What ICE is doing in US airports today, it will be doing at US polling places in November.

[ben@werd.social]

What ICE is doing in US airports today, it will be doing at US polling places in November. These photos aren’t funny or incongruous; they should be giving us nightmares. This has to end now.

[clarablackink@writing.exchange]

@ben The polls thing is part of it but...

Its easier to disappear people at airports. No one knows each other, everyone is anxiously in transit and airplanes are on standby to traffick.

People aren't concerned enough about now. This moment. This cruelty.

Its different than a community with neighbors and a sense of shared pride and community.

[rightsprung@c.im]

@ben

This is totally a practice run

[skoombidoombis@mastodon.social]

@ben precisely. My sister said ice with their military vehicles are a common site where she lives in the greater boston area. I said they’re prepping you for martial law and to accept the lie that it’s normal and that they’re keeping you safe.

[softspeak@defcon.social]

@ben

Trump will try to scare brown people away from the election booths, but we will rise the to the occasion. We will not be intimidated, in fact it will be...

CHALLENGE ACCEPTED

[joeace967@shakedown.social]

@ben ICE's presence in airports needs to be resisted as it has been in the streets.

[pattyhanson@mastodon.social]

@ben People (not anyone specific) say "this has to end" but most are unwilling to do what's actually required to make it end. The general consensus from the public & from our great members of congress is that street protests are going to do the trick & that's wrong. In the past during more "normal" times, protests could be effective. So were petitions. But so many refuse to acknowledge we aren't in normal times. The Kings Protest actually serves as flattery for Trump. It recognizes him as a king

[voteeveryelection@mstdn.social]

@ben agreed

[joeace967@shakedown.social]

@ben As a practical matter, people of many political stripes fly. Even a Kool-Aid drinking MAGA person showing up at an airport must think having ICE instead of TSA employees is a stupid way of doing this.

[freyjfreyj@mastodon.social]

@ben I agree with you.
I have a friend who has a theory that having ICE at airports is good, because then the clueless white people will become uncomfortable and begin to understand how people of color have been feeling.

[stonykark@mstdn.ca]

@ben @msbw it ends when you, personally (with a few thousand friends), end it. So many americans claim not to like any of this, but never enough to actually do anything about it. You have to DO something.

[phoenixserenity@beige.party]

@JoeAce967
Unfortunately, that's not the case. I saw several news vids of travelers being interviewed at various US airports where ICE was sent. There was several MAGA interviewed & almost all of them said that they don't have a problem with ICE in airports, that ICE is helping make the airports safer & that ICE aren't a threat because they're just standing around & talking to each other.

You can't cure some MAGA loyalists.

@ben

[geonz@mathstodon.xyz]

@freyjfreyj @ben It might not "be good,' but that could be a good side effect.
I think the goal was for people to feel *safer* -- these folks will protect them from those foreigners at the airport!!!
but honestly I don't think they know the posture to do that.

[dougiec3@libretooth.gr]

@freyjfreyj @ben
Also, my understanding is that ICE agents cannot wear masks in the airports and are subject to being photographed and their images posted.

[malstrom@metalhead.club]

@PattyHanson @ben Regardless, protests like No Kings still bring people together, boost morale, and help people make new connections and get more involved within their communities. On a local scale, these events have significant positive impacts, and they are by no means mutually exclusive with actual systemic change.

Frankly, I don't care whether Trump is flattered or not. He'd be flattered if he dropped a turd that resembled himself. And he's flattered by yes men in power every day.

[cassandra_complex@beige.party]

@dougiec3 @freyjfreyj @ben
Isn't it interesting how much better behaved they are in the airports without their masks than they've been on the streets? (At least according to the recorded images/videos - it's easier to delete the ones that paint them in a bad light too)

[bebadefabo@mastodon.social]

@ben document the ice agents without their masks now so we can cross reference their atrocities when they put the masks back on

[sharoncrockett@toot.community]

@ben@werd.socialhttps://toot.community/@SharonCrockett/116280953733978402

[alice@lgbtqia.space]

@stonykark I agree, but that's a lot easier to say than to do.

And folx *are* doing something. Millions of us are protesting, aiding the communities that ICE is attacking, posting to keep the stories alive, donating to causes that are fighting our government, doing mutual aid, filming and tracking ICE, voting, and a million other ways of resisting.

Everyone has a different threshold for "well, I guess this is worth dying for now". Usually that threshold is when they have no other option left.

@ben @msbw

[starlily@mastodon.social]

@ben Congress, who has the literal power to end it now, arent doing anything at all, because they are complicit.
Dems are controlled opposition, doing just enough to provide the illusion of resistance.

So what do you suggest?