by Robert C. Koehler
And here I am, an American, staring at the border again . . . and slowly coming to realize the paradox of it. Borders don’t actually exist. They’re invisible lies. They’re also virtually everywhere.
Consider the border Alex Pretti crossed on Jan. 24, on a street in Minneapolis, as he stepped between some U.S. Border Patrol agents and the woman they had just pushed down. He crossed the border that separates ordinary people from the federal Proud Boys (or whoever they are), the masked invaders who were occupying the city to enforce The Law. Pretti interfered with them! He dared to try to protect the fallen woman, who herself had just crossed the same border. In so doing, they both went from being ordinary citizens to “domestic terrorists.”
“Yet our greatest threat isn’t the outsiders among us, but those among us who never look within.”
The words are those of poet Amanda Gorman, who wrote a poem honoring Alex Pretti after the agents shot him 10 times. Another killing! Oh my God! Another cut to the American soul — a cut, by the way, that comes with complete immunity, according to Team Trump. They’re waging civil war against those who cross the border that separates right from wrong. “Fear not those without papers,” Gorman’s poem continues, “but those without conscience.”
You know what? As terrifying as the idea of a new civil war sounds, I prefer it to something worse: a great national shrug and acquiescence to the Trump agenda. ICE, as so many people have pointed out, is acting like the Trump Gestapo, as his administration rids sacred (white) America of the brown-skinned other, who may or may not be immigrants. What matters is that they’re different from “real” Americans. Right?
Regarding the whole concept of the border: It seems so real and viable until you start questioning it, which includes looking into its history.
As Elisa Wong and Raymond Wei write: “The way that we think of borders today, as firm boundaries that are violently enforced, is a relatively new thing, and we would argue it doesn’t serve humanity’s best interests. While ‘strong borders’ are often argued as a necessity for our security, we think they limit humanity’s potential as a global community.
“In ancient times, rivers, oceans, and mountains marked the boundaries of territory. . . . As humans began building kingdoms and empires, more walls began to form, thus more firmly delineating borders.”
And in Medieval times, from around 1000 to1700 A.D, European kingdoms started engaging with each other in a state of unending warfare, violently squabbling over the limits of their territory. And plunk! Global borders were created, and whole contents started getting divided almost randomly into European territorial possessions.
“At the Berlin Conference in 1884,” Wong and Wei write, “European leaders met to carve up Africa for themselves, which split local tribes across arbitrary lines and laid the groundwork for ethnic conflicts that still rage today’”
Oh, let us evolve toward a trans-border world! This is the core of the American civil war that is now, seemingly, getting underway. This is why protesters are flooding the streets in Minneapolis and across the country. This is why they’re enduring pepper spray and tear gas and flash bang grenades. This is why some people are being killed. But the rational — effective — response to violent aggression is not counter-violence.
“Anger and hatred are natural in response to such atrocities,” David Cortright writes, “but it is essential to avoid causing physical harm, to maintain a nonviolent intention and commitment despite increasing government provocation. A major outburst of protester violence would be disastrous, diverting attention from the message of support for victimized communities. That’s exactly what the White House is hoping for — to cover up ICE abuses, reinforce their lies about violent protesters and justify additional domestic militarization.”
And he quotes — who else? — Martin Luther King: “Hatred multiples hate. Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that. Violence multiplies violence.”
Yeah, that’s the world as we know it: endless war. But America’s new civil war must not — will not — go that way. “Loving ICE” doesn’t mean accepting their actions or their purpose, but rather, challenging it head on, courageously and nonviolently. What we choose to love fully and unconditionally is Planet Earth itself — a planet without borders — and all who live within it. Yes, that includes ICE agents. It includes Donald Trump. But loving them also means standing up to them — and handing them their conscience.
Robert Koehler (koehlercw@gmail.com), syndicated by PeaceVoice, is a Chicago award-winning journalist and editor. He is the author of Courage Grows Strong at the Wound, and his album of recorded poetry and artwork, Soul Fragments.
