The Silence of Our Friends

A Real Ally

Yesterday in the Toronto Star there was an article about 9 year old Kevin Yourdkhani and his family being released from T. Don Hutto "Family Residential Facility" which is actually a medium security prison. That's right, the US government is imprisoning children who have been convicted of no crime other than being born to the "wrong" parents. Kevin and his family were travelling from Guyana to Canada when their flight made an unscheduled stop in Puerto Rico. It is there that their nightmare began with the US government taking them into custody.

The family was released with the aid of a real ally. From the Toronto Star:

In Dallas, a wealthy property manager who helped spring the family from prison without ever meeting them, said yesterday: "I'm so happy. I pray to God that Canadians welcome that family home. Now it's on to the next family."

Ralph Isenberg, 55, who said he has suffered his own immigration nightmare over the status of his Chinese wife, has vowed to get all the kids out of the T. Don Hutto detention facility and force officials to shut it down.

"The conditions are atrocious," Isenberg told Canadian Press from Dallas. "When I see an injustice where I can do something, I step right in. I'm not afraid of these bastards. To hell with 'em."

Isenberg got involved after reading about Kevin Yourdkhani's plight and covered the $1,000 (U.S.) needed for travel permits while also offering to pay the legal fees of the family's Canadian lawyers.

He says the U.S. Immigration Control Enforcement is out of control. "They need to be put out of business.

"(They're) creating terrorists of the future by jailing kids 9 or 10 or 15 years old."

A colourful, blunt-speaking individual, Isenberg tears up when discussing how detainees are treated by authorities.

"I've seen the faces of the children who've been in there. Those kids are damaged goods," he said.

"I may not have been in prison, but I certainly know what this government is capable of doing to anyone and everyone.

"If we do this to foreign nationals, it's going to be us next."

It's too bad more Americans can't see as clearly. It's especially galling when it's people who call themselves liberals or progressives. These crimes against humanity are happening in our backyard. But there is barely a peep or mention in passing from our "allies" about imprisoning children, without health care, education, not enough food, not enough clothing, little or no play time or any toys or games at all. Next to nothing said about children being separated from their parents, nursing infants separated from their mothers. Next to nothing said about these people imprisoned without access to attorneys or telephones in horrible conditions. These are people who have been convincted of no crimes, if they were, immigration violations are civil offenses, but they are being treated like murderers with the quiet acceptance or willful ignorance of most Americans.

Read what is happening in your country; see what T. Don Hutto is really like. Here's an editorial from the Houston Chronicle - An Outrage.

It needs to be spelled out for some. Don't expect people of color to take your concern and fury over some abuse committed by governments and people in other countries seriously, when you ignore human rights violations and the vile treatment meted out by your own government, and we see the unconcern of the American people, including you. We know you are acting out the part of the colonizer. "Look at the bad people over there, but we're so good over here." It's an excuse, the colonizer says he wants to right other people's wrongs, while stealing their resources and lining the colonizers pockets. We're aware of history as the colonized, even when the colonizer has amnesia. When we see you are willing to remove the beam from your eye, your distress about the speck in your brother's might be more credible.

posted by Donna at 12:09 AM |