goodness they are few.
5/— Victoria Brownworth (@VABVOX) May 13, 2017
This is no surprise just as it’s no surprise a handful of white men are trying to take credit for activist work women have been doing.
7/— Victoria Brownworth (@VABVOX) May 13, 2017
When the Women’s March idea was envisioned by a middle-aged Hillary supporter in Hawaii November 9, Sanders was cozying up to Trump.
9/— Victoria Brownworth (@VABVOX) May 13, 2017
Sanders & Moore have their place, but their fixation on men like themselves is an impediment, not a net+. Women & POC ARE this movement.
11/— Victoria Brownworth (@VABVOX) May 13, 2017
For six months I have watched the relentless hand-wringing over losing white male voters like it was a hate crime.WHITE MEN CHOSE TRUMP.
12/— Victoria Brownworth (@VABVOX) May 13, 2017
In 2008 & 2012 WHITE MEN CHOSE MCCAIN & ROMNEY. It is NOT some new trend. White men like other white men. It’s how supremacy works.
14/— Victoria Brownworth (@VABVOX) May 13, 2017
The impact of Trump’s election hit women & LGBT the very first day. The EO’s Trump signed first were about curtailing our rights.
16/— Victoria Brownworth (@VABVOX) May 13, 2017
The singular reason all women & MOC had to veer away from these white men is because they have historically ignored us except to use us.
18/— Victoria Brownworth (@VABVOX) May 13, 2017
I have read a freaking BAZILLION pieces about white male working class economic anxiety like WOMEN aren’t the oppressed economic class.
20/— Victoria Brownworth (@VABVOX) May 13, 2017
This isn’t a hit-piece on Sanders–he’s not a bad guy &he cares about specific issues. But he has elided women & POC from his movement.
22/— Victoria Brownworth (@VABVOX) May 13, 2017
#TheResistance centers women, POC, LGBT, immigrants. We are not your afterthought or footnote or virtue signals. WE ARE REAL PEOPLE.
24/— Victoria Brownworth (@VABVOX) May 13, 2017
In a dozen townhalls w/Chris Hayes or Tom Perez, there’s been not one word about the crushing impact of Hillary’s loss on women & POC.
26/— Victoria Brownworth (@VABVOX) May 13, 2017
We’ve been told how dare @HillaryClinton try & move women & MOC to the front of US’s class bus when that’s STILL reserved for white men.
28/— Victoria Brownworth (@VABVOX) May 13, 2017
But when you all claim our rights to bodily integrity & our needs for economic justice are #identitypolitics, you are no diff from GOP.
30/— Victoria Brownworth (@VABVOX) May 13, 2017
279 YEARS we waited. She always had 50% women, 40% POC in her staff. THAT would have been our Cabinet, our EO’s, our VOICES BEING HEARD.
32/— Victoria Brownworth (@VABVOX) May 13, 2017
WE keep being told to reach out to this minority of white male voters who hate us. REACH OUT TO US. SPEAK TO US. We are the resistors.
34/— Victoria Brownworth (@VABVOX) May 13, 2017
Trump wants a country that looks like him. White. Male. Women to the back. POC out of sight. WE #resist THAT. WE demand visibility.
36/ pic.twitter.com/7G8JqsWaah— Victoria Brownworth (@VABVOX) May 13, 2017
We welcome you. #TheResistance is a big tent. But we will not be elided from a movement we started & for which we do the hard work.
38/— Victoria Brownworth (@VABVOX) May 13, 2017
Our objective is to crush this fascist in the WH. But it is also to ascend to a place where WE are equal & valued in a society WE built.
40/— Victoria Brownworth (@VABVOX) May 13, 2017
The work goes beyond Trump. Hillary’s platform was about equalizing what had long been unequal. We need to continue that work. Please.
41/ pic.twitter.com/TJRjor1GS8— Victoria Brownworth (@VABVOX) May 13, 2017
Our voices will NOT be silenced
Our bodies WILL be owned by us
Our labor WILL be paid for
Our work will NOT end
We ARE #TheResistance
42/ pic.twitter.com/DXlffuYFeY— Victoria Brownworth (@VABVOX) May 13, 2017
Thank you so much, Victoria, for your eloquence and courage.*
#OnwardTogether!
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*Thanks also for your express permission to post your thread here.
