Is it time to get a divorce from America?

[Mr_Jefferson_24]

By Ezekiel Jones
Online Journal Guest Writer

http://onlinejournal.com/artman/publish/article_1129.shtml

<snip>

Anyone who's tried to counsel a friend who's in an abusive relationship will recognize the pattern. The abusee stubbornly holds on to the hope that the abuser can be reformed. She may welcome the sympathy of friends who try to comfort her, but if they firmly suggest that she get out of house and hire a lawyer to begin divorce proceedings, she rebukes them angrily.

That's what I encounter over and over again as an American expat who urges people who are righly afraid of their government to make some preparations to leave the country. They're more than ready to tell you about the fear they feel because their privacy has been breached, their vote left uncounted, their children sent to war, and their liberty and even lives threatened because of their religion, ethnicity, gender orientation or political beliefs. But watch out if you ever suggest that it would be prudent for someone in their position to consider "getting out of the house" before this obviously dangerous abuser makes good on his threats.

Their emotional reaction is especially telling because moving out of the country was no big deal until a few years ago. For years, people have been retiring to Mexico and Central America to enjoy the warm winters and lower cost of living. Why is it okay to leave the United States to seek a better climate or a cheaper condo but anathema to depart for a place where your phones aren't tapped or detention camps aren't being readied for troublemakers like you?

The best I can come up with is that the answer lies in the emotional connection nearly everyone has to their "homeland." People may dislike or even hate their country's leaders, but they still think of that particular piece of real estate as their "fatherland" or "motherland." And it isn't so much that they love their country as that they need for their country to love them. Who wants to feel rejected or abused by the culture in which they were raised? It's a very hard thing to accept that the place where you live is going to give you nothing but pain because you're black or gay or Muslim. It's terrifying when you're offered the impossible choice between being an outcast -- or even outlaw -- and changing the very way you think and feel about society or religion or war. The worst thing is that it's not only the government or its leaders who pose the threat but also the majority of your fellow countrymen who either support the growing repression or acquiesce in it...



5 min clip from Shawshank Redemption...
http://youtube.com/watch?v=xN45hCghqi0

[sui generis]

1. no, it's time to fire the housekeeper.

All of us roommates got together and elected someone to make sure the doors and windows are locked, the property looks nice, we live in a clean space, and that nobody hogs all the resources and we all have food to eat and a bed to sleep in. There was some question about how the votes were counted but in the end we mostly all agreed what can it hurt to give the housekeeper a spin and reserve judgement.

Well, our elected housekeeper left the window open, let some burglars steal two skyscraper sculptures, then declared war on a house down the street because they had a pool and we didn't want the burglars to hole up there and use the pool. Our housekeeper tried to re-write house rules that you no longer get to bring home your dates if they are the same gender, and you lose your bathroom privileges if you happen to like the same gender.

Our elected housekeeper has started doing things not allowed in house rules, like digging through our underwear drawer, listening to our phone conversations, and cavity searching us whenever we leave to get groceries or come back from groceries.

Fire the fucking housekeeper - and all of his staff. Fire the bastard before he burns the whole house down or gets our neighbors to unite to bulldoze us with us still inside.

[MADem]

2. Shitty housekeeper

Stole from us, too; sent our kids out in the street to get killed; ran up our credit cards so bad that our debt will be owed by our grandkids...if they don't end up dead, too...

[Selatius]

3. I'm more pissed off than afraid

At this point, I am weighing long-term plans to stay or go, but I don't feel that afraid right now.

I feel more anger and rage than fear right now. The rage of the workers, once it's unleashed, can bring down the mightiest corporate barons.

[cornermouse]

4. No. All we really need to do is divorce the republican party

as a whole and George Bush in particular.

[Jeanette in FL]

5. You know what is scary

Immediately a reply came into my head as to what we can and should do and I decided to self censor. That is scary to me.

[Mr_Jefferson_24]

7. I've done the same thing many times...

...and it's both scary and very telling of what is happening to our country.

[Joe for Clark]

6. B*sh isn't America - just a pimple on our histroy.

Anyway, this is my country, our country - and we will fight for it.

Our sense of things right now are slanted. History is a pendulum and it swings both ways.

And I am pretty sure it is about to hit him in the ass right now.

Joe

[MercutioATC]

8. Unfortunately, I have to wait 'till the kids are grown...

The federal government pays me and I can't retire for another 9 1/2 years. Believe me, as soon as "the kids are in college", I'm filing for divorce.

[tocqueville]

9. Americans are not married to America

they ARE America. Thus they ultimately decide how it will look like. This is not a divorce case, it's a case of life or death.

[Selatius]

11. Yes, that is the way we should look at it.

Unfortunately, most of America is still sleepwalking.

[rinsd]

10. From a guy shilling services to help people "get out" that's fucking rich!

Fuck you and your fear culture and your crass attempt to profit from it.

[Mr_Jefferson_24]

12. Maybe I missed something...

...are you directing your remarks to me, or the author of the piece? Can you elaborate a bit?

[rinsd]

13. Sorry...that was not directed at you.

The author runs an immigration service in Croatia. It would be nice if that was at least disclosed beyond a benign web link.