Shiny Chandravel, Assistant Opinions Editor
The most prominently displayed poem at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum is the famous “First They Came” by Martin Niemöller. The poem is a recollection of events in which a powerful government comes again and again for different groups of people. As several groups are taken, the poet stood silently — until the Nazi regime finally came for him.
Only then did the poet become appalled, realizing no one was left to help him.
William Vermie, an Army veteran who was awarded a Purple Heart, was tackled to the ground and detained by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) for eight hours with no attorney.
A city plow worker with legal authorization to work in the United States was detained in an El Paso, Texas Detention Center. His wife has been desperately trying to get him his medication.
Off-duty police officers had guns drawn on them by ICE agents, demanding to see their paperwork.
Native American tribe members have reported numerous attacks on Indigenous people by ICE agents, with some of them being detained without a trace.
Alex Pretti, a Minneapolis resident, Veteran Affairs ICU nurse and U.S. citizen was fatally shot by a group of ICE agents.
Liam Conejo Ramos, a 5-year-old pre-schooler, was detained by ICE for over a week with his father in a Texas detention facility. Only after national outrage and an order from a federal judge were they released back to their home state of Minneapolis.
After each group is taken in Niemöller’s poem, there’s a repetitive lull where he reminds us that he did nothing. As the poet says, it didn’t affect him.
The veterans, the city workers, police officers, nurses and children — they affect us all deeply. When your neighbors get shot, you hear it.
As I drew up this poem as a mirror to the past few weeks, I found it applicable.
I’ve recently been watching the Hulu TV series, “The Handmaid’s Tale,” based on the classic novel by Margaret Atwood, about a world in which an oppressive regime has taken over. One of its most chilling details is how little the regime tries to hide its violence.
The bodies of victims are hung in public view, swinging along walls, roads, scenery and neighborhoods.
The overt displays of inhumanity assured one thing — no one could claim they didn’t know what was happening.
It’s an excuse that people will soon grasp for. When the dust settles and the bodies are put to rest, many will insist the reason the government was able to get away with so much was because the people were unaware.
It’s an excuse that we must reject.
There are widely available videos of people taking their final breath at the hands of unnecessary bullets. There are uncountable photos of children being escorted into black vans. There are a plethora of reports, stories and first-hand accounts of what is happening — names, timelines and footage.
If we are so comfortable ignoring what’s on our screens, what happens now that it’s encroaching into our backyard?
Earlier this month, Hanover County officials received a letter from the Department of Homeland Security looking to expand into the Greater Richmond area with a proposal to purchase a 500,000-square-foot warehouse off I-95. They intended to convert the facility into a large-scale immigration detention facility — a move that would bring ICE right to our back door.
But then, something different happened.
Last week, hundreds of people refused to look away. They showed up. Our neighbors showed up and incessantly protested outside the Hanover facility. As a result, the company decided to withdraw their plans to sell the building to the DHS — preventing the massive detention center right outside Richmond.
Their refusal to settle for inaction mattered.
Watch the videos. Read their stories. Don’t click away. Don’t scroll past.
When you are asked to deny what you have seen with your own eyes, you will know precisely what is being asked of you — and why.