recommended resistance reading part 1: ten books to help you understand the present moment

10 Books for Resistance Reading

Knowing what's happening and how we got here helps us strategize and make plans for what to do next. I can't say reading these books will make you feel better about the recent election results, but I know they will help you see the reality of the world in which we live a little more clearly. All of these are recent works or classics and until at least January 20, 2025 you should be able to find them easily in a public library, book store, or online. If you're going to buy a copy, consider a used book seller or an independent bookstore.

I consider the books on this list essential recommended resistance reading. They are works of political philosophy, political science, history, and current events. I will add to this resistance library in future posts. I think it make sense to try and put our present moment in a historical context and I think that taken together these books do this. The books are listed in no particular order. They're all great. I know there are a lot of other books one could add to this list, but I kept my list to books I've actually read.

On Tyranny, How Democracies Die, and Anne Applebaum's books are all very short, quick, potent reads, and the physical books are small and thin. I recommend starting with these. The Origins of Totalitarianism and Manufacturing Consent are classics, but they're dense and some find them quite a slog. I had to attempt Arendt three times before finally finishing it, but it was worth it.

• The Origins of Totalitarianism by Hannah Arendt

• On Tyranny: Twenty Lessons from the Twentieth Century by Timothy Snyder

• How Democracies Die by Steven Levitsky and Daniel Ziblatt

• Manufacturing Consent by Noam Chomsky

• Tyranny, Inc. : How Private Power Crushed American Liberty and What to do about It by Sohrab Ahmari

• Autocracy Inc.: The Dictators Who Want to Run the World by Anne Applebaum

• Twilight of Democracy: The Seductive Lure of Authoritarianism by Anne Applebaum

• How to Stand Up to a Dictator: The Fight for our Future by Maria Ressa, winner of the Nobel Peace Prize

• Rich White Men: What it Takes to Uproot the Old Boys’ Club and Transform America by Garret Neiman

• Attack from Within: How Disinformation is Sabotaging America by Barbara McQuade

Up next Fiction and Non-Fiction to Keep hope alive.

the last imperfect day in america

Defying authoritarianism in America

Once upon a time in America

there was a last imperfect day.

A day when not only the churches,

but the temples and the mosques

called people to prayer;

a day when it was still legal to be a non-believer.

There was a last imperfect day when children

of every color and creed went to school;

A day when people could speak their mind

without fear of neighbors turning them in;

A day when people could speak Spanish,

or Arabic, or Portuguese, or Cantonese

without being arrested.

On that day women still owned their own bodies;

you were innocent until proven guilty;

And there was no government list of undesirables.

On that day, as it was in all the days before,

Life was hard, and messy, and difficult,

and full of compromise and hard lessons.

It was far from perfect.

It was full of failure, starting over, and trying again,

but it was real and there was enough hope

to wake up each morning and give

community, respect, dignity, and inclusion another shot.

In very many ways, it most certainly was not great.

There was, once upon a time, not too long ago

A last imperfect day like this.

And then America became great

Again.

mend The Things worthy of repair

Some years ago, the stitching on a favorite pair of slippers let go. I noticed when I nearly stepped out of it while carrying the laundry. “Damn!” I thought, “I need to get some new slippers.” I stepped out of the slippers, put the laundry basket on the bed and began folding the laundry. Then I remembered something. “Wait! I don’t have to throw the slippers away. I can mend it! And I did. Instead of creating trash and spending money on slippers, I kept the slippers and spent a few dollars on a set of needles and various types of thread. This was my first opportunity to take up a spiritual practice I had learned about a few weeks prior at a workshop called “Mending Church,” led by the Rev. Laura Everett at a Unitarian Universalist Christian Fellowship retreat at First Unitarian Church in Worcester, MA.  Rev. Everett had spoken about mending as a spiritual practice and made connections to church, faith communities, and ministry, noting “the metaphors are rich and tactile.”

And indeed they are. I need mending, you need mending, the church needs mending, the country needs mending, the world needs mending, just about everything needs mending.  And all of us have the ability to mend. We can all learn to mend. Rev. Everett explained that just as we have actually lost the art of mending clothes in our culture, we have in many ways also lost the art of mending ourselves, our relationships, our families, and our communities. Rev. Everett writes (https://religionnews.com/2019/04/10/the-spirituality-of-mending/):

We learn to look for the places that need repair. We discover holes at the elbows and fraying at the cuffs. We see stress at the seams. We notice the places of friction and instability often need the most repairs. Sometimes we find that the garment was not well created to begin with and thus, prone to tearing. We learn to look carefully and ask, “Is this worth fixing?” I find myself asking this often about my neighborhood, my city, my church, and my country.

The act of physically stitching my slipper back together brought me to that place where the Spirit teaches me lessons. I couldn’t find an exact matching thread, so I used something close in color. My life is like this, I thought, I am not always a perfect match and I repair myself as best I can. I am not like I used to be. I am worn and used – I’ve been through parenting, divorce, depression, and cancer. I’m full of patches and mends that don’t perfectly match. I am not the shiny new shoe or garment I once was, but who is? Like my slipper, I am worth repairing. Heck, I loved my odd little slippers, they were warm and cozy and broken in to fit my feet. I loved them the way they were, even with the repair stitching that didn’t quite match. Those slippers finally fell apart to the extent that no more mending would hold them together. It was then I got some new ones. And now I mend those!

Sometimes I get mad at myself for not being a famous designer brand three piece suit. Over and over I have to get used to the fact that I am an off the rack jeans and cotton T-shirt. That’s who I am. And not a top brand at that. But I’m me and me is enough. Worthy. Lovable. And when I break down, I am worth fixing. “Mending,” Rev. Everett says, “is a validation of worth.”

The looming presidential election rents our minds and hearts with anxiety.  Civil discourse is ripped apart and needs mending. The supreme court needs mending.  Congress needs mending.  The constitution and democracy need mending.  Health care needs mending, reproductive freedom needs mending, education needs mending, the social safety net needs mending, immigration policy needs mending, Gaza needs mending, Ukraine needs mending. So much seems ripped apart, worn out, and broken. 

But it’s worth mending. All of it. Just like you and me.   I can’t afford to buy new things all the time. I need to mend and repair.  I can’t make a new me when I feel broken, I must work on mending and repairing myself.  I can’t afford to tear down my country and culture and start from zero, so I am going to go about mending it as best as I can.  I hope you’ll join me.  

Shine on,

Rev. Tony