Reflections
Super Bowl 60
There are many reasons I’m not as connected to football as I used to be. But watching this Super Bowl game with Seattle and New England got me missing one of those reasons: my dad. He’s long since passed, but sports and football were often an anchor to our regular chats. He died before most of the bullshit in this country manifested to another level. Do I want to know what he would think of all that? Yes and no. But I do know we would have talked through this game, probably gone back and forth on the halftime show, I’d respectfully be happy the Patriots lost. I’m reminded I don’t get the chance to feel pain or joy, it’s more of a sadness I keep at the back at all times. There is no next conversation, and I will always miss that with you, dad.
Being a parent in the ICE age
The ICE shooting today marked the fifth person killed by this motley crew of unidentified goons, continually normalizing violence against everyday citizens exercising Constitutional rights. But this one got me after I saw this picture from the slain woman’s glove compartment:
Today was a hectic day with a doctor’s appt, daycare drop off and pick up on my agenda, alongside my professional responsibilities. I was frantically getting things together for the doctor’s appointment and realized I didn’t have any stuffed animal-type toys for Emi to play with, and mental noted to get some in the car for future rides.
DHS and the Trump administration were quick to label Renee Good as a domestic terrorist within hours of her death. Besides this being absurd in the face of authentic video evidence, what domestic terrorist brings stuffies to a gun fight? As much as the administration wants to label anyone that disagrees with their agenda as disloyal to the United States, people looking out for their neighbors with whistles and phones and keeping an eye out for border patrol agents are not terrorists. Renee’s child, apparently 6-years old, was certainly the recipient of those stuffed animals, not a gun in sight in that glove box.
Which brings me back to that photo. They killed a parent in plain sight, with her dog in the car. That could have been me, that could have been you.
There is little chance this death changes any actions by this administration. There shouldn’t be a single death in immigration enforcement. There shouldn’t be daycare workers, educators, grandmothers, taco shop owners, kitchen staffers being rounded up and deported. There shouldn’t bet be US Citizens getting detained for a month+. None of this shit should be happening.
All one can hope is the people continue to wake up. Go woke, if you will, and stand up for what’s right. Which is treating people with dignity and being respectful of their circumstances, and be against this particularly heinous element of fascism.
5 Years Since J6
Besides the shock from the actual insurrection on J6, I remember sharing this crazed photo with a few friend groups. At minimum, my intent was entertainment, at most, I thought we could try to process what the fuck was happening in DC while we were all in our homes in the early days of COVID. One group agreed yes, this is stupid, but no more discussion from that. The other..got no response whatsoever.
I mention that lack of response from either group because J6 marked a turning point where so many people in my life stopped wanting to engage in politics or any discussion beyond the surface, and much of that feels true to how the response to J6 was muted by many people in power and the greater public. We failed to process what J6 meant as the beginning of the end of the institutional order of the United States that has led to so much prosperity, but undermined our advancements in science, equality, business, infrastructure that help more people in favor of what we have now: a government that runs on abusing power, vindictiveness, retribution and helping only those deemed worthy by a small group of people.
5 years is a long time, and looking back the muted response from my more centrist/conservative friends to J6 where everything that’s happened since (school board meetings, book bans, kicking out the gays, anti-trans everything, trump 2, us aid cuts, abortion protections overturned, etc etc) just feels downstream from shrugging at that. Looking back, it’s clear to me the Biden administration and Congress at the time failing to indict Trump, removing his ability to run for elected office, are some of the longest lasting stains to our current moment as the authoritarian grip strengthens.
You’ll often see the word FAFO thrown around. Well, not taking that J6 moment seriously and rejecting it thoroughly with real consequences for anyone besides the insurrectionists themselves, has become the real fuck around and find out moment.
On Charlie
Some rapid thoughts on Charlie Kirk: I don’t want violence of any kind promoted. Especially political violence. Didn’t like it when Trump was shot at, don’t like it now. The difference now is it’s less surprising, gun violence has been normalized by people like Charlie, and that mixture to me is incredibly dangerous for what’s to come.
It’s pretty sad that this is where we are at now. The right wing media engine is going to make anyone that hints at being “left” as public enemy #1 of the USA, rather than what this (likely) assassination should do - encourage gun control. I think we can only expect more gun violence, not less, and used politically. I worry.
On Starvation
I guess this post is to my fellow man. I don’t undersand how you justify or rationalize what is going on in our world. How do you say nothing? Express nothing?
In a call back to 9th or 10th grade, I did a project for English class on the Holocaust. I distinctly remember the photos taken of the dead and the survivors from the various concentration camps by the American military that rescued them. The corpses and the emaciated bodies of the living looked so similar, you weren’t questioning the inhumane treatment the Jews and other groups suffered. My short essay was an attempt to convey coming to grips with the fact that fellow humans allowed that atrocity to happen. Looking at it in 2004/2005, there was no denying the evil of it, and a universal vow to be better was understood.
Yet just this yesterday morning, I saw another picture of an emaciated 2 year-old Palestinian boy in his mother’s arms, with their whole family behind them, starving to death. That 2 year-old boy, and so many others are beginning to look like those Holocaust survivors and the dead. What do you see?
I’m at a loss for how few people are realizing, or expressing the realization that these people in Gaza are on the precipice of being ethnically cleansed. Not just bombs here, there, everywhere or firing at starving refugees approaching for food. Not just EMTs and other personnel being targeted by the IDF in an attack, or bombing the clearly marked World Central Kitchen vehicles, everyone in Gaza is in the same boat, including the press.
A lot is made about Israel vs. Palestine and antisemitism. Yet here we are, seeing the visible signs of a slow and painful killing of another group of people, with no signs of rescue for the Palestinians. And America does nothing. Who are we to let this happen, with full knowledge of the history of fascism? Cutting off aid across the world? Incarcerating immigrants and soon people with disablilites or institutionalizing the unhoused.
It’s important to know your values, and speak up for the people that can’t. Express support. Push back. Because too many in power, including the US, is actively supporting and enabling evil, and we will have to reckon with that for our lifetime.
