Same plea, different day. Please don't look away. Please don't close your eyes to what is happening right in front of you. To those who are refusing to read the news about what is going on at our borders, because they have deemed it fake, this plea is for you. Drop the flag of political opposition and pick up the flag of humanity. This is no longer about how you were wronged by one man's or one woman's impact on your belief system. This is about your own moral compass. Your own values. The very same moral compass and values you are trying, as parents - no, as humans - to pass down to future generations. There will come a day when the names Trump and Clinton and Obama, and many others that cause people to dig in their heels, will be names in a history book, studied for their accomplishments and their failures.
So, what will those books talk about? They will certainly discuss how, for this moment in time, we were no better than other people in other countries who deemed a specific group of people less human. So much so that they would treat them like animals - often times because they were trying to send a message. "Go away. You aren't welcome here."
I have been rattled to the core by the recent articles describing conditions in these "detention centers." These aren't articles based on opinions or assumptions of leftist fake news organizations. These are articles based on first hand, eye witness accounts. Articles based on concrete evidence extracted from the written word. Sadly? The hate for administrations past keep people from righting their own ship. Perhaps their ship is pushed by a different wind than my own or they just can't get past a time when we had a leadership they despised. I would try and say "hate the player, not the game," but this is not a game. This is very real and it's a crime. I don't mean "it's a crime that movie wasn't better." I mean it's a true crime. The kind of crime against humanity that wars have been fought over. That people were hung for. And we are perpetrating those very crimes as we speak.
Perhaps we all need a refresher course of what it LOOKED like the last time a group of people were targeted for being different. For being sub-human. I mean, let's face it, it's been going on for years and years all over the globe, but let's stick to the one that is most, sadly, familiar. Or, if I am being fair, the one that is most gut wrenching to me.
I am sure this will be met by some with "it's not at all the same." It is exactly the same - make no mistake. It's depriving humans of basic human rights in a country that is supposedly the beacon for human rights. Pretend it's not and you are part of the problem. Or, some might say "this is all part of the fake news agenda." Sounds vaguely the same as when people doubted the atrocities of the Holocaust. Until it was too late. And there will be the ones who say "we didn't ask them to come across the border." Well, no one asked your ancestors either. Life, dare I say it survival, dictated it. These people are escaping terror and bloodshed and we are turning them away. And if we aren't turning them away, we are splitting up the families and throwing people in rooms unfit for a score of different levels. Maybe that's part of the problem - we've stopped referring to them as "people." They are hordes and caravans. We've dehumanized them to the point of becoming "bothered." As if they were some rodent problem. Hmm. Sound familiar?
I don't have the answers. I really don't. But, I know this much. The correct way of dealing with the problem is not repeating the past of others who have tried to eradicate as a means to an end.
Be human. Stop the denial. Or, be prepared to answer to your children and their children - for the bleak future that will no doubt come as a result of all this blindness.
The quotes below are CURRENT - from the last few days of people visiting the camps (calling them detention centers is fucking joke) on our borders. The photos - well the photos are from a time some choose to forget, but for most, will forever leave a wound that will never heal. What's truly sad is that this is just a small sampling of what was said. And there was not ONE - not ONE person who saw things differently. If you aren't remotely fazed by these few, you likely won't be if I kept going.
I don't believe in broadstroked concept of thoughts and prayers. I believe in dialogue and open minded willingness to make change. The kind of change that would limit the amount of times we need to turn to thoughts and prayers as the only thing we have to offer.
‘‘Build a wall; deport ‘em all,’’ one shouted. ‘‘That’s the way we get rid of this problem!’’
(Border Patrol Guard) "Let's start a GoFund me for one CTZ agent brave enough to throw a 10-15 lb burrito at one of these bitches. Who ever does it takes the pot of $$$."
"15 women in their 50s- 60s sleeping in a small concrete cell, no running water. Weeks without showers. All of them separated from their families."
"Women sobbing in a crowded cell because they were separated from their kids."
"Children as young as 7 and 8, many of them wearing clothes caked with snot and tears, are caring for infants they’ve just met..."
“Multiple cases where pregnant migrants who had just given birth at her hospital were forced to give their children up to Texas DFPS.”
A pro-Trump heckler yelling "We don't want Muslims here either," "We don't care about Sharia law, we care about Jesus Christ," "Go care about your own country."
“There are some children, like the age of my sister, they cried for their mother or their father. They cried for their aunt. They missed them,” she said. “They cried and they were locked up.”
“Their eyes. I'm haunted by their eyes..."
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