Show Notes
Around the world and at home, a global democratic movement is making huge strides toward freedom and accountability. Support Next Comes What + Get Andrea's posts FIRST: https://degenerateart.beehiiv.com/subscribe Read the post: https://degenerateart.beehiiv.com/p/doing-the-work-at-hand LISTEN Everywhere: https://pod.link/1779885475 WATCH TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@degenerateartnews YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@DegenerateArtNewsletter This week, Next Comes What considers recent elections in Serbia and Brazil, and how they're part of a global movement that matters very much in the United States right now. It can be easy to look at the rise of far-right governments or parties in places like France, Germany, and the U.S., while missing the successful opposition to these movements at home and abroad.
Andrea Pitzer walks through the many reasons we should follow international political shifts, and the ways the fates of other countries are directly bound up with the stability of democracy in the U.S. She considers the exuberant student movement that expelled longtime Serbian strongman Aleksandar Vučić from power on Sunday, as well as the defeat of Flávio Bolsonaro by Lula da Silva in Brazil the same day. The late surge toward Lula after Bolsonaro initially received more support in the first round of voting revealed an uprising that rejected the extreme authoritarianism Brazilians had previously shut down in the twentieth century in favor of liberal democracy, freeing themselves from dictatorship. In the Serbian case, opposition appears to be more focused on breaking up the cult of personality and defying a corrupt regime than massive democratization. Andrea ties both approaches to a broader range of resistance seen in other countries, from South Korea and Poland to Hungary earlier this year. The episode closes with a look at the No Kings marches held in the U.S. days ago, and encourages everyone to make these last days before the election count—and to get out the vote. 0:00 Global Reactionary Movements and Democratic Resilience 1:25 Serbia, Brazil, and Hungary: Rejecting Authoritarian Rule 3:50 Saluting the No Kings Marches and Grassroots Power 5:15 Roanoke Election Preview and Fighting in Ruby Red Districts 7:40 Foreign Interference, Tariffs, and International Autocratic Networks 11:15 Historical Parallels: Operation Condor and the Fight for Democracy 14:50 The Digital Battlefield: Starlink, Meta, and Social Media Censorship 18:30 Economic Justice and Affordability with Economist Isabella Weber 21:10 Early Voting Surges and the Impact of Mass Protests 24:00 Conclusion: Preventing Authoritarian Control and Protecting Our Institutions
More from Next Comes What
People are waking up to the profiteering at the heart of the administration. We can use the resulting fury to build a movement. Support Next Comes What + Get Andrea's posts FIRST: https://degenerateart.beehiiv.com/subscribe Read the post: https://degenerateart.beehiiv.com/p/the-corruption-umbrella LISTEN Everywhere: https://pod.link/1779885475 WATCH TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@degenerateartnews YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@DegenerateArtNewsletter This week's episode looks at the many ways that corruption underpins every part of Trump administration policies. Andrea Pitzer considers the deliberate choice to inflict suffering in the U.S. and abroad, which has been done across the board for direct personal or political gain. She notes that the catastrophic shifts in U.S. policy that set the stage for much of what is happening today took place in response to the 9/11 attacks, but that Trump 2.0 does not even have that flimsy fig leaf of a justification, given that the president has intentionally created the crises now engulfing the country. All this has led to illness, hunger, war, and death.
FIND A NO KINGS OCTOBER 17 VOTE EARLY EVENT NEAR YOU: https://www.nokings.org/ We can send the people pushing fascism on us back into their holes without buying into hate. Support Next Comes What + Get Andrea's posts FIRST: https://degenerateart.beehiiv.com/subscribe Read the post: https://degenerateart.beehiiv.com/p/the-clampdown-continues LISTEN Everywhere: https://pod.link/1779885475
The roots of everything that ails the country go deeper than Trump, so we need to think beyond November 3rd. Support Next Comes What + Get Andrea's posts FIRST: https://degenerateart.beehiiv.com/subscribe Read the post: https://degenerateart.beehiiv.com/p/killing-zombie-trumpism LISTEN Everywhere: https://pod.link/1779885475 WATCH
Authoritarians reveal themselves, even to followers who prefer not to see. And that leaves an opening for change. Support Next Comes What + Get Andrea's posts FIRST: https://degenerateart.beehiiv.com/subscribe Read the post: https://degenerateart.beehiiv.com/p/opening-the-blinds LISTEN Everywhere: https://pod.link/1779885475 WATCH TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@degenerateartnews/video/7692115338934127885 YouTube: https://youtu.be/p8YBYcAtXxs This week, Next Comes What looks at the disillusionment that eventually takes place for most people who succumb to the cult of personality in an authoritarian society. Andrea Pitzer looks at events in recent weeks that are providing the spark for that awakening among many Trump supporters. With higher gas prices driving the point home, we also see everyone from next-door neighbors to judges and Republican politicians beginning to stand up against Trump, or at least to edge away from association with him. Andrea compares this growing repudiation of the president and his policies to the case of Mitsuye Endo, a Japanese American U.S. citizen who was fired from her state job in California and detained in camps with her family during World War II. In other cases brought by Japanese Americans, a majority of justices on the Supreme Court rubber-stamped the bigotry of the day while rationalizing actions they understood were wrong. But when it came to Endo—a U.S.-born Christian with no ties to Japan or even the Japanese language—the judges could find no pretext at all to provide cover for what was, at root, a detention program based simply on racial exclusion. Seeing many recent examples of people recognizing that their faith in Trump was wrongheaded or even immoral, Andrea suggests that we've come to a similar moment in which Americans are being forced to choose. Not everyone will walk away from Trumpism, but many will, for reasons that may be ethical or practical—or both. The episode ends with suggestions on how to respond to those who do. 00:00 Introduction: Shifting Public Opinion & Political Dynamics 02:48 The Rising Costs of Living and Cracks in the GOP Coalition 05:36 Institutional Capitulation and the Defense of Democratic Norms 08:24 Leaving MAGA: Personal Realities and Disillusionment Stories 11:12 Human Toll: Immigration Crackdowns, ICE, and Affected Families 14:00 Legal Pushback: How Judges Are Challenging Federal Overreach 16:48 Historical Echoes: The Mitsuye Endo Case and Wartime Detentions 19:36 The Midterms and the Ripple Effects of Raging Unpopularity 22:24 Complicity, the Thanksgiving Table, and Long-Term Cultural Shifts 25:12 Conclusion: Guardrails for the Future and Continuing the Fight
Corrupt power will always inflict more harm if it can benefit from that additional suffering. But we don't have to let it happen. Support Next Comes What + Get Andrea's posts FIRST: https://degenerateart.beehiiv.com/subscribe Read the post: https://degenerateart.beehiiv.com/p/there-is-always-a-box LISTEN Everywhere: https://pod.link/1779885475 WATCH TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@degenerateartnews/video/7689199426488831246