A blind and deaf man can tell you a large chunk of white America feels a decreasing obligation to regulate legal authority, particularly its application to minorities. Whether it’s unarmed black men shot by police, undocumented immigrants rounded up in raids proliferating around the country, or bus passengers being asked if they are citizens, there now exists a decided lack of empathy for those charging various law enforcement agencies with abuse.
Yesterday the Washington Post reported the State Department was denying passports to US citizens born decades ago near the southern border in Texas. Apparently at the behest of the White House, State is calling into question the validity of birth certificates because a couple of midwives and doctors may have vouched on several occasions – again, decades ago – for couples who had children on the other side of the border but wanted them recognized as US citizens. To read and hear, not just Fox/AM universe opinions on the matter, but those of neighbors and even old friends, forces one to reckon with the realization that millions, not only have slight concern for the plight of Hispanics being targeted in the nastiest, most vindictive ways right now, but applaud the targeting.
The same holds true for unpunished police brutality toward African-Americans. If I had a dollar for every time I’ve read or heard “why don’t they just cooperate,” in the aftermath of a harrowing video, I’d be on easy street. And if you added a buck kicker for every “my kid wouldn’t be in that situation” response to the question of what if that were your son, there would be a Big Man Racing stable of thoroughbreds. That so many feel actual hatred for pro athletes simply taking a knee during the National Anthem to protest a fully documented national disgrace, clarifies a divide only possible when complete refusal to consider another’s position exists, which by the way gets inches from Webster’s definition of racism.
Walking in another man’s shoes appears an endangered attitude in both coastal suburbs and flyover expanses alike. Empathy seems a Trump era casualty, particularly toward those identified within six degrees of separation from, say, MS13…or Black Lives Matter, or the villain du jour, Antifa. It has been said the best protection of individual freedom is a vibrant community. But if the death of community is the utter inability of one part to place itself in the other’s situation, then American liberty is surely on life support.
We are a nation governed by the rule of law. Therefore, legal authority means primacy to impact the freedom of others. The fact that one with the law’s power ultimately has to justify exerting it means little in real time to those under the boot. Understanding one’s rights provides little solace when being tased and beaten… “stop resisting,” particularly when no money exists to pursue justice. One doesn’t have to be a pampered snowflake to suffer a good long while from mental trauma after such an ordeal. The ability to seek redress – compensation – for suffering such a wrong is what is supposed to supply the brakes on abuses by law enforcers. Far easier said than done, especially when the POTUS is cheerleading excesses.
Democracies can’t survive citizenries unconcerned with protecting themselves from abuses of power. It’s that simple. Dictatorship 101. When law enforcement, and the military, wherever deployed, feel unrestrained by guidelines for personal behavior and the protection of populations they come into close quarters with, nobody is safe because now absolute power exists. In that equation only good graces and better natures assure a fair shake.
Dictators always divide and conquer. They never rise with a promise they will keep everybody down. Certain groups are isolated for persecution, labeled as threats to the welfare of other constituencies, who embrace the selective repression as required for their security. Fear is the best motivator; nothing else is usually required. And most important to the tyrant is not the enthusiasm of those who support crackdowns; it’s the silent acquiescence of the rest that emboldens atrocity.
Most important to understand about personal freedom’s vulnerability is that it can be attacked in so many different ways, by endlessly different means. Hitler had the SS, Stalin the NKVD. The Shah had SAVAK, and the Ayatollah, the Revolutionary Guard. And now Trump is grooming ICE for his particular dirty work. Pick your poison; the common denominator is the authority to act, and the elimination of strictures on how and to whom it may be applied.
Where we are is a function of how much we care, and who we care about. I have a close Jewish friend, who is all in with Trump. He posted on FB the other day about a wonderful PBS documentary on the special stories of Jewish GIs in WWII, the emotions of their cause and the horrors they witnessed. My friend honored his father, a bombardier as one of that special group.
I responded by observing the obvious disconnect he exhibits between recognizing the horrors of despotism 70 years ago and being oblivious to all its burgeoning incarnations today. After the standard gaslighting of my concerns, he scolded me for trivializing the holocaust by comparing the inanities of family separation, or refusals to condemn “blood and soil” parades, with the deaths of six million.
My friend’s cluelessness is why the subject deserves fervent attention. History’s lessons are there to teach and provide for solutions… or to be ignored. And the results of yesteryears’ grievous mistakes can be avoided if the locksteps of the past are recognized… or, of course, disaster can be repeated. Our choice, our consequences. BC