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It should be pretty clear to any federal employees by now that they have virtually nothing to lose by taking direct action. "What are they gonna do, fire me? Lol."

Also, naming and shaming any supervisors who are Trump collaborators, and threatening to prosecute them later, might slow their zeal a bit.

The Kapp Putsch, which I've referenced here before, was a coup attempt that was thwarted largely by mass non-cooperation of civil servants.

The people in these offices, especially if they remain in them and use their access to lock the system up, have the power to stop this and bring the government to a screeching halt in a way that will gain public support.

No one needs a union to start this. This is the perfect time for a wildcat strike. And for those who are doing directly life-saving work, others can go on wildcat sympathy strikes.

Damn, if Americans don't need to learn their labor history. No time like the present.

I mean, what does anyone have to lose? And it would give all the rest of us a direct action to support. I think the response would be massive.

I'm in a little rural town in Arizona. Right here is a National Wildlife Refuge office. 30 miles away is a National Monument (NPS) headquarters. 130 miles away in Tucson there is a major federal building and probably a lot of satellite offices. Phoenix has a ton of offices. There are federal offices everywhere.

This is the advantage of a federal employee wildcat strike and occupation. It gives virtually every American a place to go and act in solidarity. And it takes virtually no organizing or logistics to launch. Anyone can do it anywhere.

Even if employees at some of these small offices don't want to occupy them, they can shut them down and call in sick in solidarity. Take vacation time or sick leave and ask the public for support. Hack the local website with a "wildcat strike" message. Fly the flag upside down. Hang banners spray painted on sheets out of office windows. Lots of creative possibilities.

The doxing of collaborators is important, as is threatening future prosecution or other consequences. Make anyone who might go along with DOGE think twice before turning over employee roster, login credentials, keys to the building, etc. Make it clear that their names will be shit in their communities. Make their actions have consequences.

This needs a hashtag.

I wonder what would happen if someone with a bazillion followers were to promote this?

There is a fundamental premise that undergirds all resistance: a regime can only function with the support, obedience and cooperation of the population; and that support obedience and cooperation can be withdrawn.

Here is a basic concept from strategy theory: to figure out how to best direct an opposition movement's limited resources, look for what are called "critical vulnerabilities" In other words, which elements of your opponent's operation, if withdrawn (through whatever means) would cause them to capitulate? (Hint, it's usually not one simple thing.) Right now, the support, obedience and cooperation of federal employees is that thing, IMO.

Quit being obedient. Obstruct at every opportunity. Withdraw cooperation. Bring the government to a halt. This is the single most critical vulnerability and point of leverage right now.

Withdraw support, obedience and cooperation.

Monday morning. D-Day for federal workers. Bedtime for Space Karen.

I haven't seen any better ideas.

Federal workers: if they fire you, engage in civil disobedience, refuse to leave and livestream it.

I still can't believe there hasn't been any worker direct action in response to the federal firings. This seems so obvious.

Live-streaming a sit-in and especially live-streaming an arrest or forced eviction of workers could provide the trigger for others to take similar action, especially if the cops got nasty. In this case, it's almost better if they do, since it would show the real viciousness behind what is happening. That's part of the point: to make the injustice visible.

The likely legal consequences would be nil because Trump and Musk wouldn't want the publicity. Actions like that could totally change the narrative. So much possibility.

Strategy-wise, a federal worker sit-in shouldn't be spontaneous, though that is better than nothing. Ideally, you'd have workers in a office who are doing work that the public understands (e.g. the VA or SSA or EPA) pick a spokesperson and plan outside support to amplify the message, even if the action was made to initially look more spontaneous.

For those not familiar, this was the tactic behind Rosa Parks' bus sit-in. She was not some random tired working woman. It was all very smartly planned and this should be as well.

I always distrust people who suggest things that other people should do, but I'm not a federal worker and know very few of them (one of whom was just fired). I *have* been arrested at plenty of sit-in protests in my younger days, so can easily imagine the perfect opportunity this would be.

Okay, look, this is driving me nuts. Back in the 1980s, we figured out how to "go viral" and get our photos and actions and message "above the fold" in major papers, TV and radio. *Before the internet!* *Before live-streaming!* It's not that hard if you hit your moment deftly.

I think the public (at least the non-nazi part) is hungry for some good news, news of effective resistance, a place to focus their anger and, more importantly, hope for this to turn around.

The first federal workers who refuse to leave and are arrested and removed from their offices on livestream will be heroes and go down in history.

Or maybe not. But it's worth a try?

How about this: think of it as a red team/blue team thing. Right now everyone is on the defense without even a plan, no back ups, no defense in depth, no fallback position, just freaking out and fretting about how bad things are and waiting to see what happens next. (I hope I'm wrong. Please show me something to change my mind.)

Taking direct action is a perfect way to flip that script. Occupy the narrative, put them on the defensive. Go full-attack mode. Make Musk and his cronies wait and wonder what we are going to do next. Make them waste their time and energy responding to us and in the process pissing off more and more people who have up to now remained passive.

By the way, if you look up "tactical innovation" with regard to social movements, you will see that there has been a fair bit written about it. Short version is that introducing new tactics regularly tends to increase participation and support in movements.

The absolute worst thing you can do is to keep repeating the same thing.

To put it another way you only win the same way once, but you can lose the same way forever.

@Catawu

Nah, I'm talking about back when each city typically had one or at the most two major newspapers and there were one or two major local TV news stations and a couple or maybe one major news radio station, plus a smattering of alternative papers and community radio stations here and there.

Much more of a monopoly and a chokehold.

Further, if those outlets chose not to cover what we were doing, we were left with zines, posters on bulletin boards and so on. Very limited, labor-intensive, slow and expensive outreach.

The advantage now is that even if Facebook, ExTwitter, Bluesky and Instagram censor outright or down-rank video and news of a sit down strike, people can still mass email and text message it to each other in an instant.

@Mikal The problem for me, with all the consolidation of media outlets is they all literally say the exact same thing about every event. Barely even change inflection. We aren’t getting news at all, we are getting programmed. I remember my friends slapping posters up on walls, poles and curtain walls (plywood barriers). I remember having radio stations that were local and we could phone in. We’ve lost so much and we are told we have so much more. More of the same.

@libramoon

The fact that the firings are not legal is even more reason to do this. It gives moral legitimacy, "necessity defense", etc. to the actions.