Intersectionality as Reckoning
Catastrophic Thinking, and Strengthening Solidarity in Opposition to Fascism
In the contemporary US, every day is an overt catastrophe. For many communities, though, this reality is not simply contemporary, but also deeply historic.
The hard truth about this fact is that many catastrophic harms have not only been perpetrated by the elite class against working people—they have also been proliferated within our communities in the form of anti-Black racism, misogyny, xenophobia, Islamophobia, antisemitism, transphobia, and more. Our people are traumatized, and those traumas are not simply a result of abuses by the elite class, but are often deeply rooted in intracommunity betrayals and harm.
The Appalachian region itself has been subject to a wide range of catastrophic labor and ecological abuses along class lines. At the same time, our communities suffer an enormous amount of trauma and division as a result of extreme harm done by enslavement, lynchmobs, witch hunts, racist vigilantes, and the list goes on.
In this context, deep and unresolved wounds have created a situation where trust is challenging, to say the least. Today, many marginalized folks are thinking, “They (the police, the racists, the homophobes, etc.) always target me, and no one will be here for me in the end”—a form of catastrophic thinking that has only been corroborated under a regime of liberalism that pays lip service to pluralism and diversity, but has failed at every point to fight for and secure policies that would afford reparations and lasting protections to those diverse communities. Within our communities, those liberal failures look like folks laundering their complicity by using black squares, banners, and yard signs, while failing to depart from the comfort of their own lives to engage in the forms of dissent and disobedience necessary to achieve social change.
As Appalachians, we must ask ourselves:
What does a unified front against fascism really look like today, and how do we achieve that?
What steps must be taken to solidify the bonds of trust necessary to, in fact, defeat this onslaught?
What role does vulnerability and empathy play in achieving this goal?
How do we remain sensitive to the complex traumas, fears, and needs of our community members, while remaining unified and ruthless in our opposition to fascism?
White liberals, and in particular white Southerners, are being asked a similar question today to those asked during the Civil War, Civil Rights Movement, and at many points throughout our past: will you betray your comfort and stand up to fight for the liberation of Black, Brown, and Queer people when the state and its stooges inflict violence against them? In our region specifically, we must ask again, what is the responsibility of white Appalachians in the struggle against fascism and white supremacy?
To deepen trust and strengthen our solidarity against fascism, we must strengthen the intersectional dynamics of our politics. To strengthen the intersectional dynamics necessary for unified opposition, we must allow ourselves to engage a process of vulnerability, empathy, and reparations on a community scale. This process is multidimensional, and will often require a deep awareness of how our communities have been enmeshed within reciprocal networks of harm against each other.
In love, we must build communities where the diverse, historic traumas of our people are heard; and, in love, we must vow to remain committed to the fight for justice, in our communities and in our society—for without justice, there can be no love.