http://www.buzzflash.com/articles/interviews/077Naomi Wolf:
Americans imagine that there is still recourse. Ordinarily, there is recourse, with checks and balances in place. What we need Americans to think about is how the ability to physically threaten Americans on a most personal level will change that.
None of us knows in our bones what it's like to live in a police state. My warning is that, when you get a state using violence against the individual in the act of suppression of democracy, you change your whole reality. Most Americans have a sense of physical invincibility. If we sign a petition somewhere, if we register as a Democrat, someone might know about it, but we still can't believe that anyone would ever hurt us in our democracy.
But people should be aware of how aggressively this administration has sought to assert the right that it has to call any American an enemy combatant and to mistreat them on a physical level. They've been very clear. Think of the abuses against Jose Padilla. And Dick Cheney has said he's outside the system, right?
But what happens after you are arrested, or I am arrested, or someone we identified with is called an 'enemy combatant', or after the first journalist or an editor is charged under the Espionage Act, or after more people like Brandon Mayfield experience break-ins in your home? And their computer's taken. Their kids come home to find that their house has been broken into by the state. As that begins to become not a bizarre exception but part of the landscape, I promise you, based on the historical record, the kind of recourses we assume we have as free people protected by the Constitution will vanish, because people just aren't willing to take physicals risks -- understandably.
I, personally, as a mother, am willing to risk arrest in a strong democracy, because I assume that my innocence will protect me, or the First Amendment will protect me, that the courts are fair, that I'll get good representation and I will not get hurt in prison. But would I be willing to risk three years in a Navy brig? In solitary confinement? No.
And history shows that it doesn't take many such cases to close down an open society. Author Greg Palast was investigated by Homeland Security, and it's kind of a joke. But when fifty critics of the administration are investigated, it is a tipping point. And history shows things get quiet after that very very fast.
Everyone has to draw the line somewhere -- and this is also a lesson we need to learn from Germany. How can so many good people have done nothing? Because once you introduce state terror against the individual, you completely change the landscape of what we're willing to risk, understandably. And I just want to kind of conclude by saying we need to reverse these laws, because all of the actions that we can still take in a democracy to restore democracy, we will be scared to take after that next tipping point. . Ordinarily, there is recourse, with checks and balances in place. What we need Americans to think about is how the ability to physically threaten Americans on a most personal level will change that.
None of us knows in our bones what it's like to live in a police state. My warning is that, when you get a state using violence against the individual in the act of suppression of democracy, you change your whole reality. Most Americans have a sense of physical invincibility. If we sign a petition somewhere, if we register as a Democrat, someone might know about it, but we still can't believe that anyone would ever hurt us in our democracy.
But people should be aware of how aggressively this administration has sought to assert the right that it has to call any American an enemy combatant and to mistreat them on a physical level. They've been very clear. Think of the abuses against Jose Padilla. And Dick Cheney has said he's outside the system, right?
But what happens after you are arrested, or I am arrested, or someone we identified with is called an 'enemy combatant', or after the first journalist or an editor is charged under the Espionage Act, or after more people like Brandon Mayfield experience break-ins in your home? And their computer's taken. Their kids come home to find that their house has been broken into by the state. As that begins to become not a bizarre exception but part of the landscape, I promise you, based on the historical record, the kind of recourses we assume we have as free people protected by the Constitution will vanish, because people just aren't willing to take physicals risks -- understandably.
I, personally, as a mother, am willing to risk arrest in a strong democracy, because I assume that my innocence will protect me, or the First Amendment will protect me, that the courts are fair, that I'll get good representation and I will not get hurt in prison. But would I be willing to risk three years in a Navy brig? In solitary confinement? No.
And history shows that it doesn't take many such cases to close down an open society. Author Greg Palast was investigated by Homeland Security, and it's kind of a joke. But when fifty critics of the administration are investigated, it is a tipping point. And history shows things get quiet after that very very fast.
Everyone has to draw the line somewhere -- and this is also a lesson we need to learn from Germany. How can so many good people have done nothing? Because once you introduce state terror against the individual, you completely change the landscape of what we're willing to risk, understandably. And I just want to kind of conclude by saying we need to reverse these laws, because all of the actions that we can still take in a democracy to restore democracy, we will be scared to take after that next tipping point.
Printer-friendly format
Email this thread to a friend
Bookmark this thread
(1000+ posts)
Send PM |
Profile |
Ignore
