on ICE

[sabotabby]

I just can't believe that something like ICE exists, in our era. Being Jewish, I grew up knowing about the Holocaust and Good Germans and I've been to Buchenwald and seen just how thin the veneer of "we didn't know" really is. Nor am I under any delusions about the ethics of the average American.

Still. The part of me that is, against all evidence to the contrary, an optimist about the behaviour of collective groups of humans just can't fathom how easily people swallow the concept of a state-funded organization routinely carrying out massive physical, emotional, and sexual abuse of children. The more I read, the more I want to vomit.

In other news, some shitheads bombed an Indian restaurant in Mississauga with an IED, because we aren't immune from it up here either. My handful of friends there have all checked in safely, and fortunately no one was killed. There were two parties going on, at least one for children. Suspects still on the lam. Cops aren't ruling out a hate crime or terrorism. Light-skinned suspects. I won't draw any conclusions at this juncture but you can probably guess what I'm thinking. 

Comments

[mme_hardy]

This is where it absolutely stops for me. Disabled or not, I'll be at the marches with my folding chair.

[sabotabby]

Good.

From here, I don't know what I can do.

[mr_sharkey]

😿

[sabotabby]

Not enough D: in the world.

[ebourland]

A f*&^ed up situation. =(

[sabotabby]

Pretty much yeah.

A fixable one, with guillotines and firing squads, tbh.

I can believe it, though it's hard

[ed_rex]

The part of me that is, against all evidence to the contrary, an optimist about the behaviour of collective groups of humans just can't fathom how easily people swallow the concept of a state-funded organization routinely carrying out massive physical, emotional, and sexual abuse of children.

The parallels with the early years of Nazi Germany really are striking, but I'm not quite so incredulous. The American people especially, have been subject to a literally decades-long program (or series of programs) designed to dumb them down. A barrage of propaganda and never-ending attacks on their public schools have had their desired effects: a populace that literally doesn't know any better, because they have been lied to from childhood and their parents have been lied to from their childhoods.

Couple that with massive social changes and a brutally declining standard of living and it's no wonder so many are onboard with pogrom — excuse me, program. And that the rest don't know how to fight it, other than turning to the "good cop" in the guise of the Democratic Party.

What scares hell out of me locally, is that a revulsion with Trudeau's many betrayals brings a similar corrective to this country. (For that matter, if Andrea Horwath takes power in Ontario and then turns into Siriza, someone more awful than Doug Ford will replace her.)

But I try to remember/believe that most Americans don't support ICE &ct. It's just that there is no existing organization for them to turn to.

Re: I can believe it, though it's hard

[sabotabby]

Yeah, that's the thing. While I don't agree with the anarchists that there is no point in involving oneself in bourgeois electoral politics, I do worry that we don't have alternative structures in place for when the whole thing falls apart. Rae was kind of shit, but the worst thing he did was allow the disastrous Harris regime to replace him.

Nothing really surprises me on an ideological level, but on a sort of instinctual human level, I just can't fathom anyone being that evil. And yet.

Re: I can believe it, though it's hard

[ed_rex]

Rae was kind of shit, but the worst thing he did was allow the disastrous Harris regime to replace him.

Betrayal of his base, though. There were all kinds of reasons, some good(ish), some really bad, but the fact remains: his government reneged on public auto-insurance and broke signed union contracts with the Rae Days.

I was working for a provincially funded agency for much of the Rae government's term, and the people I worked with mostly enjoyed the enforced time off, but they never forgave the fact that it was just that, enforced.

Floyd Laughren, the Finance Minister and Deputy Premier is a family friend, and my mum quoted his late wife saying at a party, that if the government was smart they would just fire X number of civil servants and be done with it, rather than pissing off all of them for the next (was it?) four years.

But I digress.

... on a sort of instinctual human level, I just can't fathom anyone being that evil. And yet.

And yet, it's so damned easy to find a scapegoat for one's problems. Especially when you're poorly-educated and anxious, magical thinking is a powerful elixir.

Re: I can believe it, though it's hard

[sabotabby]

Oh, I remember. Though when we had enforced unpaid days off under the Liberals later, I was like, whee! But teachers get paid well.

I kinda figure that whoever's Premier, I'm going to end up protesting that person, and more to the point, that person is going to be my boss and we will have diametrically opposed political and economic interests (even though politically, I'm pretty impressed by, say, my local candidate and some of the others running, who have the best of intentions). I'd rather be in a labour dispute with the NDP than Tories, and Ford's Tories in particular.

Re: I can believe it, though it's hard

[lapinlunaire]

You know, I'm not so sure I still believe that any part of it is just propaganda or ignorance. You don't need a PhD to be morally horrified by children being killed. I think everyone already knew this would happen, there's no way people didn't know just from hearing Trump talk a couple of years ago. What I think is that there's far, far too many people who are 100% ok with voting for a man who indicated this would happen.

Re: I can believe it, though it's hard

[sabotabby]

Yeah, I mean, aren't most people, on a very biological level, repulsed by this sort of thing? Otherwise we'd have never survived as a species.

Re: I can believe it, though it's hard

[lapinlunaire]

We are, that's also why hearing a baby crying (or a cat yowling) is supposed to be so nerve-wracking. I'm not normally a BUT INSTINCTS type, but in this case I am. People don't have to be especially parently to have a knee-jerk reaction of hurting kids = bad so it just feels like for these people there's something... wrong. Like an uncanny valley of morality

Re: I can believe it, though it's hard

[sabotabby]

Yeah, like I hate toddlers as a group (I'm fine with individual toddlers) but if I read about one being hurt or killed, I lose my shit and want to get exceedingly violent on whoever harmed them. It's my one maternal instinct but it's very, very strong.

[lapinlunaire]

Yeah. This is absolutely horrifying and it honestly makes me so angry. I wish there was something I could do.

I hadn't heard about the bombing but that's really depressing. I'm glad nobody was killed but damn that sounds really traumatic, especially for the kids :(

[sabotabby]

It's so weird 'cause it's barely been covered. And this is like a pretty dramatic thing for Canada.

[smhwpf]

ICE and Border Patrol are horrific and are getting ever more evil. Like I was saying at the other place, what are the direct action steps that can be taken against these murderous organizations? One of my Boston DSA FB friends was suggesting pitchfork mobs outside every ICE office, or at least blockades.

[sabotabby]

Yeah, there are a lot of obvious sabotage efforts that could be made and would save lives. Crazy Glue is good for sealing locks, sugar is good to put in engines, large magnets are good for wiping computers, etc. Tires may be slashed. Or so I've heard. Honestly the firing squad is too good for these shits, but a war crimes tribunal has to come first. In the meantime, we can slow them the fuck down.