Cry for the unborn child who inherits not our constitutional freedoms, but our systematically programmed fears. Cry for the attempt to dismantle our peaceable, democratic right to dissent. Cry for a republic where foreign policy is no longer an exercise in genuine negotiation — the diplomatic hallmark of all democracies that have survived. Cry for the human sacrifice in yet another war of choice, launched without congressional approval against the next “enemy.”
Look closely at the State Department’s 100-page report, “Cuba: The Capital of 21st Century Communism.” Written by a ruthlessly ambitious, blind minority of power-driven leaders led by Secretary of State Marco Rubio, it offers a terrifyingly naked blueprint for a state-sanctioned structure. It mimics the historical patterns of the darkest autocracies of the last century, utilizing a rigid dichotomy that categorizes citizens into “desirable” and “undesirable” profiles.
By publishing a blacklist targeting dozens of American individuals, elected officials, anti-war groups, labor unions and anti-racist movements such as Black Lives Matter, the state performs an overt amputation on our legislative body — the one branch still actively representing us, the people.
To be profiled as a “desirable” citizen, you must remain silent and compliant, surrendering your critical faculties to the state’s programmed paranoia. If you bow to exclusive executive power and accept the strategic starvation of a neighboring island, you are deemed a desirable asset. If you exercise your constitutional right to peaceably dissent, protest, or demand diplomatic sanity, you may be instantly branded an undesirable tool of a foreign threat. This is a terrifyingly blatant redefinition of dissent as treason.
What is most heart-wrenching — what should cause us to drop to our knees and cry for our beloved country — is not the naked ruthlessness of these leaders, but the quiet, numbed compliance with which we accept the normalization of the inhumane. When we, as a society, read this manifesto and shrug our shoulders, we actively cast away our collective morality and the protective guardrails of the Constitution.
The moment a single human being stands firmly upon their own moral bedrock and refuses to look at a country or a dissenting citizen through the lens of a state-sponsored blacklist, we are transforming our passive neutrality into an active wave of moral and constitutional resistance.
Let our collective cry wake us from our compliance. Let us reject the blacklists and reclaim our birthright. Let us no longer cry for the soul of our beloved country.
Note: The title of this piece is a deliberate adaptation of, and homage to, Alan Paton’s famous quote from his 1948 novel.
Sarah Blum
Northampton