Dad was out of the country at that time. Mum left us with our grandparents in the village and moved to the city for a better teaching job. I was maybe 6 or 7. My brother Paakow was 3 or 4.
My brother and I missed her so much.
She promised she would come down on as many weekends as possible and as kids, we expected her to keep her promise.
Each Friday, my brother and I would go to the bus stop near our grandparents’ house and wait for her. We would wait till it turned dark. Sometimes, we were lucky and she got off the bus. Most times though, she could not make it. Those were the times we would go back home crying, me literally dragging my brother along. He always wanted to wait a little longer.
Mum was away for about a year or so but to my childhood mind, that felt like an eternity.
These last few weeks, as reports came in about South American children being separated from their parents who sought asylum at the southern US border, memories of this period in my life came roaring back.
As I saw pictures of these kids locked up in cages, away from their parents, all I could think of was me and Paakow at the bus stop.
For those who have never experienced a long separation from a mother especially as a child, let me tell you – IT IS FUCKING TRAUMATIC!!!
I am 52 years old, happily married, with 2 kids and a career and when I think of that period, I get extremely sad. It is one of the worst things that can happen to a child. At least, we had our grandparents but what do these kids have? Unsmiling guards, who cannot even touch them?
The US is a sovereign nation and has every right to take appropriate measures to stem or even stop the inflow of illegal immigrants. These measures can even be termed “A War”. That’s this nation’s prerogative. However, even in real war, there are conventions on how to treat prisoners-of-war. They are accorded some humaneness.
Shouldn’t these immigrants, some of whom are asylum-seekers, like prisoners-of-war, be treated humanely? Is this how the US treats the less fortunate? Is it something about this country that makes it hard for it to temper justice with mercy?
I keep hearing that the US is better than this. Really?
This country has used the separation of children from their families to torture, punish and dehumanize minorities in this country for centuries. Maybe it is par for the course.
Slave children were torn away from their African-American mothers and sold off. If anyone is interested, there is an account by a Charles Ball in the “Maryland State Archives” about the day he was sold off as a child and the anguish of his mother who was then beaten for holding on to him.
From about 1870 till the 1970s, Native American children were taken away forcibly from their families and stuck in boarding schools run by churches and local authorities to turn them into civilized Americans. They had to give up their Native names and take English ones. They were taught to speak English and were punished for speaking their own languages. They were taught that their cultures were inferior and were forced to become Christians. Abuse was rampant and a majority of those children never saw their families again.
When the boarding schools become unpopular in the early 1900s, they were replaced by forced adoptions.
Starting also in the early 1900s, a lot of children were ripped from the homes of the poor and stuck in orphanages and later foster homes. The great Malcolm X was such a victim.
During the Great Depression, thousands of Mexicans were chased out of the US on the pretext that they caused the hardship. A lot of those families got separated from their children.
Last but not the least was the internment of the Japanese during the Second World War.
Maybe, this too – the separation of children from their asylum-seeking families – is supposed to dehumanize, punish and even send a message.
A message to all potential illegal immigrants and asylum seekers – that “the US will not be a migrant camp”. Maybe it helps to remove the moral hazard created by treating these families with kids humanely and thus attracting more such immigrants. Maybe it forces the approval of billions for a wall.
Whatever the case is, separating children from their parents is one mean thing to do to achieve any aim. It reveals a darkness in the soul that not even the sun can illuminate. It shows a depravity that not even all the mythical blood of Jesus can wash away.
One day when I was 8, my brother and I moved in with our parents and those Fridays at the bus stop ended.
However, for these 2000+ children who were ripped from their parents, the ending might be very different.
I fear that, like the African-American and Native American children from a century or more ago, they might be lost to their parents forever. I fear that these children are forever going to live with the trauma of separation for the rest of their lives.
Can the US be better than this?
Even though history is not reassuring, this same history tells of men and women who always fought to help right those wrongs. They were always in the minority but sooner or later, the power inherent in the good of their cause swung the pendulum around.
Like John Stuart Mill, said in 1867: “Bad men need nothing more to compass their ends than that good men should look on and do nothing.”
It is only when the good trumps the ugly in a society that we as American can boldly say, “We are better than this”.
Until then, I’ll say a prayer for those children and hope that if there is really a God up there, He will take care of them and make this nation “better than this”.
Maybe I’ll even shed a tear for their plight like I used to do those Fridays at the bus stop many years ago.