On warnings ignored, performative protest, and why America would rather crown mediocrity than trust Black women to lead.

I had to check myself before stepping any further into this campaign. A gut punch that rattled me but also clarified what is at stake. It would be dishonest to launch into Audacity October and wrap everything in a bow of hope without telling the truth about what we are walking into. Pollyanna speeches will not save us. Denial will not protect us.

The opposing side knows exactly what they are doing. MAGA loyalists, conservative hardliners, Christian Nationalists—none of them are fumbling in the dark. They are building power in plain sight. They are willing to use every tool: tragedy, grief, hypocrisy, even our own capacity for decency, and turn it into ammunition. They want us to underestimate them. They want us to believe we can outlast them with patience or politeness. That would be a mistake.

Look at how quickly grief is weaponized. A man is killed, a tragedy by every measure, and within hours his image is pressed into service for a political project that was already moving full steam ahead. Condolences become currency. Mourning becomes marketing. The sign says “nobody should be killed for their opinions,” and on the surface, who would argue? But behind the banner is a movement that profits from silencing and stripping others of their lives. One hand shows pain. The other hand is busy legislating cruelty.

This is not hypocrisy by accident. It is strategy. The same people who preach about family values are gutting healthcare, childcare, and reproductive rights. They defend free speech for themselves while demanding that libraries strip shelves bare. They cry patriotism while outsourcing trade to the highest bidder. Ask yourself who China is buying soybeans from now.

It used to be American farmers. Then came a manmade trade war, built on the fantasy that America could strong-arm the world into bending the knee. We were told tariffs would bring China to heel, that the world would fall in line. But the world walked away. China buys zero soybeans from America now. They get them from South America. And when those South American countries felt the squeeze of global markets, this administration agreed to bail them out with a multibillion-dollar package of American taxpayer money.

Where did that money come from? From tariffs that function like hidden taxes on the American consumer. From higher prices at checkout. From gutting safety nets that once protected working families. All of this to cover the bill for tax cuts handed to the ultra-wealthy. Farmers were sacrificed, families were squeezed, and foreign competitors were bankrolled. So who won that trade war? Not the American people. Not the American farmer.

That is the sleight of hand. Tell people tariffs are a patriotic weapon. Tell them we are punishing China. Then quietly let the costs bleed out of their paychecks, their grocery bills, their hospitals and schools. Wave the flag with one hand while the other empties their pockets. And most voters never see how their elected officials voted to enable it, because they are too busy being fed slogans about greatness and faith.

This is how the hypocrisy works. It is not sloppy. It is intentional. The contradictions are not flaws. They are weapons. And they rely on people not asking the most basic questions: Who is actually benefiting? Who is actually paying? Who is protecting me, and who is cashing out on my silence?

And here is the part that hits hardest. They count on our humanity as their cover. They know we will hesitate, that we will pause, that we will measure twice before we strike. They know we will bend toward compassion, even for those who have shown us none. And that pause is their opening. That moment of restraint is their wedge. It gives them just enough room to rearrange the story so they are the victim and we are the threat.

And here is the part that should haunt this country. The demographics that tried to warn about this strategy—the Black, Brown, and immigrant communities who knew this form of manipulation like second nature—were mocked. We were told we were exaggerating, told we were fearmongering, told we were making everything about race or gender. People convinced themselves that even the worst and most inhumane acts of an authoritarian Trump regime would be better than the best good intentions of a Democrat. That was the divide and conquer strategy, and it worked. It still works.

Even now, you see it in the way people mobilize. Pro-Palestinian protesters show up at events with Obama or Kamala Harris to demand an end to violence in Gaza. They demand accountability from Democrats who, for all their flaws, are at least within shouting distance. But where are they when Trump speaks? Where are they when his rallies fill stadiums? Where are they when his supporters—the very people who greenlighted the slaughter, who cheer for authoritarianism in plain sight—gather by the thousands? You do not see them there. You will not see them there. They will not risk it. They will not confront power at its source.

Instead, the confrontation is redirected at Black women, at those who are already burdened with leading, with organizing, with seeing the danger long before anyone else does. We are told to lead, to be the example, to be the sharpest and the most aligned, to anticipate the moves in the room before they even happen. And yet, when it comes time to choose leaders, to give authority, to extend trust, this country will do anything but follow a Black woman. They will elevate the most ignorant, the most hateful, the most unqualified man before they will acknowledge what a Black woman embodies. Because to acknowledge it would mean admitting that the foundation of this country’s hierarchy has always been a lie.

It would mean admitting that strength, clarity, and survival have never come from whiteness or from maleness, but from the very people America tried to erase. And that kind of truth is unbearable for a nation addicted to mediocrity. Better to crown the loud fool than to confront the brilliance they have spent centuries trying to bury.

So I ask the question out loud. Why? Why is this country willing to gamble its future on extremists and charlatans but not on the women who have already proven themselves again and again? Why do we watch people treat performative protest as enough—screaming at the safe targets, the ones who will not harm them—while never putting themselves in the direct line of the authoritarian machine they claim to oppose? Why do so many choose blame over solutions, posturing over sacrifice, silence over courage?

People pay attention to what you do and to what you refuse to do. Performative resistance is not resistance at all. It is theater, a way to be seen as righteous without risking anything real. And the truth is this: they are not looking for solutions. They are looking for someone else to blame for problems they cannot or will not confront themselves.

This is why we cannot afford denial. This is why we cannot soften the truth. Because the sleight of hand move depends on our humanity, yes, but it also depends on our silence about what is obvious. Black women have been the canaries in the coal mine of American democracy, and every time we sing the warning, the country finds new ways to dismiss the sound.

But here we are, still singing. Still warning. Still standing. The question is whether the rest of this country will finally hear it before the mine caves in completely.

This is what fascism looks like when it is close enough to touch. It demands that we keep playing nice while it bulldozes every safeguard in its path. It thrives on our denial. It thrives on our belief that the center will hold while it is already being burned down.

That is why I had to check myself. Because it is tempting to soften the edges and present this campaign as pure inspiration. But inspiration without clarity is useless. We are in a life-shifting moment, one where futures are being decided in back rooms and on ballots, in pulpits that sanctify hate and platforms that disguise propaganda as journalism. I will not sugarcoat it. We are collapsing into a fascist state. The signs are here. The strategies are in motion. And the people we are fighting against are not confused, not divided, not hesitant. They are clear. They are relentless. And so should we be.

So what do we do? We do not fall for their tricks. We name them. We refuse to let grief become a shield for cruelty. We refuse to let hypocrisy pass as conviction. We stop pretending that denial is protection. We choose truth, even when it is uncomfortable. We choose urgency, even when it feels heavy.

When they say freedom, ask who they want free and who they want in chains. When they say patriotism, follow the money and the soybeans. When they say family, ask which families they are willing to let starve. When they say life, ask whose life they mean and whose life they are ready to discard.

The sleight of hand only works when you keep your eyes where the magician tells you to look. Shift your gaze. Watch the other hand. Name what it is doing.

I will not deny the fear. This is scary. Scary as hell. But fear is not the end of the story. Sometimes moving while you are scared is the truest act of courage. Sometimes taking the step before you feel ready is what keeps the world alive.

So yes, I checked myself. And now I am checking all of us. There is no time to wait, no crown worth bowing to, no lie worth swallowing whole. Do it now. Square up. The sleight of hand move only works if we look away. And I am not looking away.

 

Tasha Monroe

Founder, Simply Edyn & Co.

Writer & Editor, The Commons Dispatch