{
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  "canonicalUrl": "https://www.jacky.wtf//essays/2025/adhere-empire",
  "path": "/essays/2025/adhere-empire",
  "publishedAt": "2025-10-11T23:30:00.000Z",
  "site": "at://did:plc:e2ctbutx6kya6si4if5ngjmm/site.standard.publication/3mniussyp2d2g",
  "tags": "essay",
  "textContent": "I have been struggling with feeling \"okay\". I talked a bit about my family's\ncurrent struggle with the United States's human kidnapping program and how that's\nbeen on my mind for months now. It's drained thousands of dollars that flow\ninto litigation processes or the State itself, dozens of hours and who knows\nhow many tears from my eyes. People can only see the\n_person_ being kidnapped but individualism encourages us to stop there. A\nperson is nothing without their people and those people are irrevocably harmed\nwhen harm is met with no repair. This process, in its more violent form,\nstarted for me in 2019 and led me travelling to Canada for the first time\n— the first time I left the United States. Since then, despite my casual\ndistaste for how things go down within the nation, this brought home more of\nthe things that I've only heard and read about into the light of my life. I am\nfortunate to make enough to insulate some of this damage to my family and\nextended kin but this is _not_ an easy task and it's more risky when I choose\nto engage in actions that can threaten my employment because of the current\nadministration.\n\nThere is a huge luxury being a citizen of the United States. At no point do you\nwonder if you'll be removed from its embrace of protection. You can run to\nits arms in any country in which they've planted their bases or embassy in\nhopes of help that transcend that of the one you're visiting. You perceive\nother regions — not intentionally — as inferior. The militia, with\nmore [than 4,000 bases around the globe][1], gives one the sense that, with enough\nimportance, you will be _saved_. Of course, this privilege weakens the further\naway you are from the archetype of the classic and \"native\" American: that of a\nwhite man. The definition of \"white\" even gets stretched to include those who\nwould be more ethnically ambiguous in other countries: like those of Turkey,\nSouth Africa (who are those of _European_ descent, mostly) and descendants of\ncolonizers (and prisoners) in Australia. We're not _really_ native in the eyes\nof the state. We can vote, protest, sue and write but as long as the state\nremains to hold onto tenants that [reinforce the cultural system of said\ndivision][2], all of this will be as revocable as the law permits. All of this\nis to say that if you're born in the United States, have no perspectives beyond\nthe country, you won't be able to empathize with a lot — that's\nintentional.\n\nIt is _hard_ watching the bipartisan violence of state _and_ federal officers\nrunning around, kidnapping, brutalizing and otherwise trampling on the rights\nand bodies that we _thought_ we had control over. The concept of the [_terrific\nboomerang_][3] is being made manifest and for those who've seen this deployed\nby proxy in their homes and warned of its return aren't feeling glee in being\nright but a sense of fear of the mechanisms being made more robust now that\nthey've been given time (and support!) to implement them. The things I can hope\nfolks — especially my tech industry peers — to consider is how we\ndefend and support the companies that are overly eager to keep systems of\nviolence up. If we can't identify them, we should look for people _who can_\n— especially those who've been impacted by them. We should talk to them\nwith the same eagerness and fervor we clamor around new Apple© macOS®\nor iOS® releases for our Congolese- and Chinese-built (but designed in\nCupertino) devices. We should be more curious and expand (instead of buying)\nempathy for folks that we can't see. We should give just a bit of a fuck.\n\n[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_American_military_installations\n[2]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caste:_The_Origins_of_Our_Discontents\n[3]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Imperial_boomerang",
  "title": "Adherence to societal norms as a form of acceptable self harm"
}