The First Bill Sent to Pres 47 Should Be Titled "Invite Violence Against Non-Citizens Act"

This article started out from reading out the passage by Congress of the "Laken Riley Act"

Commentary by Dana Chasin of 2020visiondc.org

I missed an implication of this bit: "expanding detainable offenses to include ... any crime that causes bodily harm". Self-defense is an affirmative legal defense, which is presented in response to the charge of assault or aggravated assault. This bill essentially declares an open season of civilian violence upon [any person not a citizen or national of the United States], since the condition for a "shall issue" detainer is merely "is charged with, is arrested for, is convicted of, admits having committed, or admits committing acts which constitute the essential elements".

Engaging is violence or even allegedly admitting to having done so even in self defense will result in "effective and expeditious" detainment.

Furthermore, the bill adds

(2) DEFINITION.—For purposes of paragraph (1)(E), the terms ‘burglary’, ‘theft’, ‘larceny’, ‘shoplifting’, ‘assault of a law enforcement officer’, and ‘serious bodily injury’ have the meanings given such terms in the jurisdiction in which the acts occurred.
(3) DETAINER.—The Secretary of Homeland Security shall issue a detainer for an alien described in paragraph (1)(E) and, if the alien is not otherwise detained by Federal, State, or local officials, shall effectively and expeditiously take custody of the alien.

Which allows a local jurisdiction the leniency to draft misdemeanors named ‘burglary’, ‘theft’, ‘larceny’, ‘shoplifting’ which would then compel detainment by federal forces. Which one look at the history of loitering, vagrancy, and Black codes in this country suggests will absolutely be abused. Especially if there are kickbacks from the private contractors that DHS will be partnering with to provide the detainment facilities.

This bill is absolutely an attack on the concept of due process of law. Detainment and detention are a tried and true method of separating people from their legal representation, family, and community. Doing so decreases the chances of successful defense in court. It is especially challenging to fight an allegation of what one has said ("admitted to") without having even a criminal charge or arrest to establish the paper trail and legal grounding. What would it look like for a non-citizen from Vermont to fight their detention in Arizona when they were shipped there based on an allegation that they'd admitted to having shoplifted an item in Florida during their Disney trip? Or some Red Cap drops an item into a purse and calls attention to the victim leaving the store?

A terrible series of events in a hostile local jurisdiction, which just requires one police collaborator, would be for a Red Cap to trigger a shoplifting incident and then claim to perform a so-called "citizen's arrest" if they can't get support from a staff member. Resisting the illegal detainment would risk the trap of being accused of assault while accepting the wait for the police collaborator to arrive and notify DHS.

But wait, the new (E)(i) limits this handling to "Inadmissible aliens"!

Lets delve into what (6)(A), (6)(C), or (7) of 212(a) means:

• (6) Illegal entrants and immigration violators

• (A) Aliens present without admission or parole

also

• (6) Illegal entrants and immigration violators

• (C) Misrepresentation

• (i) In general

  Any alien who, by fraud or willfully misrepresenting a material fact, seeks to procure (or has sought to procure or has procured) a visa, other documentation, or admission into the United States or other benefit provided under this chapter is inadmissible.

  (ii) Falsely claiming citizenship

  (I) In general

  Any alien who falsely represents, or has falsely represented, himself or herself to be a citizen of the United States for any purpose or benefit under this chapter (including section 1324a of this title) or any other Federal or State law is inadmissible.

How many people are prepared to, at a moment's notice, prove that they had entered the county via admission or parole? And can also prove, at that moment's notice, the legitimacy of the documents they have and had used? Remember also, one of the triggers for (6)(C) is falsely claiming US citizenship, so can you prove that at a moment's notice?

• (7) Documentation requirements

• (A) Immigrants

  (i) In general

  Except as otherwise specifically provided in this chapter, any immigrant at the time of application for admission-

  (I) who is not in possession of a valid unexpired immigrant visa, reentry permit, border crossing identification card, or other valid entry document required by this chapter, and a valid unexpired passport, or other suitable travel document, or document of identity and nationality if such document is required under the regulations issued by the Attorney General under section 1181(a) of this title, or

  (II) whose visa has been issued without compliance with the provisions of section 1153 of this title,

• (B) Nonimmigrants

  (i) In general

  Any nonimmigrant who-

  (I) is not in possession of a passport valid for a minimum of six months from the date of the expiration of the initial period of the alien's admission or contemplated initial period of stay authorizing the alien to return to the country from which the alien came or to proceed to and enter some other country during such period, or

  (II) is not in possession of a valid nonimmigrant visa or border crossing identification card at the time of application for admission,

You know who does not carry a passport or visa? United States citizens in the United States. What makes a person inadmissible under (6)(C)? Claiming to be a United States citizen.

How does one prove themselves to a DHS agent acting not in good faith, which is anyone taking possession of a person for merely being "charged with, arrested for, ... admits having committed, or admits committing acts which constitute the essential elements" a crime sans conviction. Conviction is the process of having proved the facts in court. Requiring conviction is how our system proves it knows what happened. How does one prove to that agent that they should not be detained?

This law was not passed yet before:

ICE Agents Detain American Citizens in Newark Raid

This has led me to revisit heartbreaking readings from 2018, such as “Are you alone now?” After raid, immigrant families are separated in the American heartland and from 2017 such as Exploitation and Abuse at the Chicken Plant. (paywall, readable with javascript disabled)

Allow me to include an extra large callout to Maryland's own Democratic representative April McClain Delaney for her participation in passing this. Thankfully, Alsobrooks and Van Hollen both voted against it in the Senate. My new representative, Elfreth voted against it.

IONHoCo meeting of Unity through Islamophobia

Tonight the Indian Origin Network of Howard County held a hearing session. Below is how the event was promoted.

“Recent events such as a student organization led event at Centennial High school has renewed the discussion between freedom of speech and profiling based on religion and ethnicity. This meet is to bring everyone to the table and hear each others perspectives.

Please join us on Saturday Feb 1st from 4:00 PM to 6:00 PM.for a better understanding of issues such as CAA, NRC, religious shift in South Asian Countries, freedom of speech and other related topics. Please let us know if you like to speak for up to three minutes on any of these topics at the forum.”  

The first speaker began with the intention of laying groundwork to discuss the CAA as an effort to assist persecuted religious minorities in surrounding countries. He discussed vast decreases in the non-Muslim populations in those countries since 1947 and offered the CAA as a protective remedy against persecution. He described this being an area of concern since as early as the 1950’s.

Next up was a presenter with a supporting slide deck who was having trouble getting the projector to work. While the projector issues were resolved, he was replaced by the next speaker. This was where the hearing session went sideways. Instead of addressing the concerns raised by the Muslim Student Association or addressing the concerns raised by IONHoCo about whether the students were acting inappropriately at school, he instead was speaking to why India should be seeking to limit the influence or even population of Muslims. He spoke in graphic terms about how the partition of India by the British was damaging to the Indian people and equated the partition to having limbs severed. He blamed that history on Muslims as a class, and further called out the remaining Muslim population as unwelcome. Every possible concern of anti-Muslim hatred was legitimized by this speaker.

It was at this point I began to feel relief that the Centennial MSA members had not accepted the invitation to be a part of this gathering. They did not need to have a grown adult look at them and say that if people sharing their religion wanted to live in a country then f*ck them.

A library employee had come into the room and got the projector set up so the skipped speaker could present. Like the first presenter he was lobbying in support of the CAA. I noticed he used a lot of orange and green color scheme in his slides, which the IONHoCo uses as well in their logo, and which the flag of India uses. Around this time it was mentioned, I think by an audience member, that the MSA invoking green and orange meant they “were bringing religion into it.”

Comment: I would have thought that religion was sufficiently brought into it when a student organization was attempting to bring awareness to a foreign law for being damaging to a religious group on the basis of their religion.

... The Centennial High School Muslim Students Association has asked students to wear green and orange in support of Indian Muslims, to bring awareness to a citizenship bill in India that has been categorized as Islamophobic …
Description of the event from Howard County Muslim Council

Later it was described that the color to religion association was green for Islam and orange for Hindu. I can’t speak to the intentions of the organizing students as to whether they were meaning to assign any meaning beyond just that orange and green are the colors of the Indian flag.

The evening continued with more speakers speaking not to the awareness campaign, but to the dangers from Islam. Some provided anecdotes about specific acts of violence that have occurred with Muslim perpetrators as justification of broad Islamophobia. One speaker expressed intolerance of the mere word Islamophobia based on her families’ personal history of violence in Kashmir.

Her discussion of the elimination of indigenous Kashmiri Hindus resonated with me, something I brought up when I spoke. She explained that at one time ethnic Kashmiri made up 100% of the population and that they now make up a small minority before blaming that change on all Islam.

I took the floor to address that the hearing had derailed into Islamophobia and that some of the speakers had attributed to Muslims what was better described as the result of empire. I couldn't sit silently through such an event when I was in photos and videos. To do so would have been implicit agreement.

What she described is an all too common pattern that we observe in the post-empire fallout. Canada, United States, Australia: an aspect of the British Empire is decimation of the indigenous population. Another pattern that has played out repeatedly following the British Empire has been a society of apartheid. United States and its criminalization of black people. South Africa and its criminalization of black people. Israel and its ongoing criminalization of Palestinian Muslim people. History supports the concern that a recently freed country following British subjugation will resort to apartheid.

“As educators, we are constantly seeking balance between allowing for healthy student expression and providing structure, guidance, and even limitations for our students. As Principal, I believe in working alongside students to cultivate a sense of voice and empowerment while also helping them understand that their words and actions can cause a reaction in their peers and neighbors. Often, this reaction is one in which they weren't expecting or agree with. That is all part of the learning process and an effort to prepare them for life once they leave the accepting and supportive confines of Centennial High School and Howard County.”
-text attributed by a third party to the CHS Principal

The cherry on top of this Islam hating sundae of a hearing would have to be right at the end when the gathering questioned, to broad support, why a Muslim Student Association would even exist in school. The obvious response is that a Muslim student body exists.

I am running for Howard County Board of Education and as such it is in the public interest to know where I stand on incidents such as the initiating awareness campaign. First off, let me acknowledge that Tinker v. Des Moines, 1969, takes the decision out of the hands of the board. Second of all, I applaud the school district for helping train students to perform civics and not just read about it. Finally, Tinker v. Des Moines.

Rise of an American Reich

For a full three years I have been warning that Donald J Trump has sounded just like Adolph Hitler. My main research paper in high school had been about the charisma which enabled the rise of the Nazi party. Sources for that research included three different translations of Mein Kampf from the library. [I had to have found my way to a few government lists early]

In the 2016 campaign announcement speech (June 16, 2015), Donald Trump explicitly categorized Mexican immigrants as drug trafficking rapists while allowing that there may be some that are good people. He categorically defined an entire country's immigrants and naturalized American citizens as criminals. He then continued to explain that the problems faced by the United States are coming from Mexico, "all over South and Latin America", and "from the Middle East". This set of racist coded language translates to Hispanics and Muslims, a pair of groups that would be regular targets for his demagoguery over the next three years. That xenophobic demagoguery discourages assuming citizenship and benign intent to people that visually appear Latinx, Arab, or Persian which directly impacts how such American citizens are then excluded from full equality and respect.

In that speech, that very first speech as a candidate for POTUS, I heard echos of Mein Kampf. This should not be suprising to the people of the United States because we were warned back in 1990 that his bedside reading was a book of Hitler's speeches. Since then, since warning that Donald Trump presented eerily similar to the 1925 writings of Adolf Hitler, I have been told repeatedly that the comparison lacks merit. I was told "this comparison is a gross exaggeration when you consider all the facts of the atrocities committed by Hitler" by a very trusted, very educated family member. This rebuke was followed by...

 "Let each person's record speak for itself." 

So let's view the records

(1) Hitler (1925) and Trump (2015) were at the same point: scapegoating and vilifying minority groups: Jews and Immigrants vs Muslims and Hispanics.

(3) Hitler (1935) and Trump (2017) were at the same point: Enacting policies to marginalize and target their scapegoats. Nuremberg Laws vs Muslim Ban/planning family separation

(4) Hitler (1925) and Trump (2018) were at the same point: Priming their audiences for extermination by equating their scapegoats with vermin. Untermensch, vermin, rats vs Animals, infest.

(8) Hitler (1938) and Trump (2018) were at the same point: rounding up and imprisoning their scapegoats. Night of Broken Glass vs Zero Tolerance and ICE workplace raids

UPDATE:
Hitler (June 22, 1941) and Trump (June 24, 2018) were at the same point: unleashing their goons to target their scapegoats free from the burdens of proof, courts, or judges.

"with no Judges or Court Cases"

(9) Hitler (1941) enacted a policy of exterminating his scapegoats.

Creator unknown. Based on Gregory H Stanton's 10 stages of genocide. genocidewatch.net

The record shows a tyrannical despot, familiar with the works and methods of another tyrannical despot, echoing the processes of that historical example. There are two major differences in the tales of the two rulers: speed and war. It took 1925 to 1938 for Hitler to go from public scapegoating to mass incarceration, Donald Trump required less than three years to go from "They're bringing drugs. They're bringing crime. They're rapists." to the so-called "Zero-Tolerance Policy for Criminal Illegal Entry". What took Hilter 13 years to achieve, Donald Trump accomplished in less than 3. Hitler also had promises of Lebensraum, or Living Space, to provide for the German people. To accomplish this Hitler required war and territory invasion, but the United States of America already has plenty of open space. There is no need for a parallel of the 1939 invasion of Poland.

Without foreign invasions, there are no grounds for any foreign military to invade the United States. There is no cavalry of Allied powers that would land on the beaches of California or Virginia. While the United States carries out ethnic cleansing to achieve a white ethno-state, nobody is going to come to our aid.

Genocide will begin, not end with Hispanic immigrants. Quite arguably Stage 9 has already begun with the willful neglect and fully predictable deaths in Puerto Rico over the past year. Death was an obvious consequence of the conditions post-Maria, but they were allowed to occur anyway.

Obvious next targets include communities which have already been targeted by the malice of the Trump Administration: Muslims, LGBTQIA, black communities, handicapped, seniors, and the impoverished. Efforts have already begun to damage these communities: Muslim Travel Ban, transgender protection repeal, so-called "Religious Freedom" actions, cessation of police department consent decrees, budgetary attacks on Medicare/Social Security/Medicaid.

Human Rights on the American Border

Background

Back in 2014 the Obama administration was dealing with an immigration crisis: unaccompanied minors flooding toward the United States from Central America. (Cowan, 2014) Thousands of children and teenagers were fleeing violence and seeking a chance to grow up and become adults in the rebounding economy of the United States. By May there was an emergency shelter set up at Lackland Air Force Base in San Antonio, Texas. (Cowan, 2014) As May turned to June, a warehouse building was made into a shelter in Nogales, Arizona which was quickly followed by Fort Sill, OK also being prepared as emergency housing. (Schwartz, 2014) Again, these were the lengths that the Administration was forced to resort to due to the surge in unaccompanied minors: children without family or guardians. Photos came out showing the facilities used for housing children awaiting processing: sleeping mats and space blankets on hard floors inside of chain link cages. (Franklin, 2014)

Detainees sleep and watch television in a holding cell on June 18, 2014. They are among hundreds of mostly Central American immigrant children being processed and held at the U.S. CBP Nogales Placement Center.

Women's Refugee Commission wrote about the various ways that family units could end up separated by the various federal entities involved in border security and immigration. (Podkul & Obser, 2016) Among the causes of separation, which include different family members being processed differently, ending up in different legal proceedings, and an unverified biological relationship, they also identify punitive or deliberate separation. Under the Obama administration there were recommendations from the Women's Refugee Commission about ways to reduce and mitigate family separations and that the relevant Inspectors General “should investigate complaints involving family separation and track complaints across DHS components.” (Podkul & Obser, 2016, pg 3)

Separation from family members can cause undue trauma to children and may violate the Victims of Child Abuse Act of 1990.2 In addition, family separation can impede the ability of families to access asylum and other protection mechanisms because of a variety of issues associated with the reality of the situation, see Podkul & Obser for details. Separation of adult family members during the deportation process has also shown to expose deported individuals to serious harm, rendering them more vulnerable to abuse, assaults, kidnapping, and trafficking. (Podkul & Obser, 2016, pg 1)

International Law and Treaties

Early in the 20th century the migration of people fleeing violence and persecution began to reach numbers that caused international problems requiring international solutions. There were multiple agreements set up in the 20’s and additional agreements in the 30’s. (Robinson, 1953) Following World War II the Secretary General of the United Nations was requested to study the protection of stateless persons and then provide recommendations back to the United Nations. (Robinson, 1953) Coming out of the studies for the United Nations, there have been three major defining landmarks in the handling of refugees: 1951 Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees, 1967 Protocol Relating to the Status of Refugees, and Resolution 2198 (XXI) adopted by the United Nations General Assembly. (UNHCR, 2010)
Through the various international treaties, the United States as agreed to certain rights to be afforded to refugees which includes:

• A refugee shall have free access to the courts of law (UNHCR, 2010, pg 21)
• shall not impose penalties, on account of their illegal entry or presence … provided they present themselves without delay to the authorities and show good cause for their illegal entry or presence (UNHCR, 2010, pg 29)
• shall allow such refugees a reasonable period and all the necessary facilities to obtain admission into another country (UNHCR, 2010, pg 29)
• shall not expel a refugee lawfully in their territory save on grounds of national security or public order (UNHCR, 2010, pg 29)
• expulsion of such a refugee shall be only in pursuance of a decision reached in accordance with due process of law (UNHCR, 2010, pg 29)

As such, any asylum seekers, family or single, that cross the border into the United States and present themselves to the authorities without delay are not coming into the country ‘illegally’, they are doing so under the terms established pursuant to the UN Charter treaty. “There is nothing illegal about seeking asylum – on the contrary, it is a universal human right. Conflating ‘refugees’ and ‘migrants’ can undermine public support for refugees and the institution of asylum at a time when more refugees need such protection than ever before.” (UNHCR, 2016, pg 2)

Malicious Intent

In April 2018 it was reported that a caravan of asylum seekers was traveling through Mexico from Central America. (Schrank, 2018) President Trump, through his official line of communication @realDonaldTrump at twitter.com, put out three statements regarding this caravan. (realDonaldTrump, Apr 3,5,30)

Conflating ‘refugees’ and ‘migrants’

He intentionally conflated these refugees with migrants for the exact purposes referenced above in the 'Refugees' and 'Migrants' - Frequently Asked Questions. The same caravan was referenced by Attorney General Sessions in his Zero Tolerance remarks given in San Diego. (Sessions, 2018) Sessions further explained the zero tolerance for “illegal entry” (2018) as “If you cross this border unlawfully, then we will prosecute you.” (2018) The Convention and Protocol Relating to the Status of Refugees uses those exact words in Article 31: “unlawfully in the country of refugee” and “illegal entry” (UNHCR, 2010, pg 29) So long as the border apprehension involved the refugee having presented themselves without delay to the authorities then the asylum claim needs to be adjudicated. It has been clarified for me through an immigration lawyer that asylum seekers have a year to file under current US law.

This “‘zero tolerance’ policy for illegal entry on our Southwest border” (Sessions, 2018) represents a divergence from the United States’ obligations under international treaties. Criminal prosecution for asylum seekers also results in children being separated from their parents and consequently placed in ORR custody, as previously identified as an issue by the Women's Refugee Commission. (Podkul & Obser, 2016) Thus the illegal criminal prosecution is generating additional stress on the systems that already were strained by unaccompanied minors.

Unlike the family unit separation being reported on in 2016 by the Women's Refugee Commission, the separation resulting from the Attorney General’s decision is strictly punitive and directed by policy from the top. “If you cross this border unlawfully, then we will prosecute you.  It’s that simple.” (Sessions, 2018) Except it is not that simple, because refugees have a right to “show good cause for their illegal entry” (UNHCR, 2010, pg 29)

This change was not a rash decision. Reuters has been reporting that the Trump administration has been looking into breaking up family units to discourage asylum claims for over a year. (Ainsley, 2017) In March 2017 the Department of Homeland Security was “actively considering separating women from their children but has not made a decision.” (Ainsley, 2017) The consideration was part of an exploration into “options that may discourage those from even beginning the journey.” (Ainsley, 2017) The following week then-Secretary of Homeland Security Kelly confirmed that “I am considering - in order to deter … exactly that” (Staff, 2017) It would have been accomplished through a “policy change would allow the government to keep parents in custody while they contest deportation or wait for asylum hearings” (Staff, 2017) which is exactly what zero tolerance criminal prosecution achieves.

Harm From Federal Actors

International norms and obligations are not the only reason that unnecessary custodial detainment and prosecution is unwise. As was discussed at the beginning, there are serious logistical concerns to large numbers of people detained for extended periods of time. Human Rights Watch found that asylum seekers around the southwest border “are generally placed in holding cells for several hours to several days, and sometimes a week or more” (Bochenek, 2018, sec 3) Bathing, dental hygiene, toilet paper, and feminine hygiene products are often unavailable no matter the length of holding. A 2015 court found that the holding cells had “widespread and deplorable conditions in the holding cells.” (Flores v Johnson, 2015) Similarly the court found that “Defendants have said nothing to contradict Plaintiffs' accounts of inadequate nutrition” (Flores v Johnson, 2015) Again, like the 2016 report and the 2014 unaccompanied minors influx, these conditions were present under the Obama administration. This was the situation before the decision was made to ignore international treaty obligations for refugees and increase the number of minors taken into custody separate from their families.

Department of Homeland Security has been found to make unfounded claims without evidence and

lie to federal courts to achieve desired outcomes. (Medina v US DHS, 2018) Gang affiliation has been used to justify dehumanizing speech, equating criminal immigrants with creatures to be exterminated. This pattern of speech, the language of genocide, has been widely used as a precursor to more vicious activity. Dehumanization was even used in the Abu Ghraib prison when prisoner were abused and treated like animals. (Kearney, 2007) Since the Department of Homeland Security is proven to lie about gang affiliation, the dehumanizing speech is targeting all immigrants.

Additionally, immigration judges previously had a method to remove low-priority cases from their backlog known as administrative closure. (Rosenberg, 2018) This method was “routinely used for people without criminal backgrounds who had lived for many years in the United States” (Rosenberg, 2018) Attorney General Sessions declared judges “do not have the general authority to suspend indefinitely immigration proceedings by administrative closure” although the change “would likely overwhelm the immigration courts.” (Rosenberg, 2018) This case, known as Castro Tum, relates to immigration cases rather than asylum seekers.

An extreme change reported just today seeks to reduce the number of successful asylum claims brought by refugees. Setting precedent for immigration judges, who are Department of Justice employees and not actually members of the federal judiciary, Attorney General Sessions overruled an immigration decision granting asylum to a victim of rape and domestic abuse. (Staff, June 2018) An immigration lawyer has told me that this could erase 85% of all asylum claims.

Conclusion

The Trump administration, through Attorney General Sessions, has enacted changes which undermine international law and throw more bodies into an already overwhelmed and abusive custody situation. As explicitly described in 2017 by Department of Homeland Security, these changes are punitive against current asylum seekers to discourage future refugees from attempting to reach the United States. Watchdog organizations including Human Rights Watch, the Women's Refugee Commision, and US Federal District Courts have all found abusive treatment not even consistent with rapidly weakening DHS policies. Federal Courts have also found that ICE has lied to them about the alleged gang affiliation of those taken into custody.

References

Ainsley, J. (2017, March 3) Exclusive: Trump administration considering separating women, children at Mexico border. Reuters. Accessed June 11, 2018 https://www.reuters.com/article/us-USA-immigration-children-idUSKBN16A2ES 
Aquino, M. & Taj, M. (2017,March 9) Peruvian president criticizes U.S. proposal to separate immigrant families. Reuters. Accessed June 11, 2018 https://www.reuters.com/article/us-peru-usa/peruvian-president-criticizes-u-s-proposal-to-separate-immigrant-families-idUSKBN16H09L
Bochenek, M. (2018, February 28)  In the Freezer: Abusive Conditions for Women and Children in US Immigration Holding Cells. Human Rights Watch. Accessed June 11, 2018 https://www.hrw.org/report/2018/02/28/freezer/abusive-conditions-women-and-children-us-immigration-holding-cells
Cowan, R. (2014, May 28). Waves of immigrant minors present crisis for Obama, Congress. Reuters. Accessed June 11, 2018 https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-immigration-children/waves-of-immigrant-minors-present-crisis-for-obama-congress-idUSKBN0E814T20140528
Flores v. Johnson, No. CV 85-4544 (C.D. Cal. July 24, 2015) https://www.americanimmigrationcouncil.org/sites/default/files/jenny_l_flores_v_jefferson_b_sessions_motion_to_enforce.pdf
Franklin, R. (2014). First glimpse of immigrant children at holding facility. AZ Central. Accessed June 11, 2018 https://www.azcentral.com/picture-gallery/news/politics/immigration/2014/06/18/first-glimpse-of-immigrant-children-at-holding-facility/10808687/
Goodwin, L. (2018, June 10) ‘Children are being used as a tool’ in Trump’s effort to stop border crossings. Boston Globe. Accessed June 11, 2018 https://www.bostonglobe.com/news/nation/2018/06/09/borderseparations/Z95z4eFZjyfqCLG9pyHjAO/story.html
Kearney, C. (2007, March 26) U.S. documentary shows everyday abuse of Abu Ghraib. Reuters. Accessed June 11, 2018 https://www.reuters.com/article/film-iraq-doc-dc-idUSN2326524820070326
McEntee, J. & Rosenberg, M. (2018, May 7) U.S. says it will separate families crossing border illegally. Reuters. Accessed June 11, 2018 https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-immigration-children/u-s-cements-plans-to-separate-families-crossing-border-illegally-idUSKBN1I82AB
Medina v US DHS (2018, May 15) Order Granting Plaintiff’s Motion for Preliminary Injunction. Case No. C17-0218RSM. United States District Court Western District of Washington. https://assets.documentcloud.org/documents/4463428/Ramirez-Medina-v-DHS-Order-051518.pdf
Podkul, J. & Obser, K. (2016, September 09) Separation of Immigrant Families in U.S. Immigration Custody. Women’s Refugee Commission. Accessed June, 11 2018 https://www.womensrefugeecommission.org/rights/gbv/resources/1384-family-separation-in-us-custody
realDonaldTrump (2018, April 3) The big Caravan of People from Honduras… Twitter.com
realDonaldTrump (2018, April 5) The Caravan is largely broken up thanks… Twitter.com
realDonaldTrump (2018, April 30) The migrant ‘caravan’ that is… Twitter.com
realDonaldTrump (2018, May 18) Fake News Media had me… Twitter.com
Robinson, N. (1953). Convention relating to the status of refugees. Its history, contents and interpretation. New York: Institute of Jewish Affairs. https://www.bjpa.org/content/upload/bjpa/conv/CONVENTION%20RELATING%20TO%20THE%20STATUS%20OF%20REFUGEES,%20NEHEMIAH%20ROBINSON.pdf
Rosenberg, M. (2018, May 17) U.S. ends practice that gave some immigrants reprieves from deportation. Reuters. Accessed June 11, 2018 https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-immigration/u-s-ends-practice-that-gave-some-immigrants-reprieves-from-deportation-idUSKCN1IJ00N
Schrank, D. (2018, April 9) Some 200 migrants in Mexico caravan to seek U.S. asylum: organizers. Reuters. Accessed June 11, 2018 https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-immigration-caravan/some-200-migrants-in-mexico-caravan-to-seek-u-s-asylum-organizers-idUSKBN1HH052
Schwartz, D. (2014, June 9) Hundreds more migrant children shipped to Arizona from Texas. Reuters. Accessed June 11, 2018 https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-arizona-immigration-idUSKBN0EK23N20140609
Sessions, J. (2018, May 7) Attorney General Sessions Delivers Remarks Discussing the Immigration Enforcement Actions of the Trump Administration. Department of Justice. Accessed June 11, 2018 https://www.justice.gov/opa/speech/attorney-general-sessions-delivers-remarks-discussing-immigration-enforcement-actions
Staff (2017, March 6) Kelly says considering separating women, children at Mexico border. Reuters. Accessed June 11, 2018 https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-immigration-children-idUSKBN16D2OX
Staff (2018, June 11) Attorney General Sessions limits asylum for domestic violence victims. Reuters. Accessed June 11, 2018 https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-sessions-asylum/attorney-general-sessions-limits-asylum-for-domestic-violence-victims-idUSKBN1J72HP
UNHCR (2010, December) Convention and Protocol Relating to the Status of Refugees. UNHCR Communications and Public Information Service http://www.unhcr.org/en-us/3b66c2aa10.pdf
UNHCR (2016, March 15) 'Refugees' and 'Migrants' - Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs). United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees. Accessed June 11, 2018 http://www.refworld.org/docid/56e81c0d4.html
UNHCR (2017, October 8) Asylum-Seekers. United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees. https://web.archive.org/web/20171008160944/http://www.unhcr.org/en-us/asylum-seekers.html

Living life in the median

Inspired by the Damore/Google lawsuit I want to talk a bit about my experience living life in the medians. Empathy is hard, and conformity is easy. When you never seem to stand out it makes it hard to empathize with those that do. Not taking steps to stand out becomes easy and comfortable. Your experiences are so incredibly “normal” by all of your measures that it becomes typical to just assume that everyone around you experiences the same. That assumption ends up being very wrong, and the resulting cognitive dissonance is jarring.

When life just seems like a mirror

Without a brief bio I cannot back my claim of being average. My family history traces back to European lines, but the genealogists have traced back to the American Revolution and beyond. Any specific Old World culture artifacts have been sufficiently diluted away. A white family that grew up around where my patriarch grandfather farmed his land after fighting in World War II. Through my time in high school there was one student that presented as black, though I later learned that one of my classmates’ father was black too. We are not a racist family, that was always driven in. Sure, the grandfather was an Archie Bunker type that never managed to see he was laughing at himself during All in the Family. His example was taught as what not to be. Generally, treat non-white people with utmost respect, just don’t question why they were not in the school, church, local business owners, or social clubs. We were just Normal people. My immediate family was a working father, stay at home mother (first and only marriage for both), three boys, and a dog: the textbook nuclear family at a time when “nuclear family” was being preached as The Family Unit.

Sunday was Mass, occasionally Saturday night, while Wednesday was for Confraternity of Christian Doctrine (only ever called CCD). Sure, this did make us stand out a little… Sunday Mass was just something us Catholics attended. Many of our neighbors and classmates were different… other Christian denominations. They also typically attended service on Sunday and religious education on Wednesday. Even the families that didn’t regularly attend still knew that those times were blocked off. It was so expected that adults, my parents included, would be vocally upset if coaches, teachers, or others dared to schedule Wednesday nights. Wednesday was Off Limits because it was expected, it was Normal, that the children would be attending Christian religious ed.

Well, there was one Wednesday without CCD classes - Source

I was hetro in a school and area where “gay” was a throwaway slur. It was tossed around, but didn’t mean anything against anyone because hetro wasn’t just Normal it was All There Was. Something experienced on TV shows like Will and Grace, but TV was also where Steve turns into Stefan and Sabrina had a talking cat. I missed out on asking my future wife to sophomore Homecoming because I wrongly thought my best friends were interested in her too. Turns out that one was ace and the other gay, but I didn’t know that at the time and when you are living in the median everyone is a reflection of you.

I participated in high school sports, but was never a high performer. It was expected and Normal. From Tiger Cub to Eagle Scout, I was also in Boy Scouts which did make me different from most of my peers, but this time it was media that reassured me I was again Normal… pretty much every show had boy characters experience scouts and camping in some way or another. It was just what boys did… even though my own experience showed otherwise. Thus even when my observations pointed out that my life was different, media reminded me that my life was typical. Just living in the median.

Boys will be Boy Scouts - TV taught me that. Source

Notice the cognitive dissonance already? Media that reinforced the median helped establish Normal and media that introduced the outside remained entertainment.

Leaving home for college was a chance to be exposed to a wider variety of life, which put me into new sets of people. I was an honors student at my university, living in the dorm building restricted to students associated with the honors college. Our building was co-ed, but segregated by floor. Thus, I was a male honors student living on a floor of all male honors students. Again, I fit right in, all too well. Diablo II, Starcraft, and Unreal Tournament 2K4 LAN games helped build up the social network of the floor when my entertainment medium of choice was video games. During the day I attended classes in my majors: Computer Science and Mathematics. Especially the CS classes were overwhelmingly white and male. I never questioned either case, since that fit my experience: when in doubt, expected life to reflect me. That is life in the median is. When in doubt, life reflects you. 

After college I was hired on as a programmer for a cell phone refurbisher. Besides myself, my team consisted of three white male programmers, a white male tech generalist, and a white male manager. Including me, four were married to women and the others were straight and single. There was diversity through in the company, but among those around me… I could see me. My media at the time was primarily World of Warcraft and Big Bang Theory: nerds doing nerdy things and primarily white and male. My extended family would talk about watching BBT and argue about whether I was more of a Leonard or a Sheldon… 

The newer seasons are less overwhelmingly male - Source

All around me I would see that I fit the description of my group at the time, never seeming to deviate much from the appropriate stereotype as I saw it. Straight cisgender white Christian male from a middle class nuclear American family. Television shows and movies presented me as the baseline against which everything else deviated. I was living in the median and all of the traffic flowed around that. 

The dark consequences of meeting expectation

When it seems that you are reflected as the baseline of your groups then you can discount differences as outliers. For tech issues, I had to begin to consciously note developers that deviated from the classes I identify with. Only after I made an effort to see such traits did it start to shape my default idea of what a developer was. Only then could I really see that my path to get here is unique, it was not the path traveled by every developer and software analyst that I have not yet met. Since I related so well to the stereotype of my associations, I could easily project myself onto others.

By feeling so close to the stereotypes I can always feel comfortable as the audience being spoken to. When beer commercials play they are talking to an audience that imbibes alcohol. I am not being excluded based on my age, medical history, or religion. My tech magazines include career ads for federal jobs. I am not being excluded based on my citizenship status, country of ancestry, or family criminal history. The only time I have ever noticed a character I relate to being included as a plot point is for tech interest. Since the median is always the audience it is also never explicitly the audience.

Living in the median means not being reached out to directly, by name. You see others being addressed explicitly. You see others gaining advantages that you have never had to even notice were already available, often even already utilizing. You notice when you are not represented even though you hadn’t noticed when only you were.

The margins feel far from the median, so far that they can be not seen if one chooses not to look. If you are just walking down the median then it can be jarring when confronted with the real existence of others just as if a car has suddenly swerved out of a traffic lane. Because the median is an illusion and you were really in just another lane. Merge alert! Wake up because the other drivers have just as much right of way too.

Evolving expectations is not oppression

When I became an adult I could see myself reflected in the citizenship(natural born American), education(attended college), race(white), and sex(man) of every US President in over one hundred years. As of January 20, 2009 that no longer holds true; down by one.

In office buildings I would historically be welcome in every class of rooms in the building. With the advent of breastfeeding spaces there are rooms that are created with the expectation that I won’t be in them. These spaces dedicated to breastfeeding are unwelcome to cisgender men because they address a need that we just don’t have. Designing for inclusion doesn’t mean that each space meets the needs of everyone, but that the needs of everyone have a space that meets them.

Environments, schedules and processes tend to follow historical precedents which addressed the needs and norms of past times. Viewed from the median, such things were reasonable because they were developed to accommodate needs or comfort of the majority. In the lawsuit against Google it is alleged that oppressive discrimination was carried out against men and Caucasians by “putting applicants into a more welcoming environment based on their race or gender”. There are lots of innocent ways that an environment could be off putting to previously marginalized classes. Displaying the senior executive’s portraits seems perfectly reasonable until you consider that an all white over 60 executive board suggests to non-white and ambitious young applicants that their contributions may be discounted. In 2015 Schick Xtreme 3 ran a commercial on this exact thing. One applicant shaved his head to match the executive portraits, because every portrait was bald, to have a competitive advantage over all of the other haired applicants. An entire commercial based on the underlying assumption that looking like the hiring manager’s expectation is an advantage.

Google noticed that their process was failing to reach out to everyone? The horror! - Source

Challenges of conformity

To this day I feel significant anxiety on any decision that endangers my ability to just blend into the crowd. Being raised Roman Catholic in a village where the religious diversity was Catholic, Lutheran, Baptist, or Methodist meant that I was just one of everybody. After reflecting on all the cognitive dissonance that I suffered from by trying to square Christian dogma with observed data, I have stopped attending Mass or trying to explain away reality with faith. In conversation though I tend to remain silent when related discussions come up and just quietly understand the references that draw on the culture of my Christian upbringing. This is my first time spelling out that I see no value in considering the divine to anyone other than my wife or one brother. The assumption where I grew up is that one is aware of and believes in the resurrection of Jesus and the general assumption in American society is that one at least believes in the Creator, the god of Abraham. Even when engaged in a discussion where it is relevant like discussing medical treatments I will tend to silently conform when a participant brings up the divine rather than address the statement.

I have the option remaining silent when someone disparages based on race, religion, disability, economic status, family situation, sexuality, gender, citizenship status, or country of origin. That option is available to me because I have always ridden along in the illusionary safety of the median. I am ashamed to admit I have taken that option. It is available because I am safe. That is my privilege and my curse. My curse because I cannot be trusted fully by those who are targets. Will I stand up when showing up means I am putting myself or my family at risk? To distrust those of us watching from the median is understandable and to be expected. We have earned it through our comfort with being represented, with our blindness to our comfort. Living life in the median means we must become aware of it and then actively work to relinquish and share our comforts.

Beware the insidious propaganda of White Supremacy

I recently came across a tale being distributed by a family member that speaks to the subtle, insidious white supremacy I was raised with. The kind that focuses on the symptoms in order to distract from the underlying, systemic issues that caused it. The kind that sends a child off to college “knowing” that awareness of race itself is the modern manifestation of racism.

The white supremacy that sends a child off to college “knowing” that awareness of race itself is racism.

The tale comes from an organization that promotes bicycling as a way for minority youths to escape poverty. It’s a noble goal giving the youths a hobby that connects them with mentors, teaches them discipline and physical fitness, and helps them make contacts in the wider community. All sources indicate that the organization is excelling both as a successful cycling team and as a way to improve outcomes for its members.

So why am I mentioning a successful youth outreach organization in an editorial about white supremacist propaganda? Because as much as this program does for the youths whose lives it touches, it merely treats the symptoms. By equating the positive outcomes for these specific minority youths to the potential positive outcomes for the black community, it says this: buckle down! Just try harder and you can do it too! It says this while downplaying the barriers the black community faces.

Yes, I did just jump from youth raised in poverty to black youth raised in poverty. That was the first issue with the tale. The tale was posted and told of taking five of their youth, who live in subsidized housing, to experience the Confederate monuments. It was accompanied by a photo of five black teen boys and ended with their names, four of which suggested the teen was black. After the trip the youths discussed their experience and wrote their feeling from the trip. The whole recounting and presentation of the tale created an appeal to authority about the impact of Confederate monuments on the racial environment because the authors were black teens presenting their own feelings from the day. This appeal to authority is made explicit by the use, in triplicate, of the all-caps word “their”.

The dangerous propaganda comes in when the teens describe that these statues have nothing to do with the problems they deal with daily. Problems like violence, bad food choices, and failing schools. Don’t misunderstand me, these are real problems that they have to deal with. And of course monuments do not directly cause low income neighborhoods to be cut off from jobs, but they do serve as a visible manifestation of the institutional lack of respect for poor, black lives.

It was white supremacy that extended loans to white buyers while withholding the same from black buyers.

Decades of white supremacy have funded schools based on property value and devalued property that is primarily black owned. It was white supremacy that extended loans and sold real estate to white buyers while withholding the same from black purchasers, sometimes explicitly for the purpose of keeping property values high. These forces are not visible to students suffering in underfunded schools, and so it’s easy to take them to see Confederate monuments and have them write about the irrelevance of that monument to their daily problems.

What makes this framing so sinister is that these issues are real and need to be confronted too, both the acute symptom and the root cause. When bringing out victims of white supremacy to write about their experience of the symptoms in the face of a discussion of making progress on the causes, this is a bad faith presentation to shut down the conversation. If society is celebrating and honoring white supremacy then, as a people, black people will not be able to compete on an equal level.

White Supremacy dangles current hardships to distract from efforts to address systemic hardships.

Such framing is also used when attempting to keep the focus of mitigation efforts on the symptoms. When the conversation turns to how to address problems like poor schools or a lack of mentorship, then white supremacy brings out success stories like these youth outreach programs to dismiss the prevalence of the issue. Because these specific black people were able to overcome hurdles most white people don’t face, it must not be a real problem, white supremacists say.

So beware the insidious propaganda of White Supremacy. It dangles the existence of extreme current hardships to distract from efforts to address systemic hardships. It dangles the success of an exceptional few to distract from the widespread hardships faced by many minority members of our great nation. And all the while it reaps the benefits of the lie of “equality”.