We met with a small group in the Gallery and saw this video:
The author wrote about the effect the “broken windows” theory had on the descent of the crime rate in New York City in the 1990’s
Due to “Stop & Frisk” (mainly on black men), the NY police claimed that crime had gone down by 2013. The author said tat by 2019, NY City was deemed to be as safe as Paris. The author, who had written accordingly before, changed his opinion and said in the talk that the NY crime wave was an “epidemic” and as such, died down as any mass disease would do. Crime is being perpetrated by black and white people alike.
Cl. wanted us to see the video because he is aware that we need to talk to each other better, also to people who have a different background and/or opinion as ours, such as AfD in Germany or “Chega” in Portugal. We should meet opponents and talk to them
U. said that conversation is usually on a rational level but that people with extreme opinions base their stance on emotions such as fear of loss (job, money, status). This way, such conversations may be fruitless. Cl. said that we should talk to them first on other issues and then move to the opinions that they have.
We then spoke about the situation in the US, on how democrats etc. could do damage control and get things back on track.
U. said that the Americans are, after 300 years of democracy, on a learning curve and need to experience another way of government. (The Brexit consequences are the learning curve for the UK.) They – and the Europeans – will see that autocrats (Trump, Meloni, Erdogan, Putin, Orban) are bad rulers because they are just out for money and power. Populations are being manipulated by creating fear of loss. Albuquerque is using the same technique to remain in power.
AfD is strong in the “old” East Germany, they lost the old system which they knew how to deal with. The old regime created a depression for the people, and they obeyed..
Some of us are optimistic that the US will come out of this after seeing how the autocrats are bad for the country. There is already resistance forming in the US. Canada is willing to defend itself and will accept many US citizens now; this may be good for Canada
We all were anonymous in declaring, that our member K., an American citizen, is highly valued by us!
What can we do?
Europeans are opting out from buying US products; any citizen can do this. American cars, we agreed, are of bad quality, so we would never buy an American car anyway. The US tariffs: Trump is trying to get other countries to pay for the American debt.
If we do not need the technology for business purposes, we can try to eliminate US technology from our PCs and Smartphones. We do not need to travel as tourists to the US now. The Tourist Immigration process was bad enough decades ago, now the behaviour of the Immigration agents is reportedly downright threatening. Who needs this?
A bet here: Trump will do the same thing Argentina* did: declare the State’s debt in the hands of other countries to be null and void, in order to get rid of the enormous debt the US has in the world. Just a thought…
*Argentina: Under Kirchner, Argentina restructured its defaulted debt with an unprecedented discount of about 70% on most bonds.The government of Argentina defaulted on 22 May 2020 by failing to pay a $500 million bill by its due date to its creditors. Negotiations for the restructuring of $66 billion of its debt continue. (Wikipedia)
Ursula Hahn
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