The years ahead are going to be a time of trials for us. We’re all going to face pressure to compromise our values: to keep our heads down, to avert our gazes, to play along, to profess loyalty, to collaborate.

For when that temptation is strongest, I’m writing this now, to remind myself (and you, if it benefits you) of the moral principles we should hold on to, whether the world encourages it or not. When the future looks clouded and uncertain, these values are like a lighthouse on a rocky headland. They’ll see us safely through the darkness of the night and the lash of the storm, and they’ll light the way to better days when the clouds finally clear.

First of all, I believe in kindness. In a world where cruelty is the motivation and the rule, kindness is the essential virtue. It’s a reassertion of the inherent worth and dignity of all human beings. Despite the superficial differences cited to divide us, we’re all alike in the ways that count. Everyone’s life matters. Everyone’s well-being should be protected. Everyone deserves to be safe, happy and free. When life falls short of this goal, we should do what we can to make up for it, helping people in the ways they need.

In a world where laws and institutions are slanted toward the rich and powerful, kindness is a leveling impulse. It reminds us to keep our gazes on the vulnerable, the oppressed, and those who’ve been kept in the shadows. The advocates of hierarchy say it’s right that some people should be on top and others on the bottom; the defenders of bigotry say that some people, by virtue of who they are, are outside the circle of moral concern. Both of them are wrong. Kindness is radical because it refuses these limitations.

Most of all – because I’m sure we’re going to hear this a lot – we should reject the argument that kindness is weak. Nothing could be more wrong. Cruelty is a trait of the fearful and the insecure. It’s the mindset of people who want to keep others down because they believe it’s the only way they can stay on top. Those who help, who are willing to reach down without fear of lowering themselves, prove that they’re the strongest.

At the same time, I believe in justice. Justice means that we should treat people as their actions deserve. It’s the abstract form of the Golden Rule, that enduring moral principle that every society and culture has discovered. Those who do right should be rewarded; those who do wrong should be punished, to give them an incentive to make a better choice next time.

I don’t view kindness and justice as values in opposition to each other, but as two sides of the same coin. Kindness would be meaningless and absurd if it was given in equal portion to oppressor and oppressed. As I’ve written before, I don’t believe in tolerating intolerance. Those who treat others with cruelty, malice, or disregard deserve the same treatment in return, and we shouldn’t feel empathy for them when they’re reaping what they sowed.

This principle applies with particular force to the Americans who supported fascism in this election. Millions of those people, in the coming months and years, are going to be unpleasantly surprised. In fact, the red-state footsoldiers of fascism are likely going to suffer some of the worst repercussions. That too is justice, even if only in a roundabout and approximate sense. We shouldn’t extend sympathy to them when they get what they voted for.

As an essential complement to these moral values, I believe in knowable objective reality. The world exists independently of us, and it’s not inherently shaped or governed by our desires. There are physical laws and material facts that are beyond our power to change. (Among other things: Climate change is real. Vaccines prevent disease. More guns means more violence. Cutting taxes on the rich doesn’t trickle down to the poor.) If we try to ignore them, we’ll wreck disastrously on the rocks of reality.

At the same time, we can learn what those laws are and use them to our benefit. The more we know about how the world works, the greater our power to alter it in accordance with our desires. Truth is a map and a tool for forging the future we want.

Those in power dislike the idea that reality isn’t malleable to their will, so they fight against it. Dictators, strongmen and propagandists all want to bewilder you with a blizzard of bullshit. They want to flood the public square with lies until the truth is drowned out. They want you to believe that objective truth is nonexistent, so you might as well believe what you’re told without asking questions.

But a lie is still a lie and a truth is still a truth, even if all the powers of the world are pushing you to believe otherwise. Holding to this principle is a vital defense against unjust power.

These three values – kindness, justice, empiricism – are the stable three-legged stool of my secular humanist philosophy. All are equally necessary.

Kindness without justice is undeserved charity to the oppressor; without knowledge, it’s as likely to make things worse as it is to make them better. Justice without kindness is mere cruelty, and without knowledge of who’s in the right, it becomes injustice. Knowledge alone, without kindness or justice to channel it to the right ends, can make the world worse instead of better. But when these three are combined, they create a whole that’s greater than the sum of its parts.

Last but not least, I believe in joy. This isn’t a moral value as such, but the savor that makes life worth living. However maddening and cruel the world becomes, we have the power to choose how we react. And our reactions, more than anything else, are what determine whether we’re happy.

If you have the misfortune of knowing a fascist, then you know that their worldview is bleak and bitter. Their every thought is shaped by fear, rage, and revulsion. Their lives are full of pain and suffering, which they accept as inevitable rather than seeking to change. It’s this worldview that they want to export to the rest of us. They only win a final victory if they can make us as miserable as they are. That’s a victory we shouldn’t grant them.

Millions and millions of people who lived in, objectively, more unequal and more brutal times than the present didn’t lose their capacity for joy. They found ways to bring pleasure and meaning and happiness into their lives. We’re far more privileged than them, so why can’t we?

Living with joy, refusing to let go of happiness even in dark times, is a victory all its own. We may not find that in politics for now, but there’s still love, friendship, community, art, music, literature, creativity, and helping one another – all the other ingredients that make life worthwhile. Those values aren’t at risk. We just have to remember that we still have them.