On Fear

A friend recently told me he got pulled into stumping for Harris because a couple of marginalized family members and friends of various identities were scared of a Trump presidency, and since they were more marginalized than he, he was unable to “argue with their fears”.

Fear isn’t an intelligible politic, it’s notoriously exploitable.  It cannot be argued with. All politicians are skilled at fomenting and manipulating fear to build support. We cannot build liberation from fear, we can only play into the hands of monsters that way. And fear is not a currency — “I’m afraid” means you need community to comfort you, it doesn’t mean you get to gaslight everybody into repressive politics because you’re scared.  Fear is not a reliable narrator.

Fear is not objective. Many fellow Trans people are terrified of what Trump will enable against Trans people, and some of those same people gaslight anyone afraid of the anti-Trans violence Biden allowed and Harris already signed off on — “We should follow the law.”

Radical politics are built on historical material analysis, not fear, not even rage, not that we are unfeeling in the least.