I knew they would come early in the morning. It’s supposed to be a secret. There are no secrets in this village. I am leaned up against my dirt bike. Taking photos because that’s my job. I am writing this on my tiny computer. I sneaked around some storage trucks and drove into the grove of trees that look out onto Head Start’s parking lot. A dirt bike can go almost anywhere. I do not really need a road. Poor people often have their lives unrolled in parking lots. But this one takes the cake. Cars are beginning to drive up to the spot where children are dropped off for the day. Mom and Dad head for their jobs in the community.
The parking lot is actually crowded now with kids and cars. Boom. I am typing this as it happens. The US Army arrives as if they want to kill. Lights. Sirens. Cops. Kids crying. Adults crying. Four-year-olds are told to put their hands out for the plastic hand cuffs. While daddy is being wrestled and held on the ground. The guns come out for that one. Why does it take five guns to arrest an unarmed man. Who could be an American. No one is asking questions. People are being put on a bus. Without their children who now go to county jail. They channeled pretty princes and princesses.
These kids will know all about jail and prison. Read Genet and be tearful. Read Paul Bowles. Jails all over the country are being designated as “Immigration Centers.” You all, are known far and wide. You have exhau
You can be put on that bus, too. The felon is playing the violin. The felon rapist decides whether you live or die. In time, he will kill us all.
ICE public relations is closed for a week. A complete lie. Never believe anything ICE says. When they trot out this butch woman to speak to the press, she explains how all of this will be okay. Maybe OK for her. It is now a crowd of my neighbors. This is Big Trauma for the kids. To lose your parents and you have to go to jail. We do not have pitchforks. But I wish I did. They want to know where their children are. US Army soldiers scream at the parents to SHUT THE FUCK UP. They look like teenage boys. They are shoving women around. The teachers fight back.
Did you grow up in a school where the teachers are fighting the United States Of America’s military might. These four-year-olds are bad criminals. They are going to love jail. Execute them.
This. Is. Abuse. This. Is. Abuse. This. Is. Abuse.
This is the American way. Violence against children. Who can’t talk back.
They cannot see me. When I arrived, all you could hear was the wind. I am looking at teachers putting their faces into the faces of the armed teenagers. Who will do anything they are told to do. They have no agency and they are more fidgety than a burlap bag of cats. It’s stunning. I feel like I am going numb. “But we have voices.” Perhaps they have met the New York Times comment moderators. They and they alone could solve this problem -- or any other problem -- the people who restrain us demand they will decide who is who.
Over my dead body.
They moderate nothing. They sit there and go no, no, no, no. This scenario is much like the scenario treatment by NYT. Their MO is to use terror to move you from A to B.
Maybe there are journalists involved while they are on the phone.
Maybe they’re here for the NYT to grab a story (I know a story when I see one). NYT has one voice and it’s stupid. A lot of people will get caught in this. Americans have already been identified. What they are saying to me is: Fuck you we don’t like you, and you can be put down, too. We do not mean shit to them. Some kid just out of high school feels terrorized he has to terrorize. Get that gun out of my face before I just take it, Grunt.
No. You really don’t have a voice because no one wants to talk to you, and they have no intention of letting you speak to anyone.
I was a teacher trainer for migrant Head Start. The schools were located in Immokalee, Florida. I love those women. They do not make shit. Yet they pitch right in, and I have taught thousands of children, and I had never seen such activists who were grieving as everyone arrested (including the fours) are being punished with a ruthless fervor. They wanted to grab them fast before the parents could use their phones.
This is a moral fight for morality. They were under a time restraint because they were really nervous about the cameras of journalists showing up. So. Are journalists really getting this story. Are they actually going to the places they are talking about. Do they know any of the children in head start. This is not about the felon rapist.
This is about waves of soldiers who are teenagers, and we go after Russia for the same damn thing. Children with guns. Do these kids know what they are doing with those guns. America’s answer to everything is the gun. Or do they write stuff Miss Journalist Perfect this at their perfect desks. My experience with journalists tells me they rely on phone calls. You get nada for effort. Hang out at Head Starts. Then clobber them over the head with it. Front page or go home.
We are flexed for the long walk home.
The jungle uniforms tell more about you than you can know. We have failed all our children. Even as we struggle to survive, we have failed our children. But no, Oh, sit down.
I go telephoto. I am looking for names and name tags. There are none. I want faces. I want license plates.
Mister Rawlins will run them through AI’s wringer and by the end of the day, I will have facial recognition. If they can use it, we will use it, too. I am doing a tech workshop with parents.
I am teaching migrant workers how a computer works. You can actually change your location perimeter programs to appear to be somewhere else. There are a lot of ways to hide your ass from the Internet. The Internet does not save everything. That is a wicked wives tale. “Unfortunately, you have to throw your phones away. They have too much data like phone calls to Mexico. Unfortunately, the phone is not your friend. They knew where you were. They know where you are right now."
I'm stunned. Not stunned enough.
Tell all your friends that America wants to kill your children. Mitya hands me a ripe water melon. I push that thought hard. Hecuba handed a pencil
Sluged itself like a gulpThere has to be more than weeping to change any of this. They do not care if you weep. They are the army. We are now fighting the military. In order to fight soldiers, you have to be prepared to die.
And so do they.
I talk a lot about Act Up. They had have a big effect everywhere. Today, people also want to know: What happens to our HIV meds. Things get touchy when people I teach people to how to use those confrontations. Sit down strikes work. Because business can’t operate without workers willing to be abused one way or the other. If they catch me here, I will be put on the bus. Also, we need visible photo journalists who can understand that we are not the story. The demonstrators and sit downers (my fav) forget to pull a switcheroo. Have visible photographers taking photographs of the soldiers and people who are involved at this deep level of darkness. All of this is fiction.
Now, they are lining up the men. Looking for guns. Head Start was about children. Head Start is the victim here. These dedicated people are being shit on by a rapist.
I see an adolescent girl separate from the main group. She’s sneaky. She’s crouched down between two parked cars.
She saw me bush deep in trees. Another gunshot into the air. My little world has always been ruled by. Dada. My life is surrendered now to rat coat and I want that coat, too. Alice has the ear thing. It drained Kansas of electricity.
And people call me the autistic one.
She races to me.
Get me out of here.
Two people on a bike is called riding shotgun.