{"id":73764,"date":"2026-04-15T06:11:56","date_gmt":"2026-04-15T10:11:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/?p=73764"},"modified":"2026-04-15T06:11:56","modified_gmt":"2026-04-15T10:11:56","slug":"smart-people-saying-smart-things-4-15-26","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/2026\/04\/15\/smart-people-saying-smart-things-4-15-26\/","title":{"rendered":"Smart people saying smart things (4.15.26)"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

Rebecca Gordon, \u201cThe American Gulag\u201d<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

Concentration camps exist to support and expand the power of an authoritarian regime. They make everyone afraid of being treated like the current targets of the regime. Like state torture programs, concentration camps accelerate the process of dehumanizing groups of people in the public imagination. Such a process often begins by describing the target group as non-human, as \u201cvermin\u201d or \u201cgarbage\u201d (as Trump has, of course, done). Ironically, the very act of placing people in inhumane conditions can amplify the public\u2019s perception of their inhumanity. After all, would genuine human beings submit to such treatment? Would our good nation treat genuine human beings that way?<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Radley Balko, \u201cYou can\u2019t hide your lying ICE\u201d<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

For me, it became clear that we were in a uniquely dangerous era after the shooting of Marimar Martinez and the killing of Silverio Villegas-Gonzalez in Chicago. I\u2019m pretty jaded about these things, but I was jarred at how the administration openly gloated and shamelessly lied about the use of lethal force by DHS against people who posed no threat. It only got worse after the murders of Renee Good and Alex Pretti in Minneapolis. The lies the administration told after those killings aren\u2019t the lies you tell to cover something up. They\u2019re the lies you tell when you want to project to the country that you can get away with anything. The lies themselves are their own display of authoritarianism. The government is telling us, \u201cYou know we\u2019re lying. We know that you know we\u2019re lying. And there isn\u2019t a goddamn thing you can do about it.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Karen Park, \u201cWhy Trump\u2019s \u2018Praise Be to Allah\u2019 Easter Taunt Should Be Immediately Recognizable to U.S. Christians\u201d<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

When the Roman state executed Jesus, according to John 19:19, it placed above his head a sign that read\u00a0Iesus Nazarenus Rex Iudaeorum:<\/em> Jesus of Nazareth, King of the Jews. That sign, INRI, was formalized mockery; a piece of imperial theater that turned a claim about Jewish kingship into a cruel joke and attached that joke to an executed criminal. It wasn\u2019t only Jesus who was being ridiculed in that moment, but\u2014regardless of whether one believed he was or not\u2014the very idea of a Jewish messiah; the hope of a people reframed as absurdity and defeat. INRI says:\u00a0Here is your king. Look at him. Where is your God now?<\/p>\n

The president\u2019s use of \u201cPraise be to Allah\u201d on Easter morning turns Islamic prayer\u00a0into mockery\u00a0and in so doing repeats Pilate\u2019s mockery of the crucified Jesus. For Muslims, \u201cPraise be to Allah\u201d expresses reverence toward God. But Trump\u2019s Truth Social post lifts the prayer out of that context and redeploys it as spectacle and derision; as a way of asserting dominance over those for whom the prayer carries deep significance.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Marianne Szegedy-Maszak, \u201cHow to Defeat a Very Trumpy Authoritarian Leader\u201d<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

For many Americans, of course, Orb\u00e1n\u2019s Hungary is a miniature version of Trump\u2019s US\u2014indeed, in some ways, it may have served as a role model for MAGA in its crusade to dismantle democratic institutions and crucial elements of civil society. When Trump first ran for election in 2016, Orb\u00e1n had already \u201cbuilt the wall\u201d\u2014in his case, an electrified razor wire fence constructed by prisoners\u2014on Hungary\u2019s southern border, attempting to staunch the flow of Syrian refugees who, to be sure, were more likely to use Hungary as a transit point than a final destination. This also allowed Orb\u00e1n to declare a \u201cstate of emergency,\u201d which has not been lifted since. Sound familiar?<\/p>\n

In quashing dissent, extravagantly rewarding his allies, enriching himself and his family, despairing over the dilution of the purity of the Hungarian blood line, marginalizing and oppressing the LGBTQ community\u2014well, it\u2019s all there really. The Orb\u00e1n playbook is channeled in various ways by the Heritage Foundation\u2019s Project 2025, the right-wing blueprint for Trump\u2019s second term. So understanding how the Fidesz machine might be defeated could hold some lessons for MAGA\u2019s foes.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Rebecca Solnit, \u201cThe United States is destroying itself\u201d<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

But trying to understand motives is something of a hobby when the focus needs to be on consequences. We do not need to understand these criminals in order to try to contain and ultimately remove them. They will not last for ever, and we need to think about what happens when they\u2019re gone \u2013 to talk about the kind of reconstruction the US will face for the first time since the civil war, the reconstruction a ravaged and corrupted country has to go through to return to functionality. But not to return to the way things were.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Timothy Schraeder Rodriguez, \u201cConversion therapy is soul-crushing \u2014 and it doesn\u2019t work\u201d<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

Meanwhile, back in 2014, nine former leaders of the so-called ex-gay movement, including a co-founder of Exodus International, one the largest organization in the world promoting conversion therapy, signed a statement denouncing the practice. \u201cWe know first-hand the terrible emotional and spiritual damage it can cause, especially for LGBT youth,\u201d they wrote, urging parents to love and accept their LGBT children as they are, and challenging churches to embrace and affirm LGBT persons with full equality and inclusion.<\/p>\n

But their voices were ignored, and others took up their mantle. Today\u2019s practitioners would be quick to distance themselves from the conversion therapy ministries of the past, discrediting the former leaders as having been deceived and survivors like me as not having tried hard enough or not being true believers. But the truth is, today my relationship with God is the strongest it\u2019s ever been. And I believe I am loved by God, just as I am, as a gay man.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Hanna Horvath, \u201cYou don\u2019t have to gamble for gambling to ruin your life\u201d<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

It started with DraftKings and FanDuel, which spent huge sums lobbying states to legalize sports betting apps. Sports leagues and media companies legitimized the whole thing because they wanted the revenue and ad dollars.<\/p>\n

Polymarket and Kalshi then took that model and removed the last guardrails \u2014 now you can bet on which countries Iran will launch missiles against on the same app where you bet on an NBA game or the Best Picture winner. \u2026<\/p>\n

And no one seems to be very interested in regulating it. Donald Trump Jr. is a strategic advisor to Kalshi and an investor in Polymarket. His father\u2019s Commodity Futures Trading Commission appointee, Michael Selig, has said he hopes prediction marketswill \u201cflourish\u201d under his watch. The CFTC\u2019s new Innovation Advisory Committeeincludes the CEOs of Polymarket, Kalshi, Coinbase, Robinhood, FanDuel, and DraftKings \u2014 with zero representation from consumer advocates or public interest groups.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Wise words from Rebecca Gordon, Radley Balko, Karen Park, Marianne Szegedy-Maszak, Rebecca Solnit, Timothy Schraeder Rodriguez, and Hanna Horvath.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":141,"featured_media":67260,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[37],"class_list":["post-73764","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-smart"],"yoast_head":"\nSmart people saying smart things (4.15.26)<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Wise words from Rebecca Gordon, Radley Balko, Karen Park, Marianne Szegedy-Maszak, Rebecca Solnit, Timothy Schraeder Rodriguez, and Hanna Horvath.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/2026\/04\/15\/smart-people-saying-smart-things-4-15-26\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Smart people saying smart things (4.15.26)\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Wise words from Rebecca Gordon, Radley Balko, Karen Park, Marianne Szegedy-Maszak, Rebecca Solnit, Timothy Schraeder Rodriguez, and Hanna Horvath.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/2026\/04\/15\/smart-people-saying-smart-things-4-15-26\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"slacktivist\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2026-04-15T10:11:56+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/wp-media.patheos.com\/blogs\/sites\/52\/2024\/05\/TMYK-scaled.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"768\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"502\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Fred Clark\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Fred Clark\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"1 minute\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/2026\/04\/15\/smart-people-saying-smart-things-4-15-26\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/2026\/04\/15\/smart-people-saying-smart-things-4-15-26\/\",\"name\":\"Smart people saying smart things (4.15.26)\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/#website\"},\"datePublished\":\"2026-04-15T10:11:56+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2026-04-15T10:11:56+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/#\/schema\/person\/32666545e535b697afb93d9848dcfc47\"},\"description\":\"Wise words from Rebecca Gordon, Radley Balko, Karen Park, Marianne Szegedy-Maszak, Rebecca Solnit, Timothy Schraeder Rodriguez, and Hanna Horvath.\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/2026\/04\/15\/smart-people-saying-smart-things-4-15-26\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/2026\/04\/15\/smart-people-saying-smart-things-4-15-26\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/2026\/04\/15\/smart-people-saying-smart-things-4-15-26\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"Smart people saying smart things (4.15.26)\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/\",\"name\":\"slacktivist\",\"description\":\""Test everything; 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A former managing editor of Prism magazine, Fred worked in the parachurch nonprofit world for a decade and then for a decade in the newspaper biz. He began blogging in 2002. In 2003 he began writing a review of the best-selling Left Behind series. Eight years later he still hasn\u2019t finished reviewing the second book of that series and the experience has left him a broken shell of a man. Fred knows the difference between the possessive \u201cits\u201d and the contraction \u201cit\u2019s,\u201d and he is acutely bothered when others mistakenly confuse the two, yet he himself just kind of instinctively types the apostrophe whether or not it belongs there. Some feel this is his greatest hypocrisy, but those who know him better know better. He\u2019s guilty of much greater hypocrisies. Jesus loves Fred far more than Fred loves Jesus, but he at least has the decency to recognize the unfairness of that lopsided relationship and he has long wished that he were better at maybe kind of sort of doing something more to correct that some day. A Baptist, an amateur, a Gen-Xer, a Gemini and a Mets fan, Fred lives in Southeastern Pennsylvania with his wife and two teenage daughters. 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