I tried to stay off the internet that day. I don’t know about you, but I’m sick and tired of being stressed out by what men in power with bad hair, worse fashion sense, and criminal records or intent are going to do to us all next. I’m not saying what they have planned isn’t anything short of terrorizing, but I’m no longer offering my cortisol to their whirligig willy-nilly. I know that every piece of news I lay my eyes on over the next four years is going to be demoralizing, to say the least. I need to conserve my energy. No need to spend any excess on the first day, I thought. This isn’t 2016. I’m wiser and far more wary. I want to keep as much of myself intact as I navigate my way through the onslaught of violent acts that are promised to us.
But I saw it anyway. Clear as day. We all did.
The images of the openly transphobic billionaire, left arm raised, fingers taught, reaching for the gold medal of supremacy were everywhere. The richest man in the world — a man who promotes the far-right party in Germany, the AfD, the British anti-immigration party, Reform UK — in a full Nazi salute.
Which he did twice.
And many saluted him back, from the comfort of their own homes and communities, in their imagination, or just out in the open with their cheers and zero push-back.
This is where we are. Again. And it’s a long road out of it. Decades. Generations. Revolutions aren’t built in a day. (Though I’m open to a miracle.)
As much as I am trying to keep my focus and remain undeterred by the completely unsurprising chaos of the far right, I wake up thinking about it. I wake up feeling the heaviness. I wake up with a whole host of haunting ghosts. And I am in good company. After the last democratic president excused and funded (using our tax dollars) a genocide in Gaza for over a year, what other outcome but this could there be? If there is no opposition to the most morally depraved actions known to man by the supposed liberal leaders governing us, extremism is all too predictable. If no one in charge has the moral clarity to say that carpet-bombing a population, especially one that is 50% children, is abhorrent and wrong, then we are already in hell. If we can live-stream our cousins, kin, and fellow human beings being slaughtered, and homes, hospitals, schools, and towns being leveled in an instant, well then, anything is possible.
So this unbelievable gesture, this dog whistle to all right-wing extremists and white nationalists the world over, is almost formulaic. Add to that the eerie irony that we’ve been told by the Anti-Defamation League that being pro-Palestine is anti-Semitic, but the salute heard around the world isn’t.
Next week brings us a New Moon in Aquarius, on January 29th. Occurring in a trine with Jupiter, this New Moon is broad-minded and confident. Pluto, the planet of extremes, is also newly settled in Aquarius and making an exact conjunction to Mercury on January 28th. It’s edgy for sure, but it signals an initiation, one that can awaken us to our ability to do alchemy.
Aquarius’ gifts to humanity are certainty, intellectual rigor, and an aptitude to see the forest and the trees. This sign is unflinching when it comes to truth. A visionary, Aquarius isn’t one to wear rose-colored glasses, or get lost in the comment section. It has the fortitude to make up its own mind through a deep and intensive analysis of any topic.
It is clarity.
We all know the quotes. We all know how important it is to be definitively against evil and direct in the face of supremacy. What we don’t always know, I fear, is how to muster the courage to be disobedient in the face of power. But this is also Aquarius’ strength. The sign known as the anti-hero, the outsider, the margin-dweller, the one who refuses center stage, Aquarius knows how to defy.
Those who seek total supremacy make use of every moment, every opportunity, every privilege, and every resource available to them. People upholding oligarchy meet their aim and further their agenda without regard for anyone, any law, any moral code. It’s high time we who believe in a world beyond endless cycles of violence stop trying to play by the rules that are stacked against us anyway. It’s time we stop trying to be right, perfect, or even “good,” and instead do what is needed. It’s time we stop waiting for someone to come and save us, and instead send out our own signal. One that is unwavering. One that blatantly declares that we will not let each other face these incoming long, dark, and difficult times alone. One that makes the bold statement that we will do whatever it takes to keep the soul of ourselves and this world intact.
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