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| Hello America by Vincent Valdez |
Our long weekend travels took us through our usual Western/Central Massachusetts stops: North Adams, Northampton and Worcester. Our adventures helped me focus some of my thoughts about the state of the world, a subject I've been reluctant to address here - not because I'm not upset. Indeed, I'm furious. But I've been struggling to find the right words. For months. So, here goes...
"Why were we taught to fear the witches and not the people who burned them alive?"
That quote popped up on my Facebook feed a while back and it has stayed with me. The Salem Witch Trials weren't really about religion. That was just the excuse. They were about power and social control. That social control lives on in our mythology. Mythology is social control on a trans-generational scale.
Enter Professor James B. Haile III, Ph.D...
In North Adams, we went to a reading by Dr. Haile at Research & Development, one of the retail stores at MASS MoCA (The Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art). He presented his new book, The Dark Delight of Being Strange, a genre-bending work combining both fiction and nonfiction elements. Haile's philosophical charge for himself and for the reader is to challenge and reform our mythology, especially regarding people of color.
If you control the mythology, you control everything.
The political rhetoric coming out of Washington right now reinforces a mythology we've all been fed our whole lives. For the MAGA crowd, the history of the United States - of "America" - is a story of white triumph. People of color were to be conquered, subjugated and exploited. The fact that any of them would with to be treated as human - never mind as equals - is intolerable.
The current immigration policies aren't about the law or economics as the policies are disastrous regarding both. They're about race.
You don't think so? Fuck you.
I'm not joking. I'm tired of being nice about any of this. If you're offended by what I'm saying, fuck off. If you can't draw a line on this unacceptable shit, fuck off.
If it were about the law, there would be due process. People would not be snatched off the streets and out of their homes on suspicion alone. Those arrested would not be hidden away in remote prisons in Florida or abroad in countries with appalling human rights records, even worse than Florida's.
If it were about economics, there would be acknowledgement of how much even illegal immigrants contribute to our economy, never mind our society. There would be acknowledgement of the fact that mass incarceration costs more than just leaving people the fuck alone. But there isn't.
It's about getting rid of brown people.
What is it MAGA fuckheads say to people they don't like? "Go back where you came from!" or "Learn English!" They just want people of color and their cultures to disappear. Because if they have to see them, hear them, interact with them, share the community with them, then they have to accommodate them. And I don't mean in the bullshit "Nanny State" sense. The United States is only a nanny state for billionaires. I mean they have to incorporate them into their reality, their normal. They have to acknowledge their right to exist and that is intolerable.
They have to incorporate them into the mythology. As equal contributors.
There is a culture war, folks, and the good guys are taking a beating these days. Why are people fighting so hard over what is visible in schools, libraries, sports, public spaces? Because if you control the mythology, you control everything. If LGBTQIA+ is presented as normal, they lose. If the Ten Commandments are displayed in reverence, they win. Because the mythology matters.
There's more but I need time to think it all through. For now, I'll grant the last words to SNACKTIME, a funk/hip-hop/punk/thrash metal band we thoroughly enjoyed on Saturday night.
They closed their show with the following message:
Fuck ICE!
Fuck Trump!
Free Palestine!
But…Palestine? Really?
ReplyDeleteYes. FREE Palestine.
ReplyDeleteAnd do what with Israel? Because that’s always going to be the real question here. It’s inescapable. And it begs the question.
DeleteFalse equivalent, particularly right now. Without a doubt, the October 6th attacks were horrific. But the Israeli response has been genocidal in both scope and intent. An American President could end it with one phone call. Two have failed to do so.
DeleteBut here’s the thing…That event was a declaration of war. And the only decent way out is for Hamas to abdicate. Hamas has no interest in peace. But we’re letting it dictate the discussion. So again, if this is the scorecard, how are you awarding points? This stopped being about Palestine a long time ago. That, my friend, is the false equivalency.
DeleteIn any conflict, my sympathy will always be with the most vulnerable. In this case, that's Palestinian civilians. In fact, that's been the case since 1948.
DeleteAnd if it is, in fact, a war, Netanyahu doesn't have any more regard for the Geneva Convention than Hamas does. And he's got a lot more firepower. Agreed, Hamas sucks and picking this particular fight left the Palestinian people incredibly vulnerable. But big picture, Israel is the bully in this scenario - in wartime, "peace" time, all the time.
But tts problem with backing Palestine in thus scenario, regardless of the circumstances, is that you’re effectively backing Hamas, and again, regardless of circumstances, saying Israel doesn’t have a right to exist. Israel fights the way it does because it is literally existential every single time. That’s how I view it. War is tragedy. That’s why you don’t go around picking fights like Hamas did. This time it went too far. And it still absolutely refuses to accept that. Every single time the West lends it tacit support, it lends credence to a fight that should never have even started. This isn’t Vietnam. This isn’t Iraq. This isn’t Afghanistan. Americans in particular have lost all perspective if we really believe anything else.
DeleteI disagree. But that's probably obvious.
DeleteWell, let’s put all the cards on the table, then:
DeleteWhat ya your best case scenario you honestly see as possible in the real world? Israel stops what it’s doing. Hamas just gives them back the hostages? Magically agrees to the two-state solution? Hamas, the problem being, doesn’t WANT a two-state solution. They want one. Palestine. For Palestinians.
Regardless id what’s happening right now, this is the actual problem. This is why October 6 happened. For me it’s a bit unreasonable to interpret these events in any other fashion. It’s not about what’s happening NOW. It’s about the potential of what will happen. From my perspective, it’s suicidal to suggest Israel just kowtow to Hamas. The Palestinian people, MY best case scenario, finally rise up and say they’ve had enough if them. Hamas. Not Israel.
Tony, I think you and I have different starting points on the issue. Does Israel have a right to exist? Yes. And so do the Palestinians. For decades, they've been non-citizens in a land to which they have just as rightful a claim. Israel's human rights record is atrocious and the only reason they haven't faced greater international consequences for it is unwavering US backing, both militarily and diplomatically.
DeleteAgreed, Hamas and its terrorist tactics are horrible. But the Israeli military is worse. The damage exacted by the latter with its "conventional" weapons is exponentially greater than that exacted by the former.
And what's happening right now absolutely matters. The ends do not justify the means. It's obvious to those on the ground that the current Israeli purpose is not defeating or punishing Hamas. The purpose is exterminating Palestinians. It's genocide. It's Manifest Destiny in the Middle East and it's no more justifiable there than it was (is?) in North America.
I will concede that there's no easy way out. I will also concede that the easiest of numerous terrible choices is for Hamas to acquiesce, though I fear that wouldn't actually end the current horrors in Gaza. But I disagree with you strongly about the "real problem." Until Israel completely overhauls its policies regarding the Palestinian territories, the broader conflict will persist. Meaningful resolution in our lifetime is highly unlikely.
I will always root for compassion, Tony. The deck is heavily stacked against it right now. And Israel holds all the trumps (unintended pun, I swear).
Maybe Israel is doing worse things than I am seeing. I’m not really looking very deeply into it. I know there’s a massive uptick in antisemitism at the moment, with a corresponding spike in conspiracy theories involving Jews. I don’t know how much of what Israeli forces are doing is based on the tactics Hamas is using, where they’re willing to stage fighters to draw the most horrific results (which tends to be my assumption, admittedly). I admit also I find it hard to believe Israel is pursuing a genocidal course. If so absolutely condemn. If not it’s a hugely unfortunate public discourse. And I am currently interpreting it, problematic in ways I wish had met their end with the Holocaust. I know Israel has been fighting for its existence for basically its whole existence. It’s got military prowess unmatched in the region, which has otherwise chosen to perfect the art of terrorism (which is also why, on a different note, I’ve increasingly found Star Trek’s notions of terrorists as heroes, whether Bajoran or Maquis, problematic, byproducts of occupied France, less inspiring as reflections of the Troubles, and as I say, difficult for too many reasons post-9/11).
DeleteThis is also to say, I really wish we would as a civilized world, with a United Nations, any such organization, condemn terrorism as a means to express discontent. We’ve done a remarkably poor job of making the world better. We choose to be myopic. And somehow, even undeniable genocide gets a free pass out of some misguided sense of sovereign rights or whatever the excuse is supposed to be. And these are things that don’t receive protests. This is not to excuse Israel, whatever course it’s pursuing right now. But you also have to admit we don’t condemn others nations pursuing what you call genocide, what’s sometimes outright deemed “ethnic cleansing.” We say hohum! Too bad!
And that being said…Most likely you go your way and I’ll go mine.
Indeed, let's agree to disagree and move on.
DeleteWe are in a different world. It supports your point that the only people given a free pass to immigrate these days are white South Africans... And, of course, with Musk and Thiel, who began their fortune under the unfair rules of apartheid.
ReplyDeleteIs it a different world? Or has the uglier side always been there and recently found new boldness?
Delete