The Weekend in Foolish Attention

Bit and bytes of the week

ON THE ROCKS (AN ICE JOKE). Driving a vehicle in this country without auto insurance is in violation of the law in a similar way that living here without citizenship. It isn’t a misdemeanor but it is a requirement to drive and if you are pulled over without it, you are legally prevented from driving and incur a fine. There are about 35 million Americans who drive without insurance making them, in the parlance of the immigration argument, “illegal” drivers. If the government decided to crack down on this, I doubt there would be much protest. Sure, cracking down on auto insurance would likely disproportionately target the poor but it isn’t a hot button cultural issue.

Last weekend Los Angelenos took to the streets in protest of the Trump ICE raids of undocumented immigrants. Typically, because in the new era of media described “peaceful protest” that involves the burning of cars, throwing cinder blocks, and the shooting of fireworks while screaming and blocking traffic, the scene has looked chaotic and violent. Things started on Friday in response to an ICE raid at a Home Depot (traditionally the very place where the most violent criminals from Latin America hang out to make minimum wage because few things signal cartel activity than helping a 66-year old guy trying to fix his toilet or paint the porch).

And then Trump sent in the National Guard. Rubber bullets, flash bang and tear gas grenades. Then he sent in the Marines. Our president is at war with what we are comfortable calling blue cities. Make no mistake, this isn’t the showdown sixty years ago to support the Civil Rights act. This is Kent State writ larger. Yes, LA is the size of Delaware and these protests only comprise two small areas and a relatively minuscule percentage of the city’s population but the act of a president sending in the troops is dire. The message seems to be that he won’t let the 2020 protests (which involved the wholesale destruction of swaths of cities and the weird takeover in Seattle) ever happen again.

Also, this seems to be a preemptive measure to ensure his big celebration today isn’t marred by, you know, Americans disagreeing with him.

There are currently 13 million people residing in the Greater Los Angeles metropolitan area. Even if the protests grew to 10,000, that still comprises 0.08% of the city’s population. On the flip side, if 300 decide to burn some cars, throw rocks, and loot local stores, that’s a slim 3%. Flip a different coin: a YouGov/CBS News poll conducted June 4-6 found 54% of Americans support Trump's deportation program targeting undocumented immigrants, surpassing his ratings on the economy (42%) and inflation (39%). Additionally, 51% approve of ICE conducting searches.

An RMG Research poll echoed that result, with 58% backing the deportation efforts. And in an Insider Advantage survey, 59% approved of Trump's decision to send National Guard troops to Los Angeles in response to the protests. The reason the resistance is small is because the majority of the country agrees with the Mad King.

Tuesday, protests popped up everywhere, including Chicago. Same story. Similar percentages. Media presents it as Chicago in crisis despite the relatively small size of the crowds. No rocks thrown, no cars on fire, no looting. Some vandalism of cop cars and a few scuffles but definitely in the scope of protest rather than riot. No National Guard. Like responses to a school shooter, the patterns are now trope—peaceful but passionate protesters during the day, anarchists and criminals come out at night tainting any message sent during the day.

I’ve heard many declare this approach—tricking those going through the prescribed steps to remain in the country into presenting themselves for ambush—is an unconstitutional action on the part of ICE. Not so, as far as I can tell (NOTE: I know this will surprise you, Reader, but I am not a Constitutional Scholar): they have warrants from judges, are not violating the Fourth Amendment because they’re doing their snatch and grabs in public and governmental spaces, and are making targeted rather than random seizures. But, while technically legal, it is no less shitty and unnecessary.

Today, as you read this, there are protests a plenty planned all across the country. If we’re smart (meaning rational and as dispassionate as going out into the streets to protest a cause can lend) we won’t give him the trolled out reason he’s looking for to send out more troops. Maybe the reason is only pretext. I don’t know.

My guess is he’ll do what he did with the tariffs—as soon as this decision is overwhelmingly condemned, his pathological need to be seen as great will reverse his course. That said, this shit just got a bit loonier than it was a week before. I could be completely wrong, too. Maybe he triples down as those in opposition to his overreach triple down as well. At least he hasn’t decided to go after the uninsured drivers, though, because that would be nuts, amiright?

DECIPHERING THE CODES. Language is a weird thing that humans are particularly gifted at (although I’ve read that dolphins and whales have communication styles that rival us). The words we use to describe the world become more complicated as we cease to accept the social contract of common understanding. “Toxic” traditionally has meant the presence of life-threatening poison. Leaded gasoline? Toxic. Easy. “Toxic masculinity,” on the other hand, gets a bit confusing. No life-threatening poison and no real connection to exclusively male behavior—females are every bit as capable of lying, cheating, dominating, and abusing others—so the addendum of the word is loaded with agenda and an attempt to control a specific narrative.

The toxicity lens likewise conjures up a sense of reality in which life is hellish landscape, other people are monsters until and unless proven otherwise, and institutional entities like business, government, and schools are either malign, incompetent, or both.

In the extreme, being overly vigilant (the psychiatric term in PTSD is hypervigilant) for threat creates mistrust, paranoia, and makes it impossible to have room not only for clear thinking, but also feelings of kindness and compassion for oneself and others. Kindness is seen as weakness, compassion as a way to needlessly open oneself up to be taken advantage of by predators.

Other words that seem to be coded from where I sit include:

Ambitious. It sounds good when someone uses the phrase to indicate a quality they desire in a partner but ambition to improve the world, make lots of money, or gain control of the California National Guard are all very different.

Safe. There’s a subtle difference between “safety to” and “safety from” and the gulf between being safe to speak or act versus being safe from others speech or actions get murky. Safety for one can suddenly become control of others for another.

Freedom. The word everyone claims like a five-year-old clutching the last Capri Sun. To some, it means health care and civil rights; to others, it’s the sacred right to open-carry at a Chuck E. Cheese. It’s a flag-waving Rorschach test with an AR-15 strapped to it.

Equality. Like a group project in high school: everybody wants it until someone else gets more credit. Are we talking about equal opportunity or equal outcome? Ask five people, get six answers and a TED Talk.

Diversity. To progressives, it’s essential. To conservatives, it’s an HR requirement with a DEI consultant charging $800 an hour. Diversity is the new kale—good for you in theory, force-fed in practice, and everyone’s pretending they liked it first.

Resistance. Was a noble term in WWII. Now it’s on mugs, tote bags, and Twitter bios of people who yell at staffers and think voting blue every four years counts as activism. “Resistance” without risk is just branding.

SOMETHING OF NOTE TO WATCH. My buddy in LA Donnie Smith (and the co-host of the I Like to Watch podcast) loves his independent horror films. I had Monday night off and decided to catch some films he might like. Strange Darling (Apple +) is a really big artistic swing and it ‘s better if you know less going in. Nonlinear storytelling, great performances, filmed entirely on 35 mm film (another big plus from the D. Smith lens). I was engaged and loved it. I double-billed it with It’s What’s Inside (Netflix) about a pre-wedding gathering of friends who play a game with a strange new technology that allows them to swap bodies. It’s weird and funny and speaks hard about the reliance of identity and status to establish the GenZ hierarchy. Solid stuff from people you’ve never heard of but should.

To anyone who wondered, what could go wrong if we elected as president a highly volatile, deeply dishonest, simple-minded cretin with a revenge fetish, the answer is this. All of this. — Betty Bowers

AVOIDING DEATH BY A THOUSAND CUTS. You don’t notice it at first. It’s minor. It’s reasonable. It comes gift-wrapped in team language. “We’re all just trying to be respectful.” Or “Let’s not make waves.” Or “We can fix this from the inside.”

Bullshit.

That’s the language of every 1980s action villain right before they detonate the building full of hostages. It’s Hans Gruber calm. Suave. Seductive. Weaponized compromise.

The first cut is when you apologize for being direct.

When you stay quiet instead of naming the problem.

When you sign off on the harmless little lie because maybe she’s just a little quirky or maybe the meeting ran long and you’re looking toward the door or maybe you can deal with it later.

You won’t.

Because once you’ve bled a little, the body adjusts. You become habituated to the hemorrhage. You get used to being slightly uncomfortable. You start mistaking numbness for strength. But here’s the kicker: nobody wakes up after 999 cuts and says, “Cut number 1,004? Now that’s the one that killed me.”

The only way to avoid the death is to not allow the first incision.

Sometimes, society feels like a pack of angry, hungry toddlers all fighting for the three swings on the swing set and the only sane response is to sit back, let mayhem unfold, and wait until the kids get tired.

INCONVENIENT KINDNESS. Kindness that costs you nothing is public relations. It’s that performative cloying trash handed out like stale candy on TikTok, wearing filtered smiles and hashtag halos. Holding a door when you were going that way anyway? Not virtue. Tipping 20% on a meal you devoured like a sociopathic raccoon? Not virtue. Posting a crying selfie after “checking in” on your depressed friend via a single heart emoji? Please.

No, kindness only counts when it costs you. When it hurts. When it wrecks your schedule, bleeds your wallet, or knocks the wind out of your delusions of being the hero.

Take Civil War by Alex Garland. A nation’s on fire, literal and figurative, and everyone is a photojournalist or a corpse. In a landscape soaked with nihilism and adrenaline, the only redemptive moment is when Kirsten Dunst’s grizzled war photographer decides to save a clueless young intern from a warlord’s execution, not because it’s smart, or strategic, but because it’s right. That choice nearly gets her killed. That’s what makes it real. That’s what gives it gravity. Kindness under fire—actual fire—matters.

Virtue demands sacrifice. Otherwise, it’s just etiquette.

True kindness interrupts your life. It takes your carefully curated Instagram grid and burns it to the ground. It pulls you out of your schedule, out of your comfort, and hands you a crying stranger with no instructions.

Anyone can be kind in theory. The real test is whether you’re kind when it screws you over.

So yeah, next time you pat yourself on the back for sending “thoughts and prayers,” ask if you would’ve canceled a meeting to sit with a grieving friend who smells like sour wine and regret. Ask if you’d lend your last $40 knowing it won’t come back. Ask if you’d defend a stranger getting stomped in an alley if it meant limping for weeks.

Because unless your kindness is inconvenient, it’s just another brand.

And if your brand is virtue, maybe you’re not that kind after all.

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It’s been a hell of a week, huh? If you’re protesting today, don’t throw things and remember that optics matter. The news isn’t hardwired to report that there were peaceful protests—they’re looking for the guy in the face mask, throwing chunks of the curb at police vehicles while standing on a burning car, waving a Mexican flag. That’s what sells clicks at a time when people are leaving the news model for Tik Tok.

Stay safe and make sure your sign is spelled correctly.