[FUPQ-08] Stand out

Day 3,697, 16:14 • Published in USA USA • by Pfenix Quinn


The Free University of Phoenix Quinn is a service of the Socialist Freedom Party, based in e-USA, which practices quick-fire anarcha-communist group therapy and offers exciting careers in professional verbosity and left-wing role-playing.


This is Lecture Number 8 of a 20-part series on Combating Tyranny. It's derived from Timothy Snyder's cool read ON TYRANNY, adapted to our New World context by R.F. Williams, who is supposedly the husband of the equally fierce Mabel Williams, and is also a recluse who contributes little to the game except for expostulating from time to time in a weak imitation of the inimitable Phoenix Quinn.

Encuentre traducciones al español de estas conferencias en VANGUARDIA SOCIALISTA.



Stand out.

Never forget Rosa Parks.

Without unease, there is no freedom. Following along is easy. It can feel strange to do or say something different. When we set the right example, it breaks the spell of the status quo and multitudes will follow.

Despite the myths that develop over time, accommodation and admiration of authoritarian pricks is more common than resistance to them. Those we remember as the greatest resistance heroes were often considered to be crazy, exceptional, or eccentric in their day.

Even those remembered as fiercest opponents of the worst kind of dictators often have a more conflicted story than popular and “official” perceptions allow for. For example: high-ranking members of British royal society and government worked for appeasement with the Nazis. Another: the Soviet failure to support the Polish Home Army during the siege of Warsaw, not to mention the Katyn massacre and similar events, demonstrated with little doubt that Stalin’s interest was in control over rather than freedom for the Poles.

True resistance means not conceding in advance. It means forcing authoritarians to change their plans. It means doing what others have not done. It means standing out.

In 1940 Teresa Prekerova was in her last year of high school in a city being bombed by its Nazi occupiers. Her father had been arrested; her uncle killed fighting the occupation; two brothers were in prisoner-of-war camps. By that point 25,000 people had been killed in Warsaw alone. Without telling anyone, she began bringing food and medicine into the Ghetto. By 1942, she was able to help a few people escape, saving at least one family from extermination.

She later became a historian of that period. She did not write about herself because she considered herself normal. Teresa stood out.

Of course, in our little game world there are no events anywhere close to as traumatic as what Teresa and so many others endured. So there should be far fewer reasons not to stand out when it is called for.




At the end of this lecture series, various silly certificates and dingbat degrees will be issued by Mr. Williams based on responses provided in the comment sections. Participation counts. Indicate attendance by leaving a comment or endorsing the article. Higher degrees can be bought will be awarded according to the degree of critical thinking, mindfulness and humor exhibited by responders.

Examples of questions you might want to address in response to this lecture:
* Describe situations in-game that might call for a player to stand out, to go against the tide?
* Does it take a kind of support network, either good friends or family, or a supportive community, to encourage people to stand out in this way? Or is it all about the individual?