Opinion: Whose children will they come for next?

History is calling out to us and we must listen. Recently, Unites States Department of Justice lawyer Sarah Fabian went to court and made the egregious statement that children in detention centers do not require soap, beds or toothpaste to be safe and sanitary. Innocent children.

 

Apparently, Fabian does not know her history. Perhaps she should make a visit to the Jewish Heritage Museum in Battery Park, New York, to see what happened “not long ago nor far away.” Young children ripped from their parents arms were locked in cattle cars with no sanitary conditions. Of course, they went straight to the ovens at Auschwitz. Innocent children.

 

Or perhaps a trip to the Manzanar Historic Site will shake up her memory. There she will learn about 10,000 of the over 120,000 innocent Japanese-Americans who were put behind bars. We were not at war with Japanese-Americans. Again, innocent children.

 

Now we have in El Paso, Texas. More innocent children with whom we are not at war. Well, obviously the U.S. Department of Justice thinks we are at war with these innocent children as they have been ripped from their parents and deprived of the most basic needs to maintain human dignity. Innocent children. Basic human dignity.

 

Even Charles Manson was given soap and toothpaste, and probably a bed as well.

 

The time has come to remember history and stop the Trump Administration’s war against innocent children. The Monroe Township Indivisibles, in coalition with other Indivisible chapters, are 3,000 strong. We will not stand quietly by while injustice of this type continues on American soil. The time has come to stop ignoring the disgraceful rhetoric and actions that are being made by this hate-mongering administration. The time has come to save all of the children in America, for surely if we don’t, they will all suffer.

 

We must remember the timeless words of Martin Niemoller: “Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak for me.” Whose children will they come for next?

 

Nina Wolff
Monroe Township Indivisibles
Monroe