..becomes a hanging tree
Ray
There can be no dialogue with those who reject the humanity of others. There’s no reasoning with people who celebrate drowned bodies in the Mediterranean; mock those whose bodies aren’t doing ‘what they’re supposed to’ with wanted pregnancies; nor with those rejoicing in the government ‘seeing sense’ as mere handfuls of children’s bodies assigned-male at birth are barred via administrative reforms from Girlguiding…
‘Go Home’ vans trailing billboards encouraging communities to rat out their neighbours as ‘illegal immigrants’ were scrapped by then-UK Home Secretary, Theresa May, after outcry of ‘borrowing the language of the 1970s National Front’; whilst ‘benefit scrounger’ narratives became commonplace under both red and blue UK Governments during the early 2010s with adverts on public TV and posters on telephone boxes. Communities were disaggregated into individual bodies pitted against each other. Peer-on-peer policing continued, emboldening advocates of exclusionary politics; galvanising a far-right current to believe that ‘devil’s advocate’ is a legitimate political position. Where extremists once hid in the fringes of larger electoral parties, many who snuck their way into office are reneging on their promises, joining openly far-right groups with no renewed remit from those they feign to represent.
Some years ago, I contributed to an upcoming book on teaching from marginalised identities, arguing that for all the emphasis we place on dialogue as solving differences, ‘political and social responses can – and should – form part of the discussion, but not over anyone’s right to exist’. Whether the realities have become more intense or exposure has simply increased, discourse over whose bodies matter has become ‘fair game’. So much so that on 31st March 2026, the genocidal state of Israel adopted a new law making the death penalty the default sentence for Palestinians convicted of lethal attacks. How can there be any devil’s advocate suggesting state-backed murder of Palestinian bodies as a topic of reasonable debate?
‘Where they burn books, in the end they will burn humans too.’ Heine (1823)
Dehumanising entire populations is something the state apparatus is well-prepared to enact. Where, in 1933, the Nazi youth division Deutsche Studentenschaft’s burning of the Institut für Sexualwissenschaft (ENG: Institute of Sexology) collections required physical violence, destroying the recorded care and compassion witnessed via free gender clinics, all mentions of transgender (T) people were removed from US Government websites by merely refreshing the webpage… Overnight, the long-standing abbreviation for queer (Q) communities of ‘LGBTQ+’ was shortened to merely ‘LGB’ (lesbian, gay, bisexual) on thousands of national websites including The Stonewall Inn – the site many understand as the catalyst for the modern queer liberation movement.
Bodies are not a space for debate; they’re domains we negotiate with ourselves through expression, art, and movement in an often hostile culture. Much of how we experience our bodies is imposed externally – racialised, segregated, covered, owned, sexualised, infantilised, and violated. Consent should not be up for negotiation; existence is not awaiting the approval of others, yet, barely a week goes by without major media outlets publishing supposedly ‘balanced’ articles exploring what they consider the societal challenges of the inclusion of asylum seekers, transgender people, young adults, the disabled, or queer persons.
Angela Y. Davis (1971) once wrote of ‘seek[ing] out all the doors which still remain ajar, however slight the opening might be’ with a view to demanding people ‘prove their antifascist commitments’. Her argument demanded use of petitions, block meetings, and rallies. She argued that dismissing reformism risked losing ground amongst the masses. However, whilst minor actions may showcase unity, frequently, the call is coming from inside the house… gay cisgendered men, for example, have contributed to bi-erasure and transphobia alongside the heterosexual homophobes who condemn all same-sex attraction. Hell, a 2023 YouGov poll found gay men to be the least supportive of transgender people of all queer identities (65% accepting compared to, for example 84% amongst lesbians).
A politics that forces itself on others by use of power over, intimidation, and violence is not something that should be permitted to breathe. That a bigoted, white supremacist like Charlie Kirk deserves (inter)national mourning when millions are killed through denial of access to food, priced out of essential medicines and other forms of healthcare, ‘man-made’ environmental catastrophes, demonstrates a double standard in who counts.
‘Liberals who are free speech absolutists worry more about curbing the freedom of fascists to spread their violent bigotry than about the very real impact of that bigotry on the lives of people […] and more broadly, speaking for vulnerable communities who live under the threat of racist, anti-immigrant, transphobic violence from those whom Kirk radicalized.’ Sonali Kolhatkar (author of Talking About Abolition)
Where Davis saw the door as an opportunity to alter minds, I believe, more often than we may admit, we need to lock that door for the well-being of all inside. Where others choose to be in that moment is their decision, but sharing a platform with fascists extends legitimacy to the extreme-right. In the classroom, so-called radicals propose that where intolerance is voiced, educators ‘“push back” by providing a different perspective, or ask pointed questions to encourage them to reconsider their initial statements’. My concern is, that’s not enough. The Mishkan’s Directors and Rabbinic Team, Chicago (US), were unequivocal in condemning transphobia, reminding their kin that ‘The Torah teaches that life and death are in the power of the tongue (Proverbs 18:21)’; stressing the need to ‘use our words carefully because we know that words can stoke hatred and fear, and contribute to real violence done to real people’, yet, many continue to posit religious texts as excuses for their homophobia or to advocate abortion bans.
As Kolhatkar reminds us, many educators ‘have long fallen prey to the idea that treating fascists with respect is the way to win them over’, and, yet, ‘[t]here is no winning over a person or a movement whose ideals are rooted in dehumanization’. Indeed, ‘[o]n the contrary, it is a dangerous validation of an ideal that has no place in a democracy’ – whatever one’s vision of ‘democracy’ constitutes. It’s a false promise, misplaced faith offered in a system of compromise with the safety of marginalised persons often amongst the first bargaining chips. Historian Tariq D. Khan (2025) was correct to state that, ‘[t]he way that we deal with fascists is no tolerance [ – d]on’t give them any concessions whatsoever [a]nd absolutely don’t capitulate to any of their demands’. There’s no reasoning with the far-right, ‘[d]on’t treat any of their demands as reasonable[,] don’t even give them the dignity of a debate’. To do so allows them to twist an olive branch into a hanging tree. ▪️
Ray is an anarchist, academic and agitator. They research and teach community-engagement and non-hierarchical approaches to organising, positionality, and anarchist-feminist theory. They live in Glasgow with their young family and run a pay-what-you-can barbering service at the Glasgow Autonomous Space.
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