Welcome to the History Writers Resist Trump blog.

As we begin posting our individual contributions, let me get a couple of things out of the way.

First, our goal is not to prove Godwin’s Law[i] or promulgate the Reductio ad Hitlerum[ii]. In other words, we are not here solely to draw correlations between President Trump and Adolf Hitler or his administration and the Nazis. I’m not saying such comparisons won’t be made here, because they probably will; but, as Godwin himself said, “If you’re thoughtful about it and show some real awareness of history, go ahead and refer to Hitler when you talk about Trump.”[iii]

Rather, we aim to contextualize what is currently happening at the highest levels of our government with our knowledge of historical people and events across all time periods and nations. In the process, we hope to create a contemporaneous record of events as they happen.

Second, not all of us think that the joining together of the name “Donald J. Trump” with the title “President of the United States of America” signals The End Times. That I’m aware of, none of us is building a literal or political fallout shelter, and the only weapons and ammunition we are stockpiling most likely take the form of books and knowledge. Although one among us attended the Women’s March on Washington and another enjoys “responding” to posts on The White House website, we are certainly not “so-called” anarchists (professional or otherwise), thugs or paid protestors (we protest for free). We are not even all deeply political per se.

What we are is a group of history writers and researchers who look upon the policies and behavior of President Trump and his administration with deep concern and trepidation. Thus, we have decided to use the tools most naturally available to us to resist what we view as, among other things, infringing on human rights, violating the Constitution of the United States of America, and contradicting the principles on which our country was founded.

My personal hope is that our varied political sentiments within this political spectrum combined with our individual studies of history will create a rich collection of narratives that is a credit to the tradition of writing as political resistance.

Victoria Martínez
Blog founder, admin and contributor

[i] “The theory that as an online discussion progresses, it becomes inevitable that someone or something will eventually be compared to Adolf Hitler or the Nazis, regardless of the original topic.” (Oxford English Dictionary)

[ii] Pseudo-Latin phrase coined by Leo Strauss in 1951 that translates to “Reduction to Hilter,” sometimes also known as “The Nazi Card” or “The Hitler Card.”

[iii] Godwin, Mike, “Sure, call Trump a Nazi. Just make sure you know what you’re talking about,” The Washington Post (14 December 2015).

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