https://www.meditationsinanemergency.com/immigrants-a-love-letter/
"It has never been easy to be an immigrant to the United States – for most
economic, linguistic, and cultural barriers make life here a struggle, even if
they were escaping a worse life elsewhere. The utterly evil bill that just
squeaked through in Congress, among other harms, aims to make many immigrants'
lives go from difficult to terrifying nightmare. It gives ICE a truly
outrageous amount of money, and we've already seen ICE turn since January into
a faceless, unaccountable Gestapo grabbing workers, nursing mothers, sick
children off the streets, out of their cars, from their homes, indifferent to
what their legal status is, sometimes sweeping up citizens in their frenzy,
sending the captives to domestic concentration camps or to gulags overseas or
deporting them to countries they've never visited or left decades ago. Many
people are simply disappearing, their friends, family, employers, coworkers
simply unable to find out where they've been taken. Thousands have been
directly impacted; tens of millions are indirectly impacted as they find
themselves living in fear of these fates, and it is ravaging both mental health
and the ability to continue to participate in everyday life and earn a living.
Many are, with good reason, afraid to leave their homes.
Students from other countries, here legally, as we saw earlier this year, have
been grabbed and incarcerated for exercising their free speech rights. Elected
officials, from California Senator Alex Padilla to New York City Comptroller
Brad Lander have been roughed up by ICE for standing with immigrants. Trump
just suggested looking into deporting the winner of New York City's Democratic
primary, Zohran Mamdani, making it clear that deportation will be used as a
political weapon, and this too, whether or not it punishes individual people,
will intimidate and perhaps silence many more. They're talking about
"denaturalizing" naturalized citizens, and while there's precedent for doing
that under extraordinary circumstances, this too could become a political
weapon against opponents of the regime. There's even talk about deporting
citizens and a mounting attack on birthright citizenship. All this will create
more fear and political repression.
It is a shocking, obscene, and endlessly cruel reign of terror already, and
this budget bill intends to make it far worse. Which means all of us are called
on to act in solidarity, to stand with immigrants, stand for their rights, and
stand against ICE and this regime. I know many of you have, especially in Los
Angeles; I believe that things will get worse and far more will be demanded of
us.
But this is also a war of ideas and values, and at the heart of it is another
Trumpian Big Lie, that immigrants are a burden and menace to us. We need to
fight the false story with a true one: this country absolutely needs its
immigrants and they are a blessing and an enrichment of what this country is
and in many ways its heart and soul."
Via David "Kahomono" Frier and Muse.
Cheers,
*** Xanni ***
--
mailto:xanni@xanadu.net Andrew Pam
http://xanadu.com.au/ Chief Scientist, Xanadu
https://glasswings.com.au/ Partner, Glass Wings
https://sericyb.com.au/ Manager, Serious Cybernetics
