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'Chaos and Fear' at CDC Amid Order to Retract Journal Articles to Purge 'Forbidden Terms'
(www.commondreams.org)
this post was submitted on 03 Feb 2025
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Just say no.
React with surprise and indignation. What? No. I’m definitely not doing that.
What are they going to do, fire you? Okay. People’s lives are at stake for how much traction all this bullshit is allowed to gain. It’s really allowed to be just that simple.
“No.”
Even better, say yes. Act like you're working with them, and then do nothing. Just say, ok, I'll get right on that! Then... Don't. Is anyone actually double checking that all the updates have been made?
Do they even know enough about the source material to know exactly what needs to be changed? If not, then it can easily be ignored. If something comes up just be like, oh that was assigned to so and so, they must have missed it... But they don't work here anymore.
Yeah, that's another type of resistance I can get behind.
Absolutely. I'll get right on it. Any day now. Super busy. This afternoon. Sure. Absolutely. Oh yeah, I already did it. Oh, did I miss one? That's weird. Okay, I'll get right on it.
IDK, it seems like kind of a losing game to play, maybe. But yeah, I can get behind the idea.
It's likely to more effectively stall the actual action than directly saying no. If you say no the person talking to you realizes there's a problem they need to deal with... If you say yes and then just don't it'll take them a while to realize it isn't happening. This is especially true in a chaotic overworked environment (ask me, a former manager, how I know! Or well don't because I can't tell you... but you can figure it out). The Trump admin is Chaos on Meth so there's a decent chance they won't notice for quite a while - especially if it looks like you're doing stuff.
Do some malicious compliance. Change terms just enough so that it will spell out FUCK TRUMP with the first letters of the words or something.
Making unreasonable demands is a way of outing conscientious objectors and manufacturing grounds for dismissal so that they can be replaced with subservient true believers.
I suppose if that's the approach, then you're fucked from the outset. It's not a case of if you're going to get ousted from post, rather when.
Yeah. I'd rather go out with some dignity.
If you're planning to stay, and deliberately sabotage everything you can, then maybe I can see a special case for that being a noble way to approach it. In some very selected scenarios, you can be so vulnerable economically that you have to stay, or the work can be so important that it's worthwhile to stay under the tyranny and just do the best you can. But I think acquiescing to this just because they'll punish you if you don't is a mug's way out. They're going to punish you anyway. They're going to shut down whole agencies. Staying to avoid being singled out as an objector won't accomplish anything I can see, in general.
Play dumb, say you tried, work slowly, even more slowly, give tasks to the least competent workers of you’re a manager. Save as much as possible as backups. If you’re in IT cover tracks and accidentally disable spyware. Act plausibly incompetent. You might even get a Peter Principle promotion and end up in charge.