This is how it happens

Years from now, school children and historians will look back on this ghastly time, and wade through the multiple levels of corruption and treason by the Trump administration, and the compromising of an entire American political party and religious bodies, and ask "Why didn't they SEE it? Why didn't they STOP it? Why weren't people marching? Rushing the camps? Taking over the government buildings?"
And we will say that we did march. We did protest. We did write. We did call. And shake our fists. And scream. 

But we grew tired and hopeless when nothing changed. We grew frustrated when the people we put into positions to stop it dragged their feet. And we despaired to see that so many of our fellow citizens were all too willing to enable the overthrow of our democracy.

So we retreated to our privileged lives. After all, we were not the ones who were locked up. And we had jobs. We had soccer practice. We had bills to pay. Homework to finish. Children to raise.

And so it continued.

This is how it happens: Not a monster appearing suddenly, with yellow fangs and green scales, breathing fire and announcing its plans for destruction. It does not emerge in the midst of dystopia. No, such horror and destruction flower when people are too comfortable to risk their comfort. When people have the privilege of looking away.

That is why we need institutions in place to stop such things before we can even see them coming. The "bureaucracies." The FDIC, the safety nets, the free media.

But those things will only save us if we defend them.

Which is why the monster picks these things as the first to be vilified: They get in the way of tyrants.

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