There’s No Undo Button For Our Fallen Democracy
我们堕落的民主没有撤消按钮
Tressie McMillan Cottom, one of America’s leading public intellectuals, posted this to Bluesky yesterday:
Tressie McMillan Cottom是美国领先的公共知识分子之一，昨天将其发布给蓝调：
I’m going to be very honest and clear. I am fully preparing myself to die under this new American regime. That’s not to say that it’s the end of the world. It isn’t. But I am almost 50 years old. It will take so long to do anything with this mess that this is the new normal for *me*. I do hope a lot of you run. I hope you vote, sure. Maybe do a general strike or rent strike. All great! But I spent the last week reading things and this is not, for ME, an electoral fix. So now I will spend time reflecting on how to integrate this normal into my understanding of the future. Most of this will be personal. Some of it will be public — how we move in the world. Right now, I know that I need to make a decision on my risk sensitivity. How much can I take? I also need to meditate HARD on accepting the randomness of that risk. No amount of strategy can protect me. Those are things I am thinking about.
我将非常诚实和清晰。我正在全力准备自己在这个新的美国政权下死亡。这并不是说这是世界末日。不是。但是我已经快50岁了。用这种混乱做任何事情将花费很长时间，以至于这是 *我 *的新常态。我希望你们很多人跑步。希望您投票，当然。也许进行大罢工或租金罢工。太好了！但是我花了最后一周阅读东西，这对我来说不是选举的修复。因此，现在我将花时间思考如何将这种正常现象整合到我对未来的理解中。大多数将是个人的。其中一些将是公开的 - 我们如何在世界上移动。现在，我知道我需要就风险敏感性做出决定。我可以服用多少？我还需要努力地接受这种风险的随机性。没有任何策略可以保护我。这些是我正在考虑的事情。
In response, Anil Dash posted:
作为回应，Anil Dash发布：
Yeah, I keep telling people this is a rest-of-my-life fight, and… they do *not* want to hear it.
是的，我一直告诉人们这是一场我的余生，……他们 *不 *不想听到它。
Author Meg Elison:
作者Meg Elison：
I’ve been thinking something like this for a few months now. We will fight, we will resist, etc. But we will also not live the lives we picked out and planned on. They’re not available anymore.
几个月来，我一直在考虑这样的事情。我们将战斗，我们将抵抗等等。但是我们也不会过我们挑选并计划的生活。它们不再可用。
Therapist and political activist Leah McElrath:
治疗师和政治活动家利亚·麦克尔拉斯（Leah McElrath）：
Since Trump regained office, I’ve talked about this both gently and bluntly to try to help people understand that we lived in one era but we’re going to die in another. I am, at least. I know my probable life expectancy and, at 61, have about 15 years left.
自从特朗普重新任职以来，我一直在轻轻而坦率地谈论过这一点，以帮助人们了解我们生活在一个时代，但我们将死在另一个时代。我至少是。我知道我可能的预期寿命，在61岁时还剩15年。
And @2naonwheat.bsky.social:
和 @2naonwheat.bsky.social：
We’re all going to have to start planting shade trees we fully know we’ll never sit under.
我们都将不得不开始种植我们完全不会坐在下面的树荫下。
Cottom nails how I’ve been feeling for the past few months (and honestly why it’s been a little uneven around KDO recently). America’s democratic collapse has been coming for years, always just over the horizon. But when everything that happened during Trump’s first three months in office happened and (here’s the important part) shockingly little was done by the few groups (Congress, the Supreme Court, the Democratic Party, American corporations & other large institutions, media companies) who had the power to counter it, I knew it was over. And over in a way that is irreversible, for a good long while at least.
库托姆（Cottom）钉住了过去几个月的感觉（老实说，为什么最近在KDO周围有些不平衡）。美国的民主崩溃已经到来了多年，始终在地平线上。但是，当特朗普最初三个月任职期间发生的一切发生时，（这是重要的部分）（重要的是）几乎没有什么团体（国会，最高法院，民主党，美国公司和其他大型机构，媒体公司）几乎没有做的事情，我有权对抗它，我知道这已经结束。至少很长时间以来，以一种不可逆转的方式结束。
Since then, I’ve been recalibrating and grieving. Feeling angry — furious, really. Fighting resignation. Trying not to fall prey to doomerism and subsequently spreading it to others. (This post is perhaps an exception, but I believe, as Cottom does, in being “honest and clear” when times call for it.) Getting out. Biking, so much biking. Paying less attention to the news. Trying to celebrate other facets of our collective humanity here on KDO — or just being silly & stupid. Feeling overwhelmed. Feeling numb. But also (occasionally, somehow) hope?
从那以后，我一直在重新校准和悲伤。感到生气 - 真的很生气。战斗辞职。试图不沦为厄运，然后将其传播给他人。（这篇文章也许是一个例外，但是我相信，就像库托姆一样，当时代呼吁时，“诚实和清晰”。骑自行车，这么多骑自行车。对新闻的关注更少。试图在KDO上庆祝我们集体人类的其他方面，或者只是愚蠢而愚蠢。感到不知所措。感觉麻木。但是（偶尔，某种程度上）希望吗？
All of this is exhausting. Destabilizing. I don’t know what I’m doing or what I should be doing or how I can be of the most service to others. (Put on your oxygen mask before assisting others, they say. Is my mask on yet? I don’t know — how can I even tell?) I barely know what I’m trying to say and don’t know how to end this post so I’m just gonna say that the comments are open on this post (be gentle with each other, don’t make me regret this) and I’ll be back with you here after the, uh, holiday.
所有这些都很疲惫。不稳定。我不知道我在做什么，我应该做什么，或者如何为他人提供最多的服务。（他们说，在协助他人之前，戴上氧气面具。我不知道吗？我什至不知道吗？）我几乎不知道我想说的话，不知道该如何结束这篇文章，所以我只是在这篇文章上打开评论（我会彼此温柔地说，我会彼此愉快，不要让我后悔这一点），在这里，我会在这里回来，嗯，嗯，嗯，假期，假期。
