I feel our humanity leaching away with each passing day. I feel it seeping from our collective body with each preschool teacher detained in front of their students. With each person dragged from their car and hauled off to a detention center. With each door ICE agents knock down without a warrant. With each person sent on a secret rendition flight to be imprisoned in a country where they’ve never been before. With each child dragged out into the street in the dead of night. 

And I hear the justifications in my head because I hear them all the time. “They were the ones who came here illegally.” “They needed to wait in line.” “They are criminals because they ignored the rules.” As if any of this justifies what we are seeing. 

Let’s be honest: what is the problem that we are trying to solve with these abhorrent immigration raids? It’s not a problem of increased crime rates because immigrants of all kinds commit crimes at lower rates than American citizens, and we have other systems to deal with crime: police, prisons, judges, juries. It’s not a problem of employment because most of those coming here without documentation are taking jobs that American citizens and permanent residents don’t want. It’s not a problem of resources because immigrants generate more resources for our governments than they take, since contrary to common misconception, they do pay taxes. 

The problem that some people are actually trying to solve here is the problem of working class unity. Please understand me: this is not a problem for working people – unity is our solution. It is only a problem for the wealthy corporate elites who want to keep us divided, exploiting those divisions so that their preferred politicians – Republican or Democratic – can be elected to do their bidding, which includes lower taxes for corporations and the wealthy, less regulations, and fewer resources devoted to food, shelter, healthcare, and education for us working people.

So I want to amend where I started. I feel our humanity leaching away – my humanity leaching away – but this feeling is an illusion. Those wealthy elites are ignoring their own humanity at their peril. But no one ever gives up their humanity, most of all we working people who are being victimized by the wealthy. Most of all undocumented immigrants who are being demonized, detained, and deported for others’ gain. In truth, every effort that we make to resist this oppression affirms our humanity. Every step that we each take to protect our undocumented siblings expresses our connection to one another. 

I reject my feelings. I embrace the truth: we are human beings – living, loved, and longing for liberation.

Please follow this blog by subscribing at the bottom of this page. And please follow me on Instagram, TikTok, and Mastodon: