[eudamoniac]

> > Could you explain exactly which racism is harmful and which is harmless? Does it depend on the race?

It's a utilitarian question. Degrees of harm, and what they achieve...

> Then I take it that you are pro native American, and would agree they have more right to the land than yourself, and thus their preferences should be above yours? If not, why not?

I don't understand how you got there from my comment. Native Americans are a cautionary tale of immigration. They certainly had more right to the land at the time they lost the land. But we aren't giving it back. They lost, they got fucked, it sucks for them. It doesn't follow that I should then be willing for my own self/people to lose and get fucked. I am not voting against my family's self interest because I currently benefit from some unrelated people getting fucked hundreds of years ago. This isn't a philosophy class. It's real stakes. It could be war. Nobody's preferences are above mine in the voting booth, that's what a vote is. I'm voting to not get fucked. You can vote to get yourself fucked if you want that, out of some guilt.

[latexr]

As I told you at the start, I’m not American, I don’t vote in your elections. I’m merely trying to understand the people who do vote as you do, especially seeing the apparent contradictions and conflicts of interest. And I thank you for engaging.

I don’t understand why you believe that being a citizen protects you, seeing as ICE has already proven that it doesn’t by arresting and killing US citizens.

https://www.opb.org/article/2025/10/16/immigration-ice-arres...

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026/jan/22/us-citizens-...

https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2025/09/10/immi...

https://www.democracynow.org/2026/1/16/ice_tactics

Why are you not afraid of that? Is the colour of your skin lighter than the one that is typically profiled? What do you think of ICE capturing and killing citizens? And how does capturing citizens “protect your borders”?

[eudamoniac]

I mean this with good intentions: the news you're reading about our country is sensationalist propaganda. This sort of thing almost never happens, and every account you read of is lacking context or information that makes it a lot less bad than the news wants it to sound. For example "ICE detains 5 year old" is always something like, the only parent was illegal, with the kid, and detained, so they obviously couldn't leave a 5 year old alone at home and had to take him somewhere. Every headline and every sentence you read is crafted to sound as bad as possible and omit any normalizing context.

I'm not afraid of ICE because 1. They are not targeting people who look like me as far as I know, 2. If I did look Mexican, I'm still extremely unlikely to encounter them, much more likely to die in a car crash etc.

What I think of ICE... Obviously the situation isn't good and I don't like the bad things happening. As far as I know the only deaths were caused by situations I'd never be in, like intentionally obstructing them with my car, refusing to move, then suddenly trying to run them over. Or physically obstructing an ongoing arrest in a big mob. Is it good those people died, no, but I'm not afraid of it because I wouldn't be doing those things.

I consider the current situation with ICE to be an overcorrection to decades of anger about unchecked immigration. The right has been begging to reduce immigration for so long, especially illegal immigration, and it never happens. The left vocally supports illegal immigrants most of the time, with sanctuary cities etc, refusing to enforce the law let alone strengthen the law. Finally the right gets a win largely on immigration sentiment, and this is the result. In my opinion if the left hadn't been so gleeful about protecting illegals all these years, the right would have much less of a taste for this situation. I think it's sort of like, well we tried the easy way and you wouldn't even follow the law, now we're doing it the hard way.

[latexr]

Despite not being American myself, I do have family who is. I don’t recall the exact date they became citizens, but some time before Trump’s first term. I also have friends who are American, born and raised, living in different parts of the country. Some I have met in person, others I haven’t. When I see some crazy news I usually talk to them. They do provide context but never once referred to this ICE situation as lies or propaganda. My family members have expressed concern for their own safety and are considering fleeing the country despite being citizens.

In other words, I’m not simply relying on the news for information about what is going on.

> They are not targeting people who look like me as far as I know

But if they were, wouldn’t you want people who didn’t look like you to fight for your rights too?

> If I did look Mexican, I'm still extremely unlikely to encounter them, much more likely to die in a car crash etc.

Not sure that’s true, but it would be an interesting statistic to figure out. For a fair comparison, we can’t simply take the general likelihood of dying in a car crash VS being targeted by ICE, we’d have to do something like “in period X when ICE was in county Y, how many Mexican-looking people were targeted VS were in car accidents”.

I’ll reiterate I appreciate you answering my questions. I hope it is clear I am genuinely trying to understand your positions.