Dear Us,
Here is a comprehensive list for how to survive the coming invasion from our neighbors to the south.
- Breathe. Now I understand from the most recent scientific study that this is actually a natural process to which you need to dedicate very little personal attention. But if you are in doubt, set yourself an iPhone to iWatch to Alexa mixed with Siri reminder. Turn Oxygen into Carbon Dioxide. Repeat.
- Eat. This really isn’t a problem for us in North America. It is definitely possible if you are reading this list on an electronic device. Lots of options out there. Healthy is harder. But just eat food. Enjoyment is optional.
- Sleep. Again, this is one of those things that scientists suggest happen naturally. Sleep deniers will tell you that sleep needs to be caused by chemistry mixed with activity, but I’m pretty certain that they will be proven wrong in the long haul and sent to the historical heap with flat earthers and people who think that licorice tastes good.
I’ve always wanted to do an ordered numbered list blog. People who coach successful blogging say it is a good way to get views. Hooray! We did good blogging!
Can I make an unnumbered suggestion about what is coming from Central and South America to our southern border?
Humans.
To be sure, there are a LOT of humans coming to our southern border, but I know that because of the way it is being handled, that primary definition for the mass of organic matter moving northward is being lost.
I don’t blame the president or his political allies for defining it as an invasion. That has not helped anything, I know.
I don’t blame the president’s opponents who cry foul at his very breath, not to mention the words he spends his breath saying. They have done a good job at dehumanizing these people too.
You know what I blame?
The Walking Dead
Think about it. When the zombie movie first made its big surge onto the big screen our country was in the midst of communist fear fever. Masses of Russian people intent on feasting themselves on our valuable resources stood ready to come and just consume our largesse.
What else have we allowed ourselves to look at this mass of people as than 7,000 plus mouths to feed. Because we are, on average, a compassionate people, we see this group of people approaching and sense their need. They will need accommodation. They will need food, medicine, school, service… maybe a Netflix password?
And I’ve seen southern Texas. No one really wants to hang out there.
We look at 7k people and imagine them moving down the Main Street of the town in which we live. And we fear that. It’s a mass of walkers from The Walking Dead. Suddenly, they lose humanity in a mob of need.
Military and police have zombie drills and zombie contingency plans. Why? Because it’s a lot nicer to give people spoopy makeup and play zombie apocalypse than to drill against actual people, imagining what would happen if such a group would go from needing to taking.
This is not the first such crisis we’ve ever faced as a nation.
In the early 20th century another situation developed because of an immigration policy created for votes and not for human interest. In the late 19th century, when America was attempting to recover from the Civil War, it became a popular idea to ban immigration from China.
Ugh… I can’t type “China” without hearing the president’s pronunciation go bouncing around like a rapidly deflating balloon.
Anyway, because we banned all incoming Chinese people, many of them ended up in Canada. More of them ended up in Mexico.
One Poncho Villa later and suddenly the Chinese people he terrorized in Mexico had no other place to run than the border which Villa would raid across but would not permanently cross. Camps were set up with the question of what to do with all of these illegal Chinese immigrants.
Enter Blackjack Pershing. General Pershing would go on to ultimately lead in World War I, with genius, finesse, and strength. He established his bona fides in the Philippines, creating the very first surge doctrine to put down a Muslim Jihadi uprising. In Texas, he led the Army’s response to Poncho Villa. Ultimately, he toured the Chinese camps and did not see need. He did not see take.
He saw opportunity and men and women who would work.
So he petitioned the government for temporary legal status for all of the Chinese people on the border to run his military camps, cook their food, set up their tents, and all of the logistical needs. And just like that, a political inconvenience was transformed into people.
That kind of transformation is how we un-mob people, by the way.
In Harper Lee’s book To Kill a Mockingbird, which I recommend reading often, Scout demonstrates the failsafe way to un-mob a mob.
Outside of the jail cell of a man who got railroaded by the 50’s mentality of “believe all white women” stood a mob of men who were ready to take justice into their own hands and render the execution before its pronunciation. Enter the little girl who knew each individual man by name. As she called them by name, they separated their anger and mind from the mob back to rationality again.
The man was saved for the moment.
I’m not saying we have to take all of these people into America. I’m not saying that it will be easy.
What I am saying is that we must not look at this mob of people like the zombie apocalypse. It’s 7,000 souls who must be considered people first.
Receiving them will be our military who have hearts that will break as they look past lethal and less-than-lethal weapons at men, women, and children. Remember their humanity too before you shake our spears.
The solution will not be easy. But let’s get our hearts and minds in the right place before we let Donald Trump, Nancy Pelosi, Chuck Schumer, Greg Abbott, and Beto O’Rourke politicize them into a zombie mob.
Love,
Them
Love, Them 