Babies Are Sleeping on the Ground in Migrant Camps and You're Telling Me About Your Workout and Travel Plans

It’s hard to believe that after just four short months we are back in this place. Children suffering while a few people settle in their political sphere.

Do not be confused, this is evil in its truest form.

When I think about the small children sitting alone in migration camps, unaware of where their families are, possibly unable to understand the language spoken by the adults in the room. Patrolled by men with guns strapped into a holster that matches your eye gaze. I am left speechless. The pure inhumanity of it all is breathtaking.

As headlines crawl across my screens and news updates send small vibrations through my phone, words escape me for moments. I instead begin ferociously searching where I can best be of service. We donate. We call our representatives. But still, it feels as if it’s all to no avail.

Anger takes over next. We sit together deep in my chest. Small ripples through my stomach and into my fingertips, my hands clenching periodically.

This anger is no stranger. I know him so very well. I’ve sit with him before and I am sure I will again. It’s anger at my country and our representatives. Anger at the people blindly following orders, seemingly void of a moral compass. Anger that these institutions even exist and that people continue to feel like they smash into a brick wall every time they try to hit back against it.

And then the social media.

Oh anger scootch over, let fury join us.

I knew I would feel anger in this space but even I am surprising myself with its strength.

People happily posting about summer plans and fun new recipes. Beautiful runs and reflections on old memories. Beautiful summer nights with their own kids. And not even a muttering of what’s happening. No measly re-post or screenshot.

All while children sit in caged spaces with a small sleeping pad on the floor.

I will quote Dr. King, “SILENCE IS BETRAYAL."

It’s enough to make you break. The juxtaposition of pursuit of happiness and enslavement is deafening. You want to look away and yet, when you do, you can’t unsee it.

My urge to want to assume these people don’t care, this social media silence-public quiet on something that requires screaming voices for social justice-is coming from a place of experience.

Someone beautifully ingrained in my heart and a pillar in my family was tortured as a child. Exposed to endless trauma that has lasted a lifetime. And what happened when she wanted to yell out?

The world fell silent.

When we sought justice and redemption for unimaginable evil? Institutions worked to simmer us down. They banked on our pain growing and weighing too much. Our voices could be squashed down until we felt like it was all going out to nothing with no end in sight. We would grow weary and eventually need to take a break. And then, hopefully, stop. 

Picture a small flame that catches and then is smothered with a towel, quickly, before it spreads and burns the fucking house to the ground.

We are the fire and the institutions are the towel-waving, spineless, morally void people. People who encourage silence. People who remain silent. People who hurt those who fight the silence.

But if we all screamed? Oh yes, what if.

We would create hundreds of small flames that that towel-waving lunatic could never stomp out. We could burn the fucking evil, institutionalized house to the ground.
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If you are interested in contributing, here are a few organizations you could consider supporting:
RAICES
Asylum Seeker Advocacy Project
ACLU