On my morning walks, I pass a house with a prominently placed law sign that reads, “The power of the people is greater than the people in power.” I’m not only thankful for that reminder but encouraged by it. Human history informs us that oppressed people eventually turn on their oppressors in desperation and they topple those in power.
We’ve seen the pattern where ego-driven dictators, always greedy for admiration, power, and money surround themselves with malicious sadists to do their bidding. Tapping into human insecurity, they manufacture fears and find scapegoats to punish while simultaneously promising security and prosperity to everyone else. History just keeps repeating itself as if these men are reincarnated. Their determination to remain in power amid their inevitable economic and social failures leads them to punish opposing voices with violence, imprisonment, exile, and economic coercion. In the process of strangling freedoms, innovation suffers, the economy suffers, and the most highly educated self-deport. Lacking economic growth and opportunity, the masses find themselves impoverished, sickly, and gaslighted to the point of outright rebellion.
We are not there yet. However, we are clearly on our way. We see signs of our demise in the cabinet appointments that favor loyalty over knowledge and expertise. We see it in the scapegoating of undocumented “brown-skinned” immigrants as criminals, crazy, or job stealers to feed the bigotry of insecure white suprematists. How is it even conceivable that this administration defies the Constitution and yet expects courts to allow it? Or how cruel to cut access to food and healthcare for poor and disabled people to give tax breaks to the wealthy while simultaneously reducing incentives for charitable giving among those same wealthy people? It’s ludicrous to believe that we can cut medical research and still cure diseases. Or that we can pollute the environment and expect to have clear air and water. Or that we can deport experienced farm workers and still plant and harvest enough produce to feed the nation. Or that we can ignore victims of natural disasters and expect them to recover without assistance. Or that we can scare away the best and brightest students and scholars by cutting Pell grants and denying or revoking F-1 visas without losing the competitive innovation that drives progress and economic growth. And only a simpleton thinks imposing tariffs will bring economic prosperity and not economic hardship.
Before we go any further down this road to destruction of our representative democracy, economy, environment, common sense, and even human decency, we must each find and activate our own path to resistance. Mine is writing this weekly blog, having conversations to educate others, making social media posts, writing to lawmakers, and donating to legal funds and resistance groups. I’ve seen actors perform protest skits, singers and songwriters perform protest songs, cartoonist post protest cartoons, marchers protest in the streets, community members record and post brutal ICE raids, journalists quit corporate media and set up their own podcasts, lawyers file lawsuits, priests and pastors defend the gospel in public, democrats make speeches and show up at detention centers, and community organizers organize strategies. Now is still the time for peaceful protest. Every opposition voice is needed in whatever way it is expressed. Sometimes it may just be imparting information to a friend or loved one. Other times, it might be a simple sign on the front lawn. Or it may be refusal to show up at the military parade.
I’ve also seen a kind of silent protest happening in unexpected places. I stopped shopping at Target on February 1st because of their public rollback of DEI following threats from the Trump administration. However, I pick up my prescriptions from the CVS located inside the store and I’ve noticed an absence of people who look like me. What I also noticed over the past few months is an increase in the photos of black and brown people pasted all over the walls and that the black and brown products remain on the shelves. I’ve also noticed that television commercials continue to feature people of color and that television shows and theatre productions have not slowed their production of shows featuring ethnically diverse casts. Demand for children’s books by non-white authors continues to increase. And a great variety of sports are becoming increasingly ethnically diverse.
We defeat the white Christian nationalist agenda when we stubbornly continue to appreciation our diversity, promote equity in our decisions, and simply include folks from different backgrounds in our daily activities. We win when we succeed at our jobs. We win when we thoroughly educate our children on matters of history, civics, and morality in opposition to the educational agenda of white nationalists. We win when we refuse to stop talking about our checkered history and find ways to insist on being better and doing better than those who seek to belittle us. We can turn their hateful actions into teachable moments. The mid-term elections can’t come soon enough to turn this ship around. So, find your resistance voice, whether loud or quiet, and use it every single day.
Many statements that you made I agree. But you , Democrats must take responsibility for TRUMP 47 presidency. As a FBA, I FULLY SUPPORT TRUMP AND ICE. We U.S. Citizens must get ALL of these illegal immigrants OUT OF OUR COUNTRY. I’m a native Californian and hate what the Democrats has allow this state to become. Many Areas looks like nasty Tijuana. English speaking US CITIZENS can’t even get jobs here in California. But until Trump go after the business owner who hire these people, the property owners who rent to them, and the citizens who knowly hide and protect them. TRUMP will fail the mission to get millions of illegal immigrants out.
Native Californian Who Have Had Enough
Thomas
I agree that Democrats blew the 2024 election by waiting until it was too late to have a real presidential primary. They allowed Biden to run again when he was clearly too old. I wrote to him and the DNC numerous times that we needed a new candidate. And I vigorously supported Kamala Harris once she became the nominee. Unfortunately, I also knew that bigotry and misogyny were too strong for her to win what should have been a no-brainer. So, yes, I agree with you that democrats are responsible for the Trump win.
Where we truly disagree is with regards to the deportation of undocumented immigrants without due process and the way people are being hunted and kidnapped, separated from their families, and put in deplorable detention centers. These are human beings. Yesterday my husband and I passed the empty farms where there are far too few farm workers. That tells me that there aren’t a lot of Americans falling over themselves to do the farm jobs, construction jobs, housekeeping, and meat processing. Some of the workers are here legally, but they too are too afraid to work because ICE is kidnapping those people as well. Let’s be real. Historically, California (and the rest of the country) has always relied on imported labor. Whether slaves in the south or cheap Chinese labor to build the railroads. This whole idea of documentation is a new concept. Most of the citizens in this country come from people who entered this country without documentation, simply seeking a better life for themselves and willing to work for it. Our guest worker program is woefully inadequate and has been for many years by design because there are powerful rich white men who fear replacement by people of color if they grant these people legal status and a path to citizenship. It’s pure racism. No human being is inherently better than another or more deserving of a particular job than another. I admire the courage and drive of people willing to leave everything and then work their butts off for a chance at a better future. Whether fleeing poverty, violence, or persecution, our Statue of Liberty has been a beacon of hope for the hopeless.
Let’s be real. If employers had access to an abundance of Americans willing to do this work, they wouldn’t be hiring undocumented labor in the first place. They tried and failed. A little history lesson is called for. California was part of Mexico until we started a war and took it from them. Many Mexicans can claim this as their native land because it actually was. Ever heard the saying, “I didn’t cross the border; the border crossed me.”? We have a broken and inadequate immigration system. It remains broken and inadequate. Men like Trump and Steven Miller and most Republicans want to limit immigration to white people. They believe the jobs brown people are doing are “black jobs”. Personally, I prefer my children and grandchildren have choices beyond low wage manual labor jobs.
We can agree that we’ve both had enough. I’ve had enough of white supremacy, and I’ve had enough of people thinking they are better and more deserving of the opportunity to work improve their lives simply because they were lucky enough to be born here. We are all human beings and deserve to be treated with dignity and respect. I’ve had enough of a broken immigration system that fails to meet the needs of employers and encourages illegal immigration as a result. Those who are willing to work hard will always find a job. Those who aren’t will always look for a scapegoat to blame for their failures.
They come here and disrespect Blacks people who has paved the way for them and ALL other groups to come via our civil rights struggles. I come to have NO empathy for any immigrants period. I was not raise to be this was, but the Democrats and immigrants have made me come to despise them. I totally agree with and support Trump and ICE when it comes to deportation. Deport the WHOLE FAMILY. The Hispanics FAFO, thinking that when Trump said he would have the largest MASS DEPORTATION these fools thought that he was talking about BLACK AMERICANS. It’s sad that Blacks like you are still defending illegal immigration, this is why FBAs are choosing to delineate. You should read Dr. Claude Anderson to understand what the game is. And we FBAs know that it’s going to get real rough . But we always survive. And the less immigrants we have to fight the better. 😊
“They” is a category that encapsulates an entire group of people. It’s an overstatement to say the least and generally inaccurate. As a Foundational Black American (FBA), who has spent many hours teaching, advising, and being friends with many immigrants, most of whom were legal and others who were undocumented due to extenuating circumstances, I can say that I’ve always felt respected by them. Anti-blackness is a white suprematist’s export throughout the entire planet. They even have many of us distrusting and hating ourselves. The reality is that I’ve been disrespected by countless white men and women throughout the years. Just the other day, a white man crossed the street during my walk demanding to know if I lived in this neighborhood. I’ve had white women lie about me, make rude assumptions, and insult me. I’ve had white men try to sexually assault me behind closed doors on three separate occasions. I’ve had white people try to undermine me at work. I’ve had nurses belittle my pain. Believe me, immigrants aren’t the problem. The people calling to remove DEI policies, black history, ban books, curtail voting rights, and rename military bases after Confererate leaders are white people, not the immigrants whom you hate so much. We aren’t fighting against immigrants; we are fighting against racism. Competition for jobs is normal. Employers always seek the cheapest labor. My point is that you don’t allow yourself to be a puppet because those same people who are going after immigrants today, will be coming for FBAs tomorrow using their enhanced and unethical criminal justice system.