Film-maker Moore leads ‘resistance’ against Trump
WASHINGTON: Documentarian and political commenter Michael Moore has launched a website titled “The Resistance Calendar,” which allows anyone to post, as Moore phrased it, about “anti-Trump, pro-democracy” events in the US.
Moore tweeted: “A few minutes ago, I launched RESISTANCE CALENDAR! A one-stop site for all anti-Trump actions EVERY DAY nationwide: https://t.co/c0W7beDdzF
In a lengthy Facebook post, Moore called the website a “place where you can quickly go and check it daily, ensuring that you don’t miss any event in your area to stop the Trump madness”.
As of now, there are no other pages, though Moore promised upcoming features, such as a “killer map of the US and a big desk-style calendar where you can just click on any day and see what’s happening with the movement across America”.
With the creation of the website, Moore seems bent on formalising the phrase that’s been bubbling up since Trump announced his candidacy: “The Resistance”. As Moore wrote, it’s become a political movement. But it’s far from the first movement to use the phrase as a moniker.
It was popularised as a political term during World War II, via France’s La Résistance. Nazis poured into Paris in June 1940, fulfilling the worst fears of many French residents – a German occupation. To invigorate dispirited countrymen, leader of “Free France”, General Charles de Gaulle, gave speeches on the BBC, encouraging the French to continue fighting in whatever way they could.
In one, he said, “I ask you to believe me when I say the cause of France is not lost… Whatever happens, the flame of French resistance must not and shall not die.”
As Charles Kaiser wrote for CNN: “The French Resistance undertook nearly 1 000 acts of sabotage in the hours after the Normandy invasion began, and the damage they inflicted on railroads and other communications played a crucial role in preventing German reinforcements from arriving quickly in Northern France.”
According to Simon Adams’ Occupation and Resistance, “by 1944, the resistance had grown in strength to about 400 000 members”.
Other resistance movements throughout Europe began to appear, and the usage of “resistance” to refer to such a group stuck – even today. In a 2014 joint publication, the US Department of Defence defined a “resistance movement” as “An organised effort by some portion of the civil population of a country to resist the legally established government or an occupying power and to disrupt civil order and stability”.
While the phrase is often used in reference to Trump without explicit allusion to La Résistance, some have drawn the comparison.
Days after Trump’s election, Jennifer Boyer-Switala wrote in The Huffington Post: “In light of our recent election, I look to General de Gaulle’s Speech of June 18, 1940 when I ask you to join me in lighting the flame of resistance. Let me be clear; I am not calling for, nor do I condone, violent or armed resistance, as it only serves to harm fellow human beings and validate claims that we are hypocrites. Nor am I calling for a coup d’état. On the contrary: I am calling for a coup de paix. My appeal is for Americans to engage in peaceful acts of resistance as a means of effecting positive change.”
Moore wrote he hopes the calendar will become “a 24/7 clearinghouse of the already MASSIVE resistance to Trump, to the Republican Congress, and, yes, to many of the spineless Democratic politicians out there”, before concluding, “Our goal is his removal from office – and the defeat of any politician who isn’t with us. WE ARE THE MAJORITY.” – Washington Post