He confirmed reports that that he had been floating the idea of imposing a death penalty on drug dealers by a long discourse where he praised the criminal justice system in China. Trump noted China once had a problem with “the opium” that was “devastating” and went on to explain his bafflement that murderers were treated more harshly than drug dealers. “If someone goes and shoots somebody, kills somebody they get the death penalty,” said Trump. In contrast, he noted “a drug dealer will kill 2,000 to 5,000 people during the course of his life”.

Trump acknowledged how controversial the concept was. “I don’t know if this country is ready but I think it’s a discussion we have to start thinking about.”

It marked Trump’s most explicit public statements on the topic although he previously praised Philippines President Rodrigo Duterte who is leading a campaign of alleged extrajudicial killings against drug dealers and users.

On Friday, Nevada Republican Senator Dean Heller ramped up concerns when he predicted that Judge Anthony Kennedy would be retiring in the summer.

Were Kennedy, a centrist and the crucial swing vote on abortion and other matters, to retire, he would likely be replaced with a younger, more conservative and strongly anti-abortion judge who would vote to overturn Roe v. Wade, and it would all be over. For decades.

Several red states are already getting set to pass laws meant to be challenged in the Supreme Court as soon as Kennedy or one of the remaining pro-Roe judges abandons ship.

Within days, Mississippi Governor Phil Bryant is expected to sign the strictest abortion ban in the country — which would make it illegal to have an abortion after 15 weeks, with no exceptions made for rape or incest.

Louisiana is also considering a 15-week ban.

Was this Trump not just endorsing but envying a model of dictatorship? Or was he just joking? To be fair, the US president was smiling and there were laughs from the audience. So it was all tongue-in-cheek, right? Right?

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Consider the evidence. Undermine the rule of law and the independence of the judiciary? Check. Trump has attacked “so-called” judges who have ruled against him while tweeting that a New York terror suspect “SHOULD GET DEATH PENALTY”.

Politicise law enforcement and the security services? Check. Trump fired FBI chief James Comey, tried to sack special counsel Robert Mueller and now wants to remove his attorney general, Jeff Sessions.

Demonise the free press? Check. Trump has repeatedly lambasted his critics in the media as “fake news”, “scum” and “losers”. He has dubbed leading news organisations such as CNN and the New York Times as “the enemy of the American people”.

Fetishise the military? Check. Trump has surrounded himself with unelected former generals – his chief of staff and his defence secretary, among them – and even demanded a military parade be held in Washington, DC.

Delegitimise the electoral process? Check. Trump has claimed that “millions of people… voted illegally” for his opponent and has spread false claims about “serious voter fraud” in the United States.

Criminalise the opposition? Trump has pressured the justice department to investigate his 2016 opponent, “Crooked” Hillary Clinton, and called for the jailing of her former aide Huma Abedin.

From Donald Trump’s “locker-room banter” about grabbing women by the pussy, to the instructions of the Philippines president to shoot female guerrilla fighters in the genitals, a clear target of contemporary fascistic and “alt-right” politics seems to be vaginas. This isn’t a case of hidden patriarchal structures supporting gender inequality. It’s explicit and unashamed references that identify women either as the enemy or the subhuman other, subordinate to the pleasure of macho men. And it’s a trend that’s spanning the globe.

In Britain, the victim of this emerging culture was the MP Jo Cox. Some will argue that Thomas Mair, her murderer, was an isolated case, a disturbed Nazi sympathiser from whom we cannot generalise. But before we dismiss his crime as a one-off we should remember that gender identity, specifically masculine identity, is at the centre of fascistic discourse. Crime – against women or ethnic minorities – is often a resource for those who feel their masculinity is threatened. It is a way to be “male” again.

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Above all, those who reject identity politics fail to recognise two important processes. First, how different demands on disadvantaged and excluded groups can come together to form a universal struggle. And second, how identity – class included – is not something fixed from birth. It is rather shaped and reshaped as we engage in common struggles. Nothing demonstrated this more clearly than the 2014 film Pride, about LGBT activists supporting the miner’s strike, contributing to the incorporation of gay rights in the Labour party programme in 1986.

For the progressive forces in society, the struggle of any marginalised people must extend beyond that group. When my vagina is the target of far-right hate, the progressive left better stand by my side.