Comment by actionfromafar
5 days ago
There have been quips for many years about the dragnets of intelligence services and that "Stasi couldn't even dream about having such vast data" and similar.
But now we aren't talking about intelligence services anymore. ICE truly is Stasi for America, employing tactics such as "isolating them, depriving them of sleep and using psychological tricks such as threatening to arrest relatives." (From Wikipedia about Stasi.)
This year ICE will also become the "armed wing of the Party" thanks to fresh funding.
The Stasi needed a significant segment of the DDR's population to be snitches. ICE just needs Palentir.
Oh, the snitches are there too, just check some of the comments in this thread. They only need a few percent.
I fear we are at the point where descendants of ICE employees will be embarrassed to acknowledge the relation.
Keep in mind that some Americans still proudly fly the Confederate flag.
The first and second Reconstruction eras didn't go far enough.
The irony about that is that a lot of the Confederate flag-flyers (ironically enough, overlapping with the Don't Tread on Me crowd) seriously hate the government.
The administration's kept them on side with culture wars red meat so far...
But the further ICE / police militarization goes, the more awkward the situation with right-wing militia types is going to get.
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We're well past the point that they should be, I would be more concerned their descendants won't be, based on, let's say the last 250 years of this national experiment.
there are plenty of people who are children of cops or military who have no shame, so I doubt it
Or be proud once the history has been rewritten
“It says here in this history book that luckily, the good guys have won every single time. What are the odds?”
-- Norm MacDonald
Or we make it impossible to inflict such North Korean, Soviet, or Chinese style harassment such that the sins of one have no ability to propagate.
Nah, they'll still be able to kick down your door.
It might not be the right door, but that doesn't matter to them.
Grandchild: "Grandpa, what was it like back then, when ICE was snatching innocent people off the streets and the President was putting some them in dictator prisons without trial? Before the super bad stuff started?"
Grandpa: "It was a very controversial time, yes. Lots of people doing what they believed was best."
Grandchild: "Did ICE ever go after you?"
Grandpa: "I worked for the--it was only office--I mean, I was unemployed then. Yes, that's right! Tricky economy, don't you know. Only odd-jobs. I lived in a place where those things weren't happening. In fact, most of us didn't really know about it until it was all over. You remember that, right dear?"
Mother: <frustrated death-glare> "...Come along, let's wash your hands before dinner."
That's if they ever face a "truth and reconciliation" commision like after Apartheid South Africa.
If not, and if you have 3 hours, there's a documentary you can watch. The director said "It was like I went to Germany 40 years after WW2 and found out the Nazis had won".
There was an "anti-communist" massacre in Indonesia in 1965. The killers were sanctioned by the government who remained in power/are still very powerful nowadays. (When a reformist president said "maybe we can look at this part of the country's past", the rumour was, the army was going to let protesters (who are still gung-ho communist-hating) protest near the presidential palace, and not intervene if/when they invade it.
This documentary follows one old killer and his "journey" from being able to talk about it casually until he ends up meeting his conscience.
Here he is in the beginning: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oZqEzIEWzPk
And the full documentary: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3TDeEObjR9Q
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Arnold Schwarzenegger had a very heartfelt story about his childhood. It went more or less as you describe, except it was his dad, not his granddad and there was a lot of alcohol and abuse involved as well.
Hopefully that play ends as tragically or more as The Death of a Salesman.
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>ICE will also become the "armed wing of the Party"
interesting that the ICE is performing that hallmark of 20th century - mass removal of "undesirable" people from society and placement them into the camps without criminal charge and judicial oversight, etc. thus totally undermining the main contract between government and society - due process.
I don't think Stasi is the most apt comparison, rather the Gestapo, where the "Geheime" did not refer to their existence being secret, rather their standards of operation, chain of command, and general accountability being beyond oversight from the electorate.
Apples and oranges, though, and it's all fruit.
The difference for me is that the Stasi seemingly had more competent people and more people that actually believed in what they were doing and thought it effective. With none of that, these are the actions of an organization that is failing and full of incompetence. It is even more alarming how effective they could be if anyone actually believed in them, including their own leadership or if the cause actually attracted worthwhile participants.
Such competent participants flock to these terror organisations only after it has proven itself a viable career path. Compare the chaos and mayhem of the brownshirts in Germany before the war, vs the Gestapo later. Very chaotic evil vs lawful evil.
At this point in time, it's not apparent if the current regime will prevail. Thus, it's time for brownshirt tactics. When Presidential/King/Dictatorial power is fully consolidated, States' Rights are just a memory, and all nonloyal judges are fired, it's time for the disciplined Career Bureaucrats to join ICE.
You're not wrong that that's the intent, I'm just not even seeing stupid bigots that are happy with it and they also don't seem to care about that either. So, once they lose even the hateful for not being hateful enough they're just as likely to be embarrassed by all of this or fracture amongst themselves with various no true bigot fallacy infighting. This has been the more recent mini patterns at least.
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The iron curtain wasn't so iron from the beginning. The Berlin wall was built in 1961, that is 12 years after the east German republic was founded. 16 years worth of able workers draining from the soviet-occupied part to Western Germany.
Shall we put a reminder in our calendars to talk again in 2037?
The fleeing part comes later, don’t you worry. It takes time to break people’s hope.
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