*Directed at African Americans, but applicable for all.*
We have an extensive blueprint for responding to authoritarian and fascist playbooks. Black Americans endured more than 100 years of Jim Crow, a legalized system of oppression, discrimination and segregation built on pseudoscientific, biologically based notions of Black inferiority. The lessons of that long struggle speak directly to our present moment.
## Know our history, and our thinkers
Understand the past. Study the work of our theorists, intellectuals and activists: Maria Stewart, Ann Plato, Frances Harper, Henry McNeal Turner, Alexander Crummell, Anna Julia Cooper, Nannie Helen Burroughs, James Weldon Johnson, Charles Hamilton Houston, Ella Baker, Howard Thurman, Bayard Rustin, Fannie Lou Hamer, Martin Luther King Jr., Malcolm X, Randall Robinson, Grace Lee Boggs and Nelson Mandela.
Study the history of movements to better understand how groups have organized to effect change in America: antislavery and abolitionist, women's, labor, farmers', LGBTQIA, civil rights, anti-war, anti-apartheid, disability, elder rights, environmental, the Old Left, the New Left and Black Lives Matter.
Stop repeating the mantra that our history is being erased. Black people created our history, and it is a living embodiment of who we are. Our time is better spent supporting local history initiatives and joining state and national organizations devoted to preserving Black history. Raise your concerns at school board meetings. If your children attend charter or private schools, ask what steps they are taking to expose students to diverse historical stories. Never believe that if the federal government does not support our efforts, we are doomed.
## Reject false equivalence and easy answers
Critique "bothsiderism." It suggests that extremism on the right equals an imaginary extremism on the left. This is a false equivalency. Neo-Nazi racists trying to create a white republic that oppresses people of color, women, LGBTQIA people and non-Protestants are not the equivalent of antifa, which is not a formal organization and is simply opposed to fascism. "Considering both sides" can become a clever cover for misinformation and disinformation.
Resist simplistic solutions to complex problems.
Reject the buzzwords and labels used to dismiss or discredit diversity: political correctness, reverse discrimination, racial gerrymandering, identity politics, anti-woke, anti-DEI, "DEI hire," "men in women's sports," "men in the bathroom," left-wing liberal, fake news, anti-American, socialist, communist.
Educate yourself about the meaning of terms such as left-wing, socialist, communist and anarchist. These terms are being misused and mischaracterized to cause fear and misunderstanding.
Do not fall for the false divide between affordability issues and cultural issues. They are inextricably bound together. You cannot have equitable outcomes in education, wealth building, employment, access to capital or affordable housing without genuine fairness and the equal allocation of resources for all Americans. Nor can you have a stable economy through the forcible expulsion of immigrants, many of whom perform vital work and contribute to the tax base. Nativism, labeling people "illegal" and racial antipathy all feed current policies against immigrants.
## Get politically active
This is not a time to be apolitical. Political activity is essential in repressive times, and it means more than attending rallies. Get involved with your city or county council, local school board, state delegate or state senator, or your member of Congress. Raise your voice against unjust laws. Learn the legislative process. Support progressive candidates in local campaigns.
Think beyond the two-party system. There are hundreds of political parties in the United States. Find one or more connected to your interests and get involved.
Do not abandon your agency. You have the power to influence events and shape your environment. Do not succumb to the belief that institutional power trumps people power.
## Support Black Studies, and each other
Organize to support African American and Black Studies and those who teach them. Sitting idly by while departments, museums, schools and curricula are under attack can only be devastating in the long term. Ask your local library or museum about the status of Black materials. Talk with your school board to support, strengthen or start Black history programs. Ask local bookstores to host Black authors. Start book clubs devoted to Black books.
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Realize that our struggle is and always has been intersectional. See the connections between Black struggle and all people of color, LGBTQIA+ people, disabled people, women and other groups at home and abroad.
Resist efforts to demonize the trans community. Push back against laws restricting trans people's access to sports and their right to identify themselves as they choose, and reject the propaganda that trans people are a threat to women and civil society.
Support teach-ins, community organizations, and civil rights and free speech organizations such as the NAACP, the NAACP Legal Defense Fund, the National Urban League, the ACLU, the Southern Poverty Law Center and the Equal Justice Initiative.
## Know the truth, and your rights
Identify reliable news sources and learn to spot misinformation and disinformation. Challenge the "fake news" label, which is itself an invitation to discredit news outlets not sanctioned by authoritarian and anti-social-justice voices.
Know your rights and be prepared to exercise them.
## Be hopeful
"Hope will never be silent."