Don't go in the water

Going to a foreign country as a tourist is like going to a beach on another planet and looking at the beautiful ocean not knowing or feeling the world inside it and only being able to make intellectual guesses at best based on what you've read or meer past possibly completely unrelated experience and just standing there not even getting your feet wet.

Taking in the Chaos

I feel like my whole day every day consists of taking in the chaos and then making enough sense of it to know what to do next.

Stuck in reality

Age has created a hardened shell that protects me from my dreams.  Doesn't allow me to access the realm of imagination.  I remember as a child waiting around through the dumb and boring part of Mr. Roger's until they got to the Land of Make Believe.  I would write stories in 3rd grade that were pages and pages long, I couldn't stop going on about things that weren't real.  My mom told me that she got me a set of colors or paints when I was 2-3 years old and the day she gave them to me I sat down in the morning and painted and wouldn't eat or sleep and would shush her away every time she got close to try to feed me or see if I was ok until she found me passed out on the floor at 11pm with my hand in the air clutching a paint brush.  I have remnants of these imaginative moments but can't just call on them any time, and don't fall into them as often as I used to, and have this idea that in my 40s the shell is covering more of my brain.  I wonder if the dreams of make believe are still there?

The abstraction in the mind, the imagination, the dream state that sees a truth that may not be logistically or literally possible is what makes a story or work of art timeless.  The future is unpredictable and what seems impossible, unrealistic, and wouldn't even occur to anyone in the present, could be the norm in the future and this is where the magic of the dream state comes in because it doesn't come with any universally defined edges and it's inexplicable content can fit into anyone's cultural box.

Chollas

La Cholla se acuesta llena de espinas, que penetran al suelo y pican al que les interrumpa
Brotan verdes brillantes del tronco que pierde sus picos mientras se mezclan con la tierra
Los hijos ahora arraigados aspiran hasta penetrar el cielo vacío,
Su propio peso los rompe de si mismo, caen, acostados en la madre.

The Cholla lays, spikes on its front penetrate the dirt and on it's back yell "get away."
New green branches sprout from the original body whose spikes dull as it mixes with the earth
The now rooted offspring aspire up until they penetrate the empty sky
They break off from themselves under their own weight, falling down into the mother.

Can't we all just get along? How enforcement at the border is not only false security but also creating great harm.

The only reason it seems complex to get rid of enforcement at the border is because powerful entities are behind keeping it intact.  I started innocently with the fun idea of people getting to know each other across barriers at US/Mexico border through the fence.  I honestly didn't see anything activist like about it and I certainly didn't think that DHS would try to stop it in any way.  It didn't seem like it would be part of their job so it didn't seem like they would have any reason to be against it since it was done in an area that was designated for this type of contact and making friends and creating trust could actually contribute to security.  It may seem incredible for people who know how Border Patrol works, but that is exactly what I was thinking.  When I realized that they didn't approve, it didn't hold me back.  People who had been fighting border patrol abuses for years liked my work and were intrigued at my innocence.  I remember having a conversation with Christian Ramiriez one time around the point where I had realized that BP was a major obstacle to making friends through the US/Mex border fence that included me saying something like if we just continue to make friends through the fence eventually their power will fall away.  I still think that's true but I  now believe there has to be something more done about their power simultaneously or maybe even first.  I believe this because I've discovered over the years that Border Patrol is run by a policy that puts enforcement first over everything and they are in charge.  I'm not against enforcement but I've come to be against it because of the lack of priority in the policy.  I mean, I think enforce has it's place.  I'm not, for example against having police officers.  I think, in that case, there are more abuses than there should be and than that we even know about but I don't think the solution is to get rid of police officers completely.  Not so with Border Patrol.  I honestly believe that everyone and everything would be better off if there were no such position as a border patrol agent and there were no such thing as enforcement at the border (walls, sensors, etc.).  I don't say this as a radical statement in order to gather attention to the abuses that most would agree need to be curtailed some how, I say this because I've come to this conclusion through many years of seeing things that convince me of it.  At times when I wasn't even thinking about it and at times when I was completely expecting enforcement agents to react in a way that would creat safety and instead they created more violence.  The conclusion I've come to is that they are present along with all enforcement measures at the border in order to maintain an image of protection as opposed actually protecting anyone. This is not to say that there aren't border patrol agents who have saved people's lives, I'm sure there are.  My thesis here that seems extremely obvious to me at this point is that first the enforcement doesn't complete with it's stated purpose of protecting people from harm and second that the measures taken in order to maintain the image that they are in order to justify their existence are inhumane, killing people and ruining the evironment every day.  The main real reason I think that the Border Patrol is there is to maintain an image of protection more than to protect is because I catch them lying on a regular basis about the dangers in the area that justify their presence.  To give a few examples, a customs agent told when crossing the border once in 2010 that there are 120 US citizens killed a week in Tijuana.  I knew this was wrong but I looked it up just for the hec of it and it turns out there were 200 US citizens killed in all of Mexico in the previous 10 years including those involved in cartels and accidents.  Another example: I met the new chief of the san Diego sector border patrol in the beginning of 2011 and asked him how he liked his new job.  He told me that it's a lot different than his old one in AZ because here he covers much more area, a total of 64 miles and mentioned that there are around 115 aprehensions a day.  This seemed like a lot but I normally only frequent about 3 miles and most of my time is spent within the last 1/2 mile up close to the fence so I thought it acually could happen in other areas of his perview.  "Wow, where are most of the aprehensions, out East?"
"No, the majoriity are right here in this area."   We were standing at friendship where I had spent several days a week for hours at a time for the preivous ten years or so and seen maybe 3 aprehensions in all of that time.  We broke off the conversation for to talk to someone else who had a aproached and I stood there stunned comprehending that he had just made that up.  Other agents have told me (before and after that conversation) that it's a very dangerous area.  When I tell them my experience has been different, they say it's because I don't come at night.  I've been watering the bi-national garden there since 2007 on a regular basis and nearly always at night from the Mexican side at a variety of times between 7p and 2am and not only have i never seen any violent acitvity, about 50% of the time there are no agents present.
Ok, so it's not ok that the US government out and out lies about what they are doing at the border in order to maintain an image of keeping us safer from bad guys, but what's worse is that the measures that they take in order to maintain this image are literally killing people, ruining our environment, and separating people from their families and from strangers who they could learn from, make friends with, and enrich their lives with new perspectives.  I should clarify that I don't mean that Border Patrol agents are going out everyday and shooting people for no reason, although that has happened and probably more than we know, the major offender is what they call "Border infrastructure" ie, border walls.  The most obvious example of this inhumane murderous policy in somewhat recent history is Operation Gate Keeper which was implemented in 1994.  Before it's implementation, no more than a dozen people were dying every year crossing the border, after, while crossings dropped around 92% in the SD/TJ area, overall crossings have stayed the same or fluctuated in same way according to the economy as before and the number of deaths shot up to between 200 and 400 every year.  I would be remiss if I didn't mention that the walls themselves aren't the root of the problem, but rather multinational commerce that forces people to migrate.  If we want people to stop leaving their homes to come to El Norte to feed their families, than these all powerful multi-national corporations who control both the US and Mexican governments need to be stopped from exploiting people and natural resources wherever convenient.  The walls created after operation gatekeeper, which were implemented as a supposed strategy of stopping people from crossing, were installed just after NAFTA which ironically opened doors and tore down walls for multi-national corporations, namely the agricultural industry, to do move into areas in Southern Mexico that forced millions of farmers and indigenous people off their lands.  The walls were a measure, possibly an honest one, to try to stop the anticipated flow of people coming North.  This is sinister no matter how you look at it.  Even if the walls would have worked to stop people from crossing and no one dared to go East into the desert so no one died trying to cross, they would have been forced to stay home and starve.  What, really, were these people supposed to do? What would you do?  There were uprisings that were mostly crushed by mexican military trained by the US although the Zapatista movement had some limited success in keeping some of their land in Chiapas.  So the real long term solution, for which there is a shift toward in the immigrate rights movement, is the "right to stay" in which people are not forced off their through invasion and through government subsidies.  That way people could make a living at home and have the choice of where they wanted that home to be.  When/if this happens, one of the pretexts given for walls (to stop people from coming into the US and taking US jobs) would disappear.  But there are more pretexts given, and since 9-11 this reason has now been combined with one of national security in order to keep people in the US safe from criminals, terrorists, and, since around 2008, from violent drug cartels.  Going back to my first point, none of these walls and other enforcement measures, have stopped terrorists or criminals from crossing the border and, even if they did, how would it be better for humanity if these criminals were made to stay in Mexico?  So the walls and enforcement aren't working to do what they say they do but back to my second point that not only is this the case but they are causing tremendous damage.  Besides the immediate crisis that has been immediate since 1994 but little has been done to change the policy, and resulted in officially as of 2009 over 5,600 people who have died trying to cross the US/Mexico border, there is the long term degradation of our environment which will result in the end of us all in the long term if not mitigated and has already resulted in the loss of valuable habitat to the sustainability of border regions.  In 2004, there was a bill that passed the house and senate that ceded authority to the Department of Homeland Security to override "Any and all laws" in order to build border infrastructure in the Western most 3.5 miles of the US/Mex border.  I heard about this and with help form an environmentalist friend, staged a protest to try to stop it and there were other efforts to try to stop the bill from passing by the Environmental Health Coalition and American Friends Service Committee.  The bill still managed to go through as a tag on to a bill to approve money for Tsunami victims.  In mid 2007, then Chair of DHS, Michael Chertoff, used his waiver authority to override 30 something laws that were protecting these last 3 miles from further infrastructure, including the Clean Air Act, The Clean Water Act, and The Endangered Species Act.  I was living right by there in San Ysidro and would go out and film the contruction that actually started at the end of 2006 little by little by the Army Corps of engineers and then accelerated ten fold just before the waiver was signed when they contracted Kiewit construction company.  I still wish I would have had the gumption to stand in front of the bulldozers to gather more attention to the issue.  It really seemed like no one was paying attention and DHS would talk to no one and my blog and youtube videos weren't working.  But the accelaration of the pace did manage to gather attention and a group formed that made a valient effort to try to stop the wall.  The group was eventually called Friends of Friendship Park.  This park is a bi-national space at the furthest Southwest part of US meets the furthest North West part of Mexico and it is where I started doing the Border meetups back in 2004.  Friends of Friendship Park is still together and has had some success in regaining access to the bi-national area since access was cut off in the beginning of 2009.  What motivated me to join and help form Friends of Friendship Park was my original goal of creating friendship across cultural barriers.  This was my priority and the activism that came about in trying to keep the park open seemed like a necessary short term step in order to get back to being able to make friends across barriers.  I've become ever more aware of all the forces that are creating the walls including the most powerful industry on earth, the defense industry.  I feel now that my priorities have shifted in the area of Friendship Park from one of events to one of structure.  Creating a space that defies and overcomes the walls.  I think that if something similar to James Brown's design for a bi-national park were implemented and the model of the bi-national friendship garden of native plants were adapted as a priority over enforcement at our border, than the space they create would allow the friendship and collaboratation needed to happen naturally.  I see signs of this with Jame's Brown unshakin dedication to making this park, with how the garden is becoming considered more and more as part of local policy for Border Patrol and how there is more of air of bi-nationality in the mainstream than ever before with a Mayor of San Diego who preaches it as his central focus, and with environmental groups of the region forming bi-national coalitions to improve the water shed and working together to clean and improve the region more and more.

Snowden could further save the day, if he were gay.

I thought of a clever status update on facebook,  "I'm glad Snowden is safe now that he has Asylum in Russia, I hope he's not gay," based on the latest news of abuses and hate toward gay people and asylum for Edward Snowden in Russia.  But, before I posted it, I started thinking about Vladimir Putin's actions as of late and decided if Edward Snowden were to come out as gay or say anything that sounded gay-friendly (or if the NSA found some record of him talking on the phone or writing in an email about some homosexual thoughts, feelings, or actions he may have had, he-he) than this would be quite a dilema for Putin and a possible good thing for humanity and relations. I'm not encouraging Snowden necessarily to do it, as he has already sacrificed his career and family life and possibly his own life, to create an escape route out of this corporate consumer fortress constructed by US defense industries.  I don't know if he would have it in him to try and save humanity from the current Russian "straight" jacket.  But if Snowden did decide to take on the gay rights cause in Russia, I don't know if Putin would actually extradite him. I'm starting to think Putin's real motives aren't quite what they seem.

The two top headlines in the news about Putin right now are his approval of a law that forbids saying anything positive about being gay and giving Edward Snowden temporary political asylum.  Meanwhile, in the US, two of the biggest headlines about President Obama are that he has expressed very strong support for gay rights and his fierce condemning of Edward Snowden's whistle blowing.   Putin's exact opposite stances makes me wonder if he really is homophobic and if he really does believe that Snowden deserves asylum or if he's just doing it cause he wants to snub Obama.  

Could it be that Putin's main priority is really to do things to spite the US?  If so, what would he do if Snowden came out as gay or bi-sexual or even just said something in support of gay rigths or something good about being gay?  If he lets Snowden keep his Asylum status in this case, he's supporting a gay rights' stance and if he terminates the asylum status he's saying he doesn't approve of Snowden's whistle blowing.  Either way he'd be agreeing with the US and might have to retract that middle finger sticking up into the Star Spangled Ether.   He would be forced to answer the question, are you ok with Snowden even though he's gay?  His answer would force the issue of gay rights in Russia and force him to either come out as a full-fledged homophope that doesn't care about saving Snowden and the fact that the US wants to set another example of what happens when you undermine their tyranny (ie Bradley Manning, Juian Assange), or break his own law in support of a gay person and US law in order to defend the right of dissent exercised to save the people from their government.  For political reasons, if not humane reasons or both, I like to think he would choose the latter. This would create a situation where Russia would right their wrong on homosexuality in addition to bolstering the current possibile results of Snowden's actions of a full disclosure of the sinisterness of the weapon's industry in the US that could create a sort of rehab for US addiction to war.  If Snowden did this, both countries would have to bury any hatchets starting to rise and they'd end up be on the side of compassion and understanding and be able to work together in the name of human rights and a peaceful future.  I wonder if Snowden or Glen Greenwald has thought of this.  

Foot note - update/correction: This was written before Chelsea Manning publicly came out and changed her name from Bradley.

Border security thought

 I hate that the word security when talking about the border has become a synonym for militarization/enforcement.  What about x-border friendship?  environmental collaboration?  family unity?  Aren't they part of border security?  What about the fact that enforced borders has done more damage than good already and has mostly served as a profitable obstacle for multi-national ag companies and the defense industry while serving as a fatal one to thousands of people, animals, and habitat?  this doesn't seem like security to me.  You might think I'm crazy, but I actually think this insane "border surge" idea is a good sign because it shows how desperate those who are hanging onto the politics of fear and corporate profit are as they see the world evolving and borders disappearing.   I'm thinking it's part of their last desperate throws to hang on to something that doesn't exist.

Monocarpic longing

The Agave cries out a beautiful humble thirsty stalk alone in the desert
Waits for attention for nurture but turns them away with spikey leaves and survival
It still longs for nourishment as it grows slowly ever more independent and strong  
Until one day, a century later, it realizes what it has to offer and the thorny thriving rosette dies as it shouts out a flower.

Could the revealing of BP abuses by Varied Perspectives Help Change the Enforcement First Policy?

I wonder if the libertarian groups challenging unconstitutional checkpoints within the US borders because they are infringing upon their right to move about freely will at some point realize they are fighting the same battle that what they call illegal immigrants are fighting.  They are very frustrated and pissed off and rightfully so at unchecked border patrol abuse.  I hope that that frustration will sway them into seeing a similarity in the common humanity they have with immigrants who are facing this repressiveness every day and that that common link will lead them to realize that, in the case of the immigrant, the US gov't is not only restricting their movement  but is part of a system that is forcing them to move in order to survive and then, in many cases, killing them for moving across the biggest checkpoint on earth.  I hope it helps them transition from backing citizen rights to backing human rights when they see that they are being abused in the same way  that other fellow human beings are being abused by the same people.   The videos are popular on youtube of people refusing to state their identity at checkpoints within the US and they really do show very well how BP can do/say whatever they want, and really have no legal or moral base to stand on in their enforcement measures.  Maybe when they see cases like Anastasio Hernandez Rojas who was tazed and beaten to death while unarmed, they'll realize that the abuses they receive could some day reach that level if nothing is done and they'll feel the urgency even more to stop the abuse. The similarities of the abuses by Border Patrol in both cases is astounding, it really does seem like the same problem to me even if the basis for disagreeing with it is slightly different .  It'd be great if the libertarians were to see the connection, that would help liberals like Pedro Rios and Christian Ramirez who are fighting every day to change the enforcement first US policy to humanity first.  I think I'm going to send a video of BP abuse of a migrant to one of the libertarians posting stuff about BP abuse at unlawful checkpoints within the US and see what they say.  To be continued...

How finding and following your path could solve the world's problems

Hay muchas crisis en el mundo ahora y muchos que quieren resolver todo, encontrar la solución de todos los problemas.  Esto es imposible porque no todos pensamos iguales y nunca podemos estar todos de acuerdo en cuál es el problema más grave, en qué debemos de enfocarnos como prioridad.  Entonces lo único que podemos hacer es girar hacia adentro y encontrar nuestro propio camino lo que nos dice nuestro instinto que es el camino indicado para mi.  Siguiendo ese camino y no esperando que otros lo sigan también, porque la verdad es que es imposible que otra persona siga un camino que no sea suyo, podemos realizar el camino destinado para cada uno de nosotros, vivir una vida plena y sentir satisfechos que hemos cumplido con nuestra contribución al mejoro del mundo.

The best way to make the border disappear is to do activities at the border that ignore it.

The open ride of life

You know  the "airplane effect" where you say things to the person sitting next to you that you wouldn't normally be that open about because you know you'll never see them again?  Well, I just had a fleeting though that life is like an airplane ride so you might as well be open with everybody you have a chance to be because after life's over you'll never see them again.

The 'Dan "I don't want to say"' experiment

This is a recount of what happened when I refused to state who I was when crossing the US/Mex border on April 3rd, 2013.  My digital recorder was taken away and the recording erased by the BP agents so I wanted to write it all down before i forgot.

I moved into the final part of the line and pulled out my recorder.  "Oh shit, the battery's not working."  Scuffle, scuffle through backpack, "Damn, where are those damn batteries..?  Oh, wait, the recorder's on hold."

I walked up to the agent with my arms crossed.  "Don't give me any drama."
'What? how did she know?', I thought to myself.
She was a bigger lady and very matter of fact.  "Your documents please."
"Nothing against you, I know you're just doing your job, I don't want to show them."
"You don't have any documents on you?"
"I do, I just don't want to show them.  I want to go to San Diego"
She pulls out the orange slip to send me to secondary inspection apprarantly unaffected by the whole thing, "What's your name?"
"Dan"
"Dan..."
"I don't want to say."
She says "Dan..." and then, as she writes in the last name box, "I d.o.n.'t   w.a.n.t.  t.o.  s.a.y. Ok, put your bag down beside you and grab it with your left hand.  This way."  As she leads me from behind steering me over to the seating area next to the counter facing the pedestrian booths and hands the slip to the very young officer and the older Philipino officer next to him and mentions some things about it and goes back to her post.
Just after I sit down a middle age Mexican man sits down in the same area with a big sigh about 6 chairs away.  The three officers at the counter stare blankly at their screens clicking their mouses seemingly unaware of the bright orange slips laying beside them.  Another young man comes into the area and sits in front of me and tells the cleaning lady how he got mugged last night and got all his ID stolen.  He got called up and then the middle age guy got called up and sent back and then called again, "Ya me encontraste o sigo siendo pollo? [Did you find me yet or am I still a wetback?]"  He said as he went back over to the counter.
A good 45 minutes went by and several others came through and I was beginning to get the idea they were avoiding me for some reason maybe to send a message since they knew I was doing it on purpose and I was wondering how long they'd make me wait and asking myself how long I was willing to wait.
"Daniel?" said the boyish faced very white agent.
I put down my book and went over.
"Where were you born?"
"No offense to you officer I know your just doing your job.  I don't want to say. I just want to go to San Diego."
"Why don't you want to say where you were born?"
"I'm making a statement that the policy of enforcement has been over emphasized and is causing more harm than good."
"What harm is it doing?"
"It can incite violence and is ruining the environment in many areas."  That didn't come out exactly the way I planned.
"Have you heard of a thing called an international border?"
"I'm aware of where we are."
"You know if you don't identify yourself we can keep you here for three days?"
Shrug. smile.  I had no idea if that was true or not.  It did make me wonder how that would work, but I figured it'd better to just not say anything.
"Ok.  Have a seat."
Another 30-45 minutes went by and several more people went through.  "Daniel?"  this time looking directly at me and calling me over.
I don't remember now what questions he asked exactly but it was more of the same of him asking me to give personal info and me refusing.  Then the two officers were behind me on my side of the counter.  "Put your hands behind your back."  He handcuffed me, not angry, and we walked in front of the pedestrian line with him holding my back and the other Philipino agent carrying my bag.  I didn't notice if anyone was staring like I do when I'm in line and someone gets taken away in handcuffs wondering if it was an excessive use of force or not.
Once in the back holding room, "I'm going to release the cuff on your left hand and I want you to put it on the counter and not move it as soon as I do."
"Ok"
"Now the right. Spread your legs.  Farther."
Both agents were there along with 3 other people in my position to my left with more agents.  He patted me down more thoroughly than I've ever been patted down and the other agent helped him take everything out of my pockets as he asked me questions and tried to fill out a form and convince me to give him personal info.
"Ok, so where were you born?"
"Yeah, sorry again, I don't want to tell you that."
"Alright," he said appearing to understand, "You're gonna have stay here for a while if you don't tell me.  You'll have to get finger printed.  I don't think you want that you'll be here for a while."
"I don't want to say who I am, I'll follow the procedure if that's what it is and I have to."
"You'll get your stuff back and you're not under arrest."
"So why am I here?  Am I being detianed?"
"You're being detained," answering the first question saying the word detained almost at the same time I did.
The other officer continued taking stuff out of my pockets and putting them on the counter, tinkerbell wallet, big wad of keys, cell phone, digital recorder.  He couldn't quite get it out and realized it was because it was wired up to the my shirt collar.
"I can unclip it but I need to move my hand," I offered.
"Go ahead."
He stared at it for a sec and handed it to the other officer who asked, "was it recording?"
"Yup"
"We're going to have to erase this." he said to me.
"Why?" I asked.
"Federal property." said the young one.
"Yup" said the other "Illegal to record on federal property."
I looked at him and shrugged.  He nodded which, looking back on it now, I think he took my shrug to be consent.  I really had no idea if they were lying or not about it being illegal to record and, in my head, I was actually thinking well, if it's true than I guess it's ok to erase it, and I think he saw that in my face and took it as a consent and erased everything.
They put all my belongings including my shoe laces into my backpack.  "You'll get all your belongings back."  As they led me through another door passed the fingerprint counter into a large hallway. "Sit over there at the bleachers." he pointed to some plastic chairs under another counter with officers at computers.  An older man scuffled over like I did trying to keep his shoes on without shoelaces and sat next to me.  "Ya me entró frio." He said under his breath.  I got the feeling he wasn't quite there all the way.
A young American guy with a tattoo on his arm sat in the chair on the other side of me.
"Hey.  You got to keep your shoe laces, huh?"
"Yeah, I'm in here every day.  All the officers know me."  He explained that he has a warrant on him in Pennsylvania  he lives in Tijuana, and every day he crosses to go to work in SD and everyday they hold him to see if Pennsylvania wants to come get him but they never do and then they let him go to work.  "We could be back here 15 min or we could be back here 2 hrs, just depends on the mood of the agents doing the finger prints."
Intermixed with that info, I gave him my story as well.  "You should've saved yourself some time and just told them where you were born."
"Maybe...this is kind of an experiment."
He asked me what I do and I told him all about Border encuentro.
"Oh, I see, you're a hippy." giving an approving chuckle.
"Yeah, I guess I am kind of."  Later in the conversation we were talking about different ways they can identify us and he said "yeah, we're loosing our rights everywhere."
"A lot of people agree with that," I said although that wasn't the point of my protest.  "What I don't get is why they don't just look me up at this point.  I saw the agent pull my driver's licenses out when they took everything out of my pockets and he read my first and last name out loud and my birth date."
Just then, "Daniel?" said a very tall and somewhat overweight blond female officer who appeared to come out of nowhere, towering over me in a slightly annoyed voice.
"Yes?"  looking up from my plastic chair hidden under the counter top.
"Where were you born?"  now in a VERY annoyed tone.
"It really is no offense to you personally, I just don't want to say."
Now yelling, "HOW ARE WE SUPPOSED TO KNOW WHO YOU ARE?"
"I don't know, the other officer mentioned you were going to take my finger prints?"
She stormed off down the hall.
My Pennsylvania friend turned to me, "She was pissed."  I could tell he was kind of liking the whole action now.  And the old man next me to me shivering just a little.  "Hace frio verdad?"  I said to him.  It was a little chilly, but I think he was mostly scared.
The Pennsylvania guy turns to me and said something about how it seemed like she was going to hit me or something.
"When they get like that, I do everything I can to make sure I don't get riled up and say something personal."
About 20 minutes later... "DANIEL!?!"  A very large black man in uniform had now stepped into the large female blonde officer's spot.
"Yes."
"WHERE WERE YOU BORN!! AND DON'T GIVE ME ANY BULL ABOUT FINGERPRINTS!"  Although he was definitely yelling and acting pissed off, I got this overwhelming feeling that it was just an act although it was also a bit scary.
"I apologize.  I don't want to say."  I said in a very calm voice.
"STAND UP!"
I obeyed.  He grabbed my arm and helped me scuffle down the hallway.  Muttering frustrated phrases under his breath.  We rounded the corner to his office, "WHAT THE FUCK DO YOU THINK YOU'RE DOING?"
Again very calmly, "I'm making a statement about the overuse of enforce at our borders.  Nothing personal."
"YOU THINK YOU CAN COME INTO MY BORDER AND JUST DO WHATEVER THE HELL YOU PLEASE?"  We were now inside his office.  "SIDOWN!"  He yelled giving me a gentle push.   He stayed standing, "WHERE WERE YOU BORN!"
"I don't want to say."
"WHY DON'T YOU WANT TO SAY?"
I started to explain but he cut me off.  "HOW OLD ARE YOU?"
"41", I said instantly wondering if that wasn't a tactic to try to get me to divulge more personal info.
"WHY ARE YOU ACTING LIKE A TEENAGER WITH THESE SHENANIGANS.  YOU THINK YOU CAN JUST DO WHATEVER THE HELL YOU WANT?"
"I don't think..."
"THE ARE SHENANIGANS!  Ok, if you don't want to tell me who you are I'll just send you back with the Mexican PD,"  this sounded very fishy to me.  I shrugged and said, "Ok"
"He stood me back up and escorted me back to the bleachers, yelling at everyone in site, "I GOT THIS GUY, GET HIS FINGER PRINTS, FLORES, GET MEXICAN PD ON THE LINE I'M SEND THIS GUY BACK WITH THEM."
The Pennsylvania guy was really finding this interesting now.  We were talking really low so they couldn't hear us.  "he was saying some serious shit.  He's the supervisor so he doesn't want to look bad in front of his inferiors like he can't handle a situation on his shift."  
"yeah, i don't know if that's true about the Mexican police or not.  I don't think so, but it could be."  I said.
"HEY, STOP TALKING.  I don't want to hear any talking."  Came a voice from behind the counter behind and above us.
"Ok, sorry." said the Pennsylvania guy.
I few minutes later, I found myself at the fingerprint counter with an Asian agent with muscles bursting out of his uniform.  "Ok you can go back and sit down now."
I went back over to the bleachers next to Pennsylvania   We both wanted to talk but didn't want him to get into trouble and have to stay longer.
The supervisor came over again, but it seemed like a whole different person.  "Daniel?" he said in a very nice calm voice.  "Come on over here."  He waved me to come with him instead of standing me up like last time.  I walked with him back to his office, noticing him smiling the whole way. "Please, have a seat", as he sat down too.  He had obviously changed strategies. "So where'd you go to college?"  I just smiled and said, "sorry i don't mind conversing but I don't want to say anything to reveal my identity"
"That's ok.  You don't have to tell me.  No problem.  So, tell a little more about why you're doing this.  I'm really curious.  I've been here for 12 years and I've never seen this before."
I explained again how enforcement is causing more harm than good and this was my protest against it.  At this point I had been detained for almost 3 hours after standing in line for two and I was a little weary and hungry, but I was managing to think mostly clearly.
"What do you mean?  Like what kind of damage is it causing?"
I gave him the clearest example that I could think of at the moment of how Operation Gatekeeper shut down most undocumented traffic in this area in the early 90s and it shifted into the desert and the number of people who died trying to cross went from 6-12 a year up to 300-400.
"Ok. So what are we supposed to do if some criminal wants to get into this country and hurt someone?  We have to know who people are."  Good point, I thought, but he didn't give me time to say it. "I know that 98% of the people who cross through here illegally are honest hard working people.  Where do you think the people that come through here are from?  Do you think they're all Hispanics?"
"By Hispanics, do you mean Mexicans?"
"Yeah"
"I think so, but you tell me, Central America?"
He shakes his head no.
"China?"  I guessed.
"Iraq, Afghanistan."
Anyway, we went on this way with us both sharing our political viewpoints including me addressing his point about how enforcement is needed to identify criminals that could hurt someone by saying that it's true and it could save someone's life but that it's causing so much damage that it would be worth the risk that someone dangerous might get through.  "The only solution, then, is to just open the border, then, right?" He said.
"Well, I don't know what the solution is, but i think getting rid of most enforcement and just letting people cross freely would be worth the risk at this point, because there are people who do harm on both sides of the border and this enforcement is causing separation and fear of the other that can lead to animosity and even violence and the infrastructure, the wall are ruining the environment."  None of what I said seemed to annoy him or make him want to make a strong argument against it and he didn't try much, he just went on about some personal stuff about himself mentioning how he spends a lot of his free time helping poor "Hispanics" around where he lives.  And that he was in the Marine Corps for twenty years and used to be more of hard-ass until he became a border patrol agent and started seeing the human side of things a bit more.  Writing this it sounds kind of like he was just bullshiting me revealing personal stuff so that I'd reveal mine and, well, he might've been, but it seemed very sincere at the moment.  All this talk was peppered with personal questions to me, but never with any pressure, "You're a college graduate aren't you?", "So where do you work?".  I was half thinking I was ready to give up at this point and his tactics were sort of working on me and I revealed some personal info.  I told him about Border encuentro and that I'm a Spanish teacher.  The Border encuentro answer sparked a whole nother conversation about borders and immigration.  When I said I'd rather not answer a question, he made sure to tell me that's no problem and just kept up the friendly banter.
"So, when are you going to send me off with the Mexican PD?"  at this point knowing that he was never planning on doing that.
"You see, I don't even want to do that."
"So what are you going to do with me?  The agent outside said that you could keep me for up to three days.  I'm not saying I'm going to do this, but what if I don't reveal anything for three days, then what would happen?"
He got a half smile on his face that told me that the 3 day thing wasn't true, "I'm gonna turn you over to someone, I just haven't figured out who yet."  This was probably kind of honest.  "Maybe the FBI."
"Can't you just figure out who I am by finger prints or my name and birth date on my driver's license?"
"I have to get a commitment from you telling me who you are."
"But I could tell you I'm anyone don't you have to verify it anyway?"
"Oh yeah, we have to verify it too."
I decided to give up. I felt a little like maybe I was taking up too much of this guy's time.  It had to be killing him to be this nice to me.  Or at least that was my rationale at the time, maybe the hunger and tiredness was convincing me.  "All right, I've wasted enough of your time, what do you want to know about me?"
Once I told him, he didn't say he was going to let me go, he just kept saying come with me, to different areas and continued to be super friendly.  I had a fleeting though that maybe this was a trick or something to take me somewhere horrible, but that wasn't the case at all.  Some agent said to him as she saw my file, "he doesn't have a record or anything?" kind of in astonishment of why I was back there.  "Just giving you a hard time, huh?"
He didn't answer, and seemed sincerely ok with me and what I'd done and got my stuff and walked me personally out the door to the US as other agents made motions to do it for him, he waived them away and would say "I got this one, thanks."
He shook my hand.
"Sorry if I made you job difficult today."
"No problem, a pleasure meeting you." with the biggest smile yet.

Breaking Good and Coming Alive - Life after violent formulas of our culture reflected in TV shows

A couple weeks ago, I posted one of my new year's resolutions on Facebook to not watch two popular violent TV shows "The Walking Dead" and "Breaking Bad".

I decided a few months back that one of my new year's resolutions '13 was going to be to not watch Walking Dead or Breaking Bad. Newtown really made me more aware of how violent a culture we live in and it just doesn't feel right to watch shows that contribute to desensitizing us to violence. It's a great resolution because it also frees up time as opposed to using time like most resolutions :-).

One of my best friends, Jason Cabassi, who has a podcast on the Walking Dead and loves Breaking Bad, wrote this:

One of the reasons why I like Breaking Bad, by the way, is that the violence has a lasting impact on the characters. The show doesn't take violence lightly, like many others do. The characters almost always experience lasting guilt and pain as a result of violence, and when they don't, when they become desensitized to it (as Walter White has), it's a major theme of the show. I'm not saying people wanting a peaceful world should watch this show  But, I do think this show is smart and thoughtful about how it portrays violence and can, for example, give action movie junkies pause for thought.

 I see that about how violence has an impacting effect on the characters in both shows and I do think that it's bettter and I also agree with him about the desensitizing of Walter White to violence because it has a well developed explanation as well, a strong message about how someone could become desensitized to violence and therefore, the show doesn't take it lightly in that case.  I still, kind of like my friend Marshella commented on the post ["I totally agree! I find myself not being able to watch violent shows anymore - I actually hide behind my hands like it's a scary movie, and I have to say that I'm glad my instinct is to react like that now."] , don't like to watch the violence, but I think, if you're going to use violence as entertainment, it's better to make it as real as possible.  I don't like the war movies where people get shot or stabbed and just make a little uuf sound and fall dead.  I think that desensitizes more than if it were to show a death that mimicked what it's really like for someone to die.  So  both shows DO take it more seriously than other movies and shows that use violence as entertainment.  I wish that violence weren't a major entertainment value in general in TV shows and these are the two of the most popular shows on cable TV.  They also participate in the “really cool kills” phenomena where people get their throats slit or get stabbed through the eye (in which case the person didn't die and gave a vengenace speech afterwards which was kind of Tom and Jerry like [Reference my buddy Nathan's comment:  The US has experienced a drop violent crimes. I think it is because kids art watching Tom and Jerry and Looney Toons, where mutilated characters come back from the dead only to seek vengeance on their tormentors.
], or their heads exploded (and I'm not talking about Zombies which would be another discussion of wether violence against them counts or not, or counts as much).  I think using violence for entertainment, manipulates a violent instinct that is inside of us and doesn't really have any purpose except to shock us or to outdo other violent shows and therefore perpetuate the violent sort of competition.  Quentin Tarentino definitely wins the prize in this competition, which by the way watching Django Unchained at the end of last year was definitely an influence in my decision not to watch these shows. 

The other more broader message about violence that I don't like about the shows is that they both follow violent conflict formulas that exists in American culture.  Like I mentioned based on my long lost friend, except for Face book, Michele's comment [Just read a great essay in the book NurtureShock, which points out how kids who watch shows on PBS can be just as emotionally aggressive as kids who watch violent shows. One of the reasons is that so much of the show is about building conflict with little time spent on the actual resolution. Reading the essay really pin- pointed one of the aspects of tv shows that I dislike. Unlike a good read, the resolution may not happen for years with a series. Granted, novels don't place much time on the resolution either; however, when we read, we don't spend years watching and indulging in conflict. I can't say that it is simply the violence of the tv series that is the issue - rather a combination of constant conflict with violence.], both shows are in constant anticipation of a major violent showdown, a war (Rick's group vs. Deadwood, or Walter White versus Hank).  Their buildup is used to “get us excited” and keep us watching.  To me, this supports a formula in society where eventually you have to have a war in order resolve things.  War and violence, in my opinion, is not only the worst way to try to resolve problems but arguably is what causes problems in society, especially in today's age where war is sold and justified to the American people in order to support an out of control war for profit defense industry which, I'd go as far as to say, is ruling the world.  Which brings me to another formula in Breaking Bad that feeds into  the justification of violent conflict in our society.  The formula that creates US/Mexico division and categorizes Mexico as a wasteland or war zone and Mexicans as either Violent Narcos or poor people and creates this false fear of Mexico and its people.  All the characters from the US in Breaking Bad are very well developed, they are complex like real people, the mark of a very good show/movie, while nearly every scene in Mexico, on the other hand, is in either a desrt wasteland sometimes with the background of people in complete destitude who don't say anything, a drug lab, or a rich narco's house and nearly every character's development from Mexico can be summed up to evil, psycho, narco killer.  People who watch the show, don't even realize this because this false idea about Mexico is so ingrained in American culture that they just take it for granted.  In fact, it's so ingrained, that I wouldn't doubt it if the show's producers or some of them at least feel justified in not bothering to develop the characters from Mexico, don't see it as necessary because they themselves to certain extent think that's the way things really are.  And the popularity of the show further ingrains this damaging formula in US society that contributes to division.

I don't know if I can avoid being influenced by violent formulas in our society and I'm sure that violence in TV shows and movies isn't the number one contributor to the Newtown shooting for example.  I'd say, almost for sure, that that would've happened even if neither of these shows ever aired and, instead, Downton Abbey and Malcolm in the Middle were the two most popular cable shows.  But because these two top shows are based on violence as entertainment and reflect some of the deeply ingrained formulas in our society that create a violent culture, I figure by not watching them, I'll be doing my part in contributing a little less to this culture, and maybe have a little extra time to do something that contributes to my self development and society as a whole in a positive way.  Isn't that the spirit of a New Year's resolution?

So many experiences

So many joys

So many opportunities to help and to love

So many curiosities...

I wish I could ignore time