It ain’t necessarily so, It ain’t necessarily so, The things that you’re liable, To read in the Bible, It ain’t necessarily so.
George Gershwin’s 1935 “Porgy & Bess” (lyrics by Ira Gershwin)
In my 33 years, and Jeffrey’s 35 more than that, American English has evolved.
Not always for the better.
In our respective youths, “incredible” was not synonymous with “very”. It meant “so extraordinary as to seem impossible” or “hard to believe”.
“Incredible” has come to mean “very”. That drains it of impact.
We find that very irritating.
In our youths, an American would not preface a statement with, “So, …”, unless the meaning was “Therefore, …”, or the “so” was being used for emphasis.
If we slip and reply to a question with “So, …” you may kick my polyester shin. (You’d regret kicking Jeffrey. His shin is titanium.)
The language surrounding refugees and asylum has evolved too.
Not always for the better.
In our youth, most lies about migrants were peddled by people on the fringe.
For the longest time, our country’s two major parties had immigrant-friendly members. Consider the Reagan administration. Eager to jail migrants, it also created the 1986 legalization (“amnesty”) program to give some unauthorized immigrants a path to U.S. citizenship.
Now anti-migrant lies come in a torrent from a leading political party.
Those lies have darkened the national mood, leading to policies that stink of autocratic bigotry and oligarchy.
Asylum applicants as a class aren’t criminals. They are exercising their legal right to ask for refuge. Almost all show up for hearings when our government gives them proper notice.
But they can’t get hearings.
There’s a 5 year backlog of asylum cases because billions of dollars that could have paid for asylum officers and immigration judges have been diverted into a gulag of 131 immigration prisons around the USA.
Tens of thousands of people with colorable asylum claims are jailed, sometimes for years, at an estimated taxpayer cost last year of $157 per adult per day—over $57,000 per year.
(It costs only $8 per day to release asylum applicants under government supervision.)
Politicians and businesses profit from the status quo. Private jailers like GEO Group and CoreCivic, and local governments that rent jail space to USCIS, and vendors who supply those (frequently appalling) jails, are paid billions of dollars in multi-year contracts.
Costly and abusive detention is a story that hasn’t changed in over 30 years.
“Reports written by experts hired by the Department of Homeland Security found that detainees were held in unsanitary and unsafe conditions, received negligent medical care and were subject to racist abuse.”
Plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose.
Our government jails tens of thousands of the innocent living.
What about the innocent dead?
We hear about border carnage. We are told that our country is being invaded, is under attack.
Lies.
There is no “invasion”. No “attack”.
The “carnage” is real. But Americans aren’t the victims.
The victims come to our country to exercise their right under American and international law to have our government hear their plea, and grant or deny them refuge.
Thousands have died in the attempt.
For Americans, the horror of mass incarcerations and mass deaths, done with our money and in our names, ought to be incredible.
So. Very. Incredible.
In the true and original senses of those words.
Alas.
The carnage is extreme.
It is credible. By definition.
We believe it.
Our stomachs turn.
Our hearts break.
When he photographs the dead, [Deputy Sgt.] Horta carries Vicks VapoRub to smear under his nose, downs menthol lozenges and sticks air fresheners in his car vents to mask the odor. It’s harder to suppress what he’s seen and heard.
“If they’ve been in the water awhile, their skin gets pruned and webby and starts to peel off. Their eyes, nose and mouth get swollen,” Horta said with a far-off look in his eyes. “For a while, I couldn’t sleep.”
By the end of 2022, Horta had recorded 225 deaths. He said it bothers him when no one claims a body, so he tries to do what he can. This past Thanksgiving, 11-year-old Cristal Tercero Medrano of Nicaragua drowned while wearing a bright-yellow Tweety Bird sweater. Horta worked with Border Patrol agents to identify her. Not long after, they found the girl’s family. Relatives sent in a photo of Cristal wearing the same yellow sweater.
“I get mad, as the father of a little girl,” Horta said. “There should be a process that isn’t the river. It gets to me, but I have to be a professional.”
Ride for Human Rights 