> Are any of those things threatened and need defending?
If you don't think authoritarianism or fascism actually has a way of harming those things, then no, I guess not.
I think for most people who had to learn about these things in school growing up, for like 7 years or something, together with grandparents who experienced these things for themselves, it's pretty clear what's happening, but without actually having that perspective, I could understand it feels like "What is everyone so upset about? Doesn't seem so bad".
It’s a disservice to the horrors of the Holocaust to implicitly compare returning Mexican nationals to Mexico, Somalis to Somalia, or hell, even Venezuelans to El Salvador with sending box cars of people to death camps.
The US has had and enforced immigration laws for decades, with Obama alone deporting 3 million people.
What aspect of Trump doing it is uniquely fascist/authoritarian?
> What aspect of Trump doing it is uniquely fascist/authoritarian?
Short non-extensive list:
Has enforcement been explicitly prioritized based on political control of areas? Yes, senior directives and public statements emphasized prioritizing deportations in Democratic-led cities.
Suppression of lawful civic activity? Yes, crowd-control force was repeatedly used against protesters, media, and observers near ICE facilities.
Have officials labeled resistance or disputed encounters as "terrorism"? Yes, senior DHS leadership publicly used "domestic terrorism" language in contested use-of-force cases.
Are there credible reports of physical or sexual abuse? Yes, civil-rights groups report detailed allegations at detention facilities
Are raids conducted with armored vehicles, masks, and heavily armed teams as standard practice? Yes, reporting documents armored vehicles, masked agents, and surge-style operations.
Have internal watchdogs or ombuds offices been dismantled or defanged? Yes, DHS eliminated or reduced multiple civil-rights and detention-oversight offices.
Has ICE expanded use of spyware, location tracking, or similar tools? Yes, contracts for advanced spyware and surveillance capabilities were activated and expanded.
Is enforcement content coordinated to generate viral political narratives? Yes, internal messages show coordination to amplify arrests and raids for public impact.
Is ICE currently exhibiting multiple indicators of a political-police / coercive-repression trajectory? Yes, politicized targeting, coercive force, anonymity, weakened oversight, surveillance expansion, political messaging.
Would you like me to go on? I have a couple of more, but I don't want to spam.
Do Americans not learn about fascism and authoritarianism in school when you grow up? Together with what to watch out for and more? Because it seems really obvious for us who did have that upbringing.
> Do Americans not learn about fascism and authoritarianism in school when you grow up?
Like, in historical names and dates, sure.
In terms of process, signs, and systemic issues? Not really, even before the recent push in many parts of the country to make the curriculum even more friendly to, particularly, white nationalist authoritarianism, historical and more current.
>Has enforcement been explicitly prioritized based on political control of areas? Yes, senior directives and public statements emphasized prioritizing deportations in Democratic-led cities.
Florida, Texas, and others use local law enforcement to enforce immigration detainers and cooperate with federal enforcement. Makes sense to go where the problems are.
>Suppression of lawful civic activity? Yes, crowd-control force was repeatedly used against protesters, media, and observers near ICE facilities.
Crowd control is used against riots and unlawful assemblies frequently: see G8 summits, Seattle May Day, Ferguson, and any time a sports ball team loses a contentious game in LA.
>Have officials labeled resistance or disputed encounters as "terrorism"? Yes, senior DHS leadership publicly used "domestic terrorism" language in contested use-of-force cases.
And? Homeland calling an assault on an officer terrorism is hardly surprising, and is still less weird than the idea that using the wrong pronouns is a hate crime.
> Are raids conducted with armored vehicles, masks, and heavily armed teams as standard practice? Yes, reporting documents armored vehicles, masked agents, and surge-style operations.
So when Clinton’s BP raided Elian Gonzalez, it was fine because it wasn’t Trump? Remember, the question was “what is Trump doing that is unique”.
> Has ICE expanded use of spyware, location tracking, or similar tools? Yes, contracts for advanced spyware and surveillance capabilities were activated and expanded.
Domestic spying by the federal government has been a thing for 100 years. Again, we’re talking unique.
> Is enforcement content coordinated to generate viral political narratives? Yes, internal messages show coordination to amplify arrests and raids for public impact.
Every task force, raid, and “crackdown” by law enforcement, even down to an organized enforcement against DUI, is intended to create that perception.
Do non-Americans not learn that the federal government has engaged in this conduct for 100 years?
We’ve enforce immigration laws, policed our populace, and had to balance 1st/4th amendment rights against the interest of a functioning state for a long time.
> So when Clinton’s BP raided Elian Gonzalez
That followed a court order. And many people were very upset about it.
>We’ve enforce immigration laws, policed our populace, and had to balance 1st/4th amendment rights against the interest of a functioning state for a long time.
Nothing on this scale since the internment of Japanese Americans in WWII. And even that did not involve (AFAIK) the mass disappearances and torture of thousands of people.
>Nothing on this scale since the internment of Japanese Americans in WWII
Obama removed more people than Trump. Clinton removed and returned more people than any president. Crazy the world didn’t end in the 90s or 2010s, huh?
Because he didn't have agents cosplaying military operations. They blended in and calmly and quietly did their jobs/work. Many of these ICE agaents are undertrained, under vetted, and unprofessional.
You do yourself a disservice by having a storybook version of the Holocaust in your head. It did not start with gassing and boxcars of people. Relative to how things turned out, the victims were treated quite "humanely" at first. The problem is that they were completely dehumanized, which made mass murder the "obvious" choice once resources and logistics started to get strained.
There was a recent story that described cramped jail cells full of dozens of wailing and weeping detainees while ICE agents nearby were laughing. We’re seeing dehumanization happen here at an alarming pace. And already, the administration seemed to relish sending noncriminal migrants to foreign torture/rape camps for essentially a life sentence. The components are all there for a repeat of the recent past. Will they coalesce? What’s going to stop them?
Remember: most Nazis were not gleeful, cackling sadists. They were normal-ass bureaucrats who'd been conditioned to see their victims as non-human.
If you don't think authoritarianism or fascism actually has a way of harming those things, then no, I guess not.
I think for most people who had to learn about these things in school growing up, for like 7 years or something, together with grandparents who experienced these things for themselves, it's pretty clear what's happening, but without actually having that perspective, I could understand it feels like "What is everyone so upset about? Doesn't seem so bad".