Mastodawn

I've been beaten by the LAPD. I lived in Berkeley in the late 1960s and early 1970s. I've been tear gassed and watched police push people backwards off of highway overpasses. I knew and understood many Black Panthers.

I am sick and tired of Kumbaya songs. I am sick and tired of turn-the-other-cheek reactions to current affairs in the US.

But I am also a lawyer, sworn to peaceful methods.

What do I do?

What strikes me is the age old method of ostracism - practiced in ancient Athens, written about in plays like Lysistrata, and rendered into strong force by churches through the practice of excommunication.

We ought to perform civil excommunication on ICE agents - do not sell or rent products to them in stores, do not rent hotel rooms to them, do not fund them, treat them like modern day lepers. Businesses should make it clear that they will never be hired for a job. Do not adopt Jesus' policy of acceptance of them.

Spread their names so that we may cut them off from society.

Wild Eyed Boy From Freecloud Jan 11

@karlauerbach Absolutely. Bonus points for mentioning Lysistrata!

@karlauerbach I have seen multiple videos of Minneapolis fast food restuarant security guards barring them from entering. These dudes can't get a Big Mac in town and it makes me smile.

@karlauerbach
I agree. The Trump Adminstration is throwing money (our tax dollars) at desperate people in an attempt to to get them to become ICE agents and turn on their neighbors. We as a nation need to learn how to shun again.

Here’s a timely example of what you’re proposing.

https://bsky.brid.gy/r/https://bsky.app/profile/did:plc:76e4qryfph6q4wmz3li6v2l6/post/3mc6qfjvrwk2b

StacesCases2 🇨🇦 📎 (@stacescases2.bsky.social)

When a Security guard stops #ICE from entering employee area at #McDonald’s in #Minneapolis...

Bluesky Social

Juggling With Eggs Jan 12

I agree that ICE is made up of individuals who have chosen to take a path which is defined by its inherent racism and desire to cause harm to those who they believe are Un-American. Ostracising them as a collective response is understandable, but surely in Athenian terms requires a vote?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ostracism#:~:text=Ostracism%20(Greek:%20ὀστρακισμός%2C%20ostrakismos)%20was%20an%20Athenian,be%20used%20for%20various%20forms%20of%20shunning.

Ostracism - Wikipedia

@karlauerbach ... which is why they're hiding behind masks and not displaying ID.

We only know the name of Renee Good's killer because Noem screwed up.

@solitha @karlauerbach All shops, fast food outlets, gas stations, whatever ... big sign - 'no masks' ...
two birds one stone.

@Reddog Absolutely not a good answer, as many people legitimately mask to protect their health (like me).

Also not the problem at hand. To get to "civil excommunication" as suggested by @karlauerbach we have to know who they are out of uniform, not just block obviously militarized uniformed goons (which many businesses already do).

@karlauerbach
ka-ching
these kkkiller cowards are the lowest

@karlauerbach 💯

WhichOne'sPink 🇫🇮Jan 12

@karlauerbach Or shoot them.

Kevin Leecaster Jan 12

@NickSchwanck @karlauerbach
Do you honestly believe that a 2nd hot Civil War is a good idea or are you just an accelerationist that is privileged enough to know you would not suffer from the actions you encourage?

WhichOne'sPink 🇫🇮Jan 12

@GreenFire @karlauerbach No. I don't think it's a "good idea", nor do I envy your position.
But I know history. And for all your name calling, I doubt you're going to vote your way out of this.
Americans are really starting in with "don't blame us".
Well, the rest of us didn't fucken elect him and now he's a danger to us all. This is YOUR problem to solve.

Kevin Leecaster Jan 12

@NickSchwanck @karlauerbach
You, of course, not being a fucking American know absolutely nothing about the American politics you are interfering in from across an ocean.

It was not Americans who elected him. It was the Americans who you foreign agitators convinced not to vote who put back into office plus a bunch of other headwinds liberalism has had globally lately.

I AM BANKSY ☕ / 🗑‍🔥Jan 12

@GreenFire
Non-Americans can know plenty about your political system, thanks. Often more than Americans.

@NickSchwanck @karlauerbach

Kevin Leecaster Jan 12

@xinit @NickSchwanck @karlauerbach
Dunning-Kruger most definitely knows no boundaries.

WhichOne'sPink 🇫🇮Jan 12

@xinit @GreenFire @karlauerbach 👏👏👏

sherbang Jan 12

@GreenFire @NickSchwanck @karlauerbach I am an American (well at least for a little longer). Does your family not have a bunch of fascist sympathizing Trump supporters in it? That would make for a rare exception.

It's not like any of this is new. Trump's behavior is only the stuff the Republicans have been pushing for since Regan (at least). They're just not afraid to say the quiet part out loud anymore.

sherbang Jan 12

@GreenFire @NickSchwanck @karlauerbach The land of the trail of tears, slavery, Nazi sympathizer rallies in the 30s, Japanese "internment" campus, the KKK, water boarding prisoners, "liberating" oil-rich lands, etc, etc.

Proud American history.

Sailor Anarres Jan 12

@karlauerbach except the business leaders and such are the ones supporting ICE so the solution isnt this at all

Karl Auerbach Jan 12

@UsagiTsukino So, boycott the business that do serve ICE.

I have instituted a policy at our company that makes a presumption about a candidate who has a prior employment with ICE - such prior employment indicatee that the candidate has poor judgement and is thus not suitable for employment in our company.

ICE people should face a realistic threat of no future employment.

the elder sea Jan 12

@karlauerbach
There are sometimes historical guides for times like these. The French, for example:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indignit%C3%A9_nationale?wprov=sfla1

Indignité nationale - Wikipedia

@karlauerbach inherently the issue of answering with money is that youre reinforcing the idea that thats how things should be solved, and looking at the amount of companies and billionaires in the last decades who side with the right theyre very happy subsidizing ICE and they have far more money than anyone trying to restore a sense of semblance.

Public shaming's window was a while back, i dont know now.

yunchtime Jan 12

agree. I'm a Buddhist. my practice requires kindness and compassion toward living beings. nonetheless, I once had some chilling advice from a ruthless person: "don't be kind to your enemies." and I've come to accept that as true. keep laser-focus on these evil nazis and don't give them any oxygen at all.

derptron Jan 12

@yunchtime @karlauerbach I like the idea from Ender's Game that you can't really defeat your enemy until you love him.

Darryl Green Jan 12

@crazyeddie @yunchtime @karlauerbach
Cruel to be kind, it's a very good sign
Cruel to be kind means that I love you, baby
You've gotta be cruel to be kind

@yunchtime @karlauerbach there is kindness and the there is what Pema Chodron calls idiot compassion. we need not judge people to oppose certain courses of action, such as the establishment of fascism and the systematic oppression of certain groups to facilitate fascist methods. If we do not stop ICE, they will not be stopped; they have lost the ability to stop themselves, and we don't want them to go from running death squads to running death camps.

yunchtime Jan 12

@jayalane @karlauerbach

yes, there is a path these evil people are on. we shall no go there!

mcSlibinas Jan 12

@karlauerbach doxx them all.

🍀March Mastodoness🍀Jan 12

@karlauerbach The only Jesus policy that we should use against ICEstapo is the motherfucking whip to drove out those Nazi motherfuckers turning cities into literal dens of thieves.

Cedar Fen Farm Cedar Fen Farm Jan 12

starting with the VP, the #pope needs to excommunicate him

derptron Jan 12

@karlauerbach Why they wear the masks.

oldguycrusty Jan 12

I love this idea.

#Lysistrata
#Ostracism
#DenialOfService as a tool of #CivilSociety and #Decency

Karl Heinz Häsliprinz Jan 12

@karlauerbach Not funding them means... tax strike? Stop using USD and build a parallen economy using Yuan or EUR instead?
That might work.

Peter Brown Jan 12

@karlauerbach the Hilton tried to do exactly that quite recently but they were overruled by headquarters

MegatronicThronBanks Jan 12

@karlauerbach Merchant has the right of refusal of service to any individual, without justification, provided it is not provably discriminatory at law.

Ashwin Dixit Jan 12

Guess we will call upon our folks, who shall remain #Anonymous , to doxx ICE agents. Let's publicly encourage #AntiFa activists to join ICE, get paid & get armed, on the Thump administration's dime. They can then retire ICE agents from behind, while in the field, helping poor people escape to safety and writing the whole thing up as an act of self-defense in which some agents got shot. Let's keep ICE agents paranoid and wondering if their teammate is an ICE guy, or a NICE guy. 😉

gunstick Jan 12

@karlauerbach as Hilton hosts ICE, I canceld my hilton membership.

@karlauerbach I think you have put your finger on why they are masked.

Karl Auerbach Jan 13

@acm_redfox Identity can often be discovered and confirmed using an intersection of various measurements beyond facial features, such as height, approximate body shape (fat, thin), walking gait, voice, etc.

If a dog can recognize you, even when you are masked, then so can we.

Michael ᚋᚔᚉᚆᚓᚐᚂ Jan 13

@karlauerbach it works:-

Captain Boycott refers to Charles Cunningham Boycott, an English land agent in 19th-century Ireland whose ostracism by the local community led to the creation of the term "boycott." His refusal to reduce rents during a time of hardship resulted in a campaign of isolation against him, which became widely publicized and inspired similar movements for social justice. https://duckduckgo.com/?q=captain+boycott&t=iphone&ia=web&assist=true