It has taken a different kind of bravery to move to Germany in retirement. That is a bravery that all of the immigrants to the US have used too. I made my move in the summer of 2023, after planning it for a while. Most of my reasons were financial or political ones.
I did not want to be retired and find that suddenly my health insurance was privatized and would not cover me, and that I had a choice of dying or going bankrupt with any serious illness.
I did not want to work 4 or 6 or 8 extra years so that we could support our child that we had already had at an old age through University instead of sending her to a tuition free university.
I did not want to breathe in the number 3 most polluted air in the US any longer.
I did not want to go through summers where even only 2-4 sweltering weeks, necessitated air conditioning which I know is contributing to global warming.
I did not want to have to stay in the house in the summer because the air was so dirty that I could not breathe it with my asthma.
I did not want to worry constantly that social security or medicare would be cut off or privatized.
I did not want my daughter to be getting a job in a country that tied health care to work so that people feel less free to move jobs.
I did not want to tie my daughter to a country where long term care insurance has a limited number of years that it is applied, and you cannot get what you have paid into, because they deny your claims.
I did not want to live where I would I could not count on the government to protect the food I eat.
I wanted to live in a place where the cost of living is lower without being devoid of things that I like to do.
I wanted to live in a place where the arts are still supported by the government.
I wanted to live in a place where access to local news is easy to come by. Here where I live every household pays a monthly fee for broadcast news.
I did not want to live where I have to pay for an expensive water filter continuously in order to drink led free, and toxin free water.
I did not want to live in a country where so many people work themselves to death.
I wanted to live in a place where I was not worried about getting shot by someone just for being out of my house.
I wanted to live in a place where I was less likely to be the victim of crime.
I wanted to live in a place that is welcoming to immigrants, which the country I live in now is not, but my city-state is, as is my city-state in the US, but it is under attack in a way that my city-state in Germany is not.
I wanted to live in a place where I would not need to have a car because the public transportation is easily available and it is easier to get around on a bike.
I wanted to live in a place where I could easily travel to other places I want to go to by train instead of plane.
I wanted to live in a place where wind and solar energy are easier to access.
I also live in the city where car sharing was created.
While many of these are financial choices, they are also political. I am able to be active to support the US, while also supporting the country where I live. I feel that as a woman with brown skin, I feel more unsafe in the US than many people may feel, but if you are also feeling unsafe or think that life could be better elsewhere, it is being open minded not unfaithful to your country. I wrote this piece in November, and it seems relevant still.
As subscribers to The Ink Substack, I believe many of us are activists in the opposition movement. Certainly, Anand is one of our most influential supporters and inspires us everyday. I struggle with understanding the passivity of many, but try to remind myself it will take time, it’s only been a couple months, but when it happens we will be ready to accept and guide these people to the movement. I found this post helpful so I’m sharing here. Let’s continue the good work and good trouble. Thank you for all the work you are doing everyday! https://substack.com/@canresist/note/p-163869201?r=1spm3&utm_medium=ios&utm_source=notes-share-action
Maureen, I do believe you are right. So many people are living their lives and moving along with their daily routines. They anre upset and watching what’s unfolding though. When their lively hoods are threatened they will join in and we will welcome them. I remind myself it really isn’t fair for me to judge others right now. We just lost a beloved furry family member and I am recovering from a kidney procedure. All will be fine, but I had to step back with my activism since the April 5th protest that I would not miss and drove down to DC. But, it reminds me that people are dealing with their own life stuff. I truly believe when we need them, they will fight for this democracy. We have certainly been given a clear view of what happens when you don’t and take it all for granted.
I read the list again and each one I identified with I changed the “was” to “am” and the “but” to “and” or “even though”. Then read it again. Revised the list. Copied the new to keep in my “daily guidance” notes. Will keep one reminder for every day in my calendar. What we can name we can change. Trying to find the way. Thanks, Anand.
This feels a bit like the White Feather movement. What does "being brave" actually mean here?
I ask because it feels like there isn't a lot to do that will actually be effective right now other than form community, build solidarity, build the political movement of resistance, speak out when it looks like it will make a difference, and conserve resources for later when a difference really can be made.
I have been angrily criticized for suggesting each of these actions, because they aren't enough.
I worry this poem (and others of this genre) is more likely to be used as a weapon in judgment of others than a motivational tool for myself. I already want to do what I can. When I read a poem like this, it feels like I'm being told that what I've decided to do isn't enough.
This is because I really am careful not to do things that I think will make me vulnerable and not actually do any good. And it's hard to know which things those are sometimes, which necessarily means that some effective actions I could have taken I won't take, because they didn't look effective to me.
Does that mean I should wear a white feather?
I say this because it's _always_ going to be possible for those of us who feel like this is an emergency to judge people who don't seem to have the same sense of urgency—who don't show up at protests, or don't speak out in a particular situation, or whatever we think they should have done that they didn't do.
I think we need to be careful about this, because the more we do this, the more likely it is to postpone the moment when the people we are judging are finally activated, or even prevent them from being activated at all.
If we want more people to act, we need to figure out ways to help them to feel safe in doing so, not guilt trip them for having a lower tolerance for danger than we do.
Replying to comments here feels manifestly unsafe to me, but I do it because I think there's a good community here and it's worth engaging even if there's some risk should things get genuinely bad (like, White Rose bad). But I'm not going to judge someone who doesn't feel safe in engaging in this way.
This is thoughtful. But I think the poem is a clarion call to leadership. Political leadership. The poem reflects the confusing dilemma we all find ourselves in. We are all looking for a political solution to this man and his hold on our country.
So, quite a few elected officials have taken a stand. Some have been arrested for it. One is going to be charged. Many courts have taken a stand. Even the Supreme Court has managed to do so, amazingly enough, although in such a narrow way that it's not much comfort.
I think the ones who haven't spoken up are so inured to the political process that led us to where we are that it's simply delusional to imagine that they're going to change, or call on them to change. Chuck Schumer thinks he's fighting the good fight already, for example.
And there's so little they can do anyway at this point. The opportunity to stop the current budget was prior to the cloture vote, months in the past. There's no opportunity to stop it now unless a bunch of Republicans defect.
Where the courage needs to be is with us. And I don't disagree with the poem's message there. I just worry that people will look at this and see it as a prescription for how others should act, or as a bludgeon for people who want to do more but can't find anything more to do that makes sense to them, to feel like they are somehow still failing.
If this had some hope of activating the folks who are barbecuing on the sidelines, I'd be all for it, but the lessons of history tell us that that's not what does it. What does it is there being something they can join in with that feels safe to join in with. That's what we have to build (and I think _are_ building). Shaming them works against this: it just makes them retreat further into their bubble.
I agree that the poem sounds judgmental. Who are we to judge the constraints on another's life, life decisions. Totally agree that "If we want more people to act, we need to figure out ways to help them to feel safe in doing so, not guilt trip them..."
There is a time to call out; a time to call in; a time to speak up; a time to show up! The time is now! Thank you Anand for sharing your wisdom, your kindness and for all the work you do to help save our precious democracy!
When I was in college I was in chamber choir. We had a director that I loved and who was very passionate about music. He would always beg for more volume from the altos. I was an alto, so I would crank my voice up until I would almost pass out with the effort of singing the hardest I could sing. One day instead of belting out my heart in response to his appeal, I stopped singing and looked around. The other altos were all placidly singing the notes with no hint of the strain or urgency he demanded. After that, I realized “he’s not talking to you.”
You put it over the outfield fence. The professional, or upper middle class has a lot of resources and a lot of latent power. But like everyone else they are under the thumb, especially in the vulnerable middle years of child rearing. That is why most of the people you see in demonstrations are either the young or the old. They are not so vulnerable to the hostage takers in our society. A very powerful and sobering list for people to read.
I'm 79 and am the first female in my direct line of female ancestors born with the right to vote. Throughout the 50's-80's, females shook society to recognize them as human beings with almost equal rights and desires to be independent, productive and able to use our bodies, brains, life as we wished. I was told as I passed in my job application for a UPS driver, "Sorry, we're looking for a male. Next!" I couldn't get a credit card, loan in my name even though I was working. I could go on but... I owe all the females and males who came before me a debt for the better life I have enjoyed since my birth. Until, the last decade.
I will stand for what I believe our "better angels" through the centuries since 1776 envisioned for freedoms, rights, justice, equality and a society based on cooperation, sacrifice, dedication to fairness and the common good of all people.
I will repay my debt to all the decent, freedom loving people before me that worked for the future, my future by acting in their times bravely, outside their comfort zones, beyond their fear of danger to themselves and others for a BIGGER COLLECTIVELY BETTER FUTURE than their own.
I fight as best I can and am not afraid to fail at times as long as I grow braver as I continue learning about myself and fighting to change the world whenever I MIGHT.
I belong to We the People working for, protecting each other..
Thank you, Becca! I respect this, your experience. I am 66 and my mother had a lot of the same experiences you've described (and I've had some myself!).
Especially, "I belong to We the People working for, protecting each other.." because in truth we do bring each other along! 💞🕊️
I think, therefore I am. Two ‘I’ statements in the western world’s predominant ideology for centuries. A paradigm shift is not possible until we try something like the Ubuntu philosophy of, ‘I am, because you are’. Democrats and Republicans, Americans and Canadians, woke and MAGA, all serve themselves first and that is the bitter reality. BTW- Shel Silverstein is somewhere smiling. Fantastic poem. Or, requiem?
This really hit home. What also struck me is that under the Trump DOJ, the personal and professional risk of speaking out is far greater. The cost of bravery isn’t theoretical when the system itself is weaponized.
What makes this moment even more dangerous is how that fear isn’t irrational. We’ve seen whistleblowers smeared, careers ruined, and the machinery of government used for retribution. When a justice system becomes a political weapon, the choice to stay silent can feel like self-preservation, but it also chips away at the foundations of democracy.
This litany of regret sounds all too familiar. Unless we're dyed in the wool activists, this is how most of us feel. It's a form of denial on the one hand (if you saw your child about to come to harm, would you hesitate?) If you smelled smoke, would you hesitate? Of course not. But there is something about these ongoing assaults on our way of life that somehow feel too fantastic, unreal. As I learned during the HIV/AIDS crisis of the 80s and 90s silence is not the answer while people are dying. In fact, the motto "Silence = Death" that emerged during that time fits today, perfectly.
I have one solution to the author's lament and subsequent outcome: Change "I" to "we". We can do together what I would find it impossible to do.
Just brilliant, and devastating!. And here's a thing: when you see the tide sucking out and realize a tsunami is on the horizon, to imagine you need to climb onto the roof of your house is to risk death, for fear of 'losing everything.' Passivity in the face of such great force is not an option. And here I am, an old and not famous person with limited means spending hours a day doing everything I can to push back. This doesn't mean nobodies like me are heroic, but it does mean we have eyes to see and hearts that care.
Unfortunately, that's how most people feel.
But I don't want to blame them. Because I have recognized myself.
Now is the time to reconsider
It has taken a different kind of bravery to move to Germany in retirement. That is a bravery that all of the immigrants to the US have used too. I made my move in the summer of 2023, after planning it for a while. Most of my reasons were financial or political ones.
I did not want to be retired and find that suddenly my health insurance was privatized and would not cover me, and that I had a choice of dying or going bankrupt with any serious illness.
I did not want to work 4 or 6 or 8 extra years so that we could support our child that we had already had at an old age through University instead of sending her to a tuition free university.
I did not want to breathe in the number 3 most polluted air in the US any longer.
I did not want to go through summers where even only 2-4 sweltering weeks, necessitated air conditioning which I know is contributing to global warming.
I did not want to have to stay in the house in the summer because the air was so dirty that I could not breathe it with my asthma.
I did not want to worry constantly that social security or medicare would be cut off or privatized.
I did not want my daughter to be getting a job in a country that tied health care to work so that people feel less free to move jobs.
I did not want to tie my daughter to a country where long term care insurance has a limited number of years that it is applied, and you cannot get what you have paid into, because they deny your claims.
I did not want to live where I would I could not count on the government to protect the food I eat.
I wanted to live in a place where the cost of living is lower without being devoid of things that I like to do.
https://www.numbeo.com/cost-of-living/rankings_by_country.jsp
I wanted to live in a place where the arts are still supported by the government.
I wanted to live in a place where access to local news is easy to come by. Here where I live every household pays a monthly fee for broadcast news.
I did not want to live where I have to pay for an expensive water filter continuously in order to drink led free, and toxin free water.
I did not want to live in a country where so many people work themselves to death.
I wanted to live in a place where I was not worried about getting shot by someone just for being out of my house.
I wanted to live in a place where I was less likely to be the victim of crime.
I wanted to live in a place that is welcoming to immigrants, which the country I live in now is not, but my city-state is, as is my city-state in the US, but it is under attack in a way that my city-state in Germany is not.
I wanted to live in a place where I would not need to have a car because the public transportation is easily available and it is easier to get around on a bike.
I wanted to live in a place where I could easily travel to other places I want to go to by train instead of plane.
I wanted to live in a place where wind and solar energy are easier to access.
I also live in the city where car sharing was created.
While many of these are financial choices, they are also political. I am able to be active to support the US, while also supporting the country where I live. I feel that as a woman with brown skin, I feel more unsafe in the US than many people may feel, but if you are also feeling unsafe or think that life could be better elsewhere, it is being open minded not unfaithful to your country. I wrote this piece in November, and it seems relevant still.
https://lindaweide.substack.com/p/a-plan-b-for-catastrophe?r=f0qfn
Same. I try, but some days I just don't have it in me. Community helps.
As subscribers to The Ink Substack, I believe many of us are activists in the opposition movement. Certainly, Anand is one of our most influential supporters and inspires us everyday. I struggle with understanding the passivity of many, but try to remind myself it will take time, it’s only been a couple months, but when it happens we will be ready to accept and guide these people to the movement. I found this post helpful so I’m sharing here. Let’s continue the good work and good trouble. Thank you for all the work you are doing everyday! https://substack.com/@canresist/note/p-163869201?r=1spm3&utm_medium=ios&utm_source=notes-share-action
Maureen, I do believe you are right. So many people are living their lives and moving along with their daily routines. They anre upset and watching what’s unfolding though. When their lively hoods are threatened they will join in and we will welcome them. I remind myself it really isn’t fair for me to judge others right now. We just lost a beloved furry family member and I am recovering from a kidney procedure. All will be fine, but I had to step back with my activism since the April 5th protest that I would not miss and drove down to DC. But, it reminds me that people are dealing with their own life stuff. I truly believe when we need them, they will fight for this democracy. We have certainly been given a clear view of what happens when you don’t and take it all for granted.
Thanks for sharing your thoughts, Deb.
I was going to be brave but my family already thinks I'm crazy.
Amazing how they won't meet your eye and keep talking about the weather.
So does mine 😂It's funny how you get the looks and shake of 🤦🏻♀️yet they well some still read my post text and give me likes So there Is Hope 🫶
I read the list again and each one I identified with I changed the “was” to “am” and the “but” to “and” or “even though”. Then read it again. Revised the list. Copied the new to keep in my “daily guidance” notes. Will keep one reminder for every day in my calendar. What we can name we can change. Trying to find the way. Thanks, Anand.
Excellent idea!
This is pure poetry.💔
This feels a bit like the White Feather movement. What does "being brave" actually mean here?
I ask because it feels like there isn't a lot to do that will actually be effective right now other than form community, build solidarity, build the political movement of resistance, speak out when it looks like it will make a difference, and conserve resources for later when a difference really can be made.
I have been angrily criticized for suggesting each of these actions, because they aren't enough.
I worry this poem (and others of this genre) is more likely to be used as a weapon in judgment of others than a motivational tool for myself. I already want to do what I can. When I read a poem like this, it feels like I'm being told that what I've decided to do isn't enough.
This is because I really am careful not to do things that I think will make me vulnerable and not actually do any good. And it's hard to know which things those are sometimes, which necessarily means that some effective actions I could have taken I won't take, because they didn't look effective to me.
Does that mean I should wear a white feather?
I say this because it's _always_ going to be possible for those of us who feel like this is an emergency to judge people who don't seem to have the same sense of urgency—who don't show up at protests, or don't speak out in a particular situation, or whatever we think they should have done that they didn't do.
I think we need to be careful about this, because the more we do this, the more likely it is to postpone the moment when the people we are judging are finally activated, or even prevent them from being activated at all.
If we want more people to act, we need to figure out ways to help them to feel safe in doing so, not guilt trip them for having a lower tolerance for danger than we do.
Replying to comments here feels manifestly unsafe to me, but I do it because I think there's a good community here and it's worth engaging even if there's some risk should things get genuinely bad (like, White Rose bad). But I'm not going to judge someone who doesn't feel safe in engaging in this way.
This is thoughtful. But I think the poem is a clarion call to leadership. Political leadership. The poem reflects the confusing dilemma we all find ourselves in. We are all looking for a political solution to this man and his hold on our country.
So, quite a few elected officials have taken a stand. Some have been arrested for it. One is going to be charged. Many courts have taken a stand. Even the Supreme Court has managed to do so, amazingly enough, although in such a narrow way that it's not much comfort.
I think the ones who haven't spoken up are so inured to the political process that led us to where we are that it's simply delusional to imagine that they're going to change, or call on them to change. Chuck Schumer thinks he's fighting the good fight already, for example.
And there's so little they can do anyway at this point. The opportunity to stop the current budget was prior to the cloture vote, months in the past. There's no opportunity to stop it now unless a bunch of Republicans defect.
Where the courage needs to be is with us. And I don't disagree with the poem's message there. I just worry that people will look at this and see it as a prescription for how others should act, or as a bludgeon for people who want to do more but can't find anything more to do that makes sense to them, to feel like they are somehow still failing.
If this had some hope of activating the folks who are barbecuing on the sidelines, I'd be all for it, but the lessons of history tell us that that's not what does it. What does it is there being something they can join in with that feels safe to join in with. That's what we have to build (and I think _are_ building). Shaming them works against this: it just makes them retreat further into their bubble.
I agree that the poem sounds judgmental. Who are we to judge the constraints on another's life, life decisions. Totally agree that "If we want more people to act, we need to figure out ways to help them to feel safe in doing so, not guilt trip them..."
You’re here saying Anand’s words sound judgemental because you’re the hit dog. You’re hollering.
Wow. Do you have the wrong platform here? Were you looking for X?
You felt comfortable saying Anand’s poem sounds judgemental. Where did you think YOU are?
There is a time to call out; a time to call in; a time to speak up; a time to show up! The time is now! Thank you Anand for sharing your wisdom, your kindness and for all the work you do to help save our precious democracy!
Well said, thank you Jo-Marcia!
Very sad!!! Shame on them!! It’s time to be brave because you have no other choice if you want your freedom. ❤️🤍💙
When I was in college I was in chamber choir. We had a director that I loved and who was very passionate about music. He would always beg for more volume from the altos. I was an alto, so I would crank my voice up until I would almost pass out with the effort of singing the hardest I could sing. One day instead of belting out my heart in response to his appeal, I stopped singing and looked around. The other altos were all placidly singing the notes with no hint of the strain or urgency he demanded. After that, I realized “he’s not talking to you.”
You came through loud and clear and if I may say so with grace.
You put it over the outfield fence. The professional, or upper middle class has a lot of resources and a lot of latent power. But like everyone else they are under the thumb, especially in the vulnerable middle years of child rearing. That is why most of the people you see in demonstrations are either the young or the old. They are not so vulnerable to the hostage takers in our society. A very powerful and sobering list for people to read.
So very true! Bravery means all of us need to choose to fight for our constitution and not leave it for someone else to defend it.
I'm 79 and am the first female in my direct line of female ancestors born with the right to vote. Throughout the 50's-80's, females shook society to recognize them as human beings with almost equal rights and desires to be independent, productive and able to use our bodies, brains, life as we wished. I was told as I passed in my job application for a UPS driver, "Sorry, we're looking for a male. Next!" I couldn't get a credit card, loan in my name even though I was working. I could go on but... I owe all the females and males who came before me a debt for the better life I have enjoyed since my birth. Until, the last decade.
I will stand for what I believe our "better angels" through the centuries since 1776 envisioned for freedoms, rights, justice, equality and a society based on cooperation, sacrifice, dedication to fairness and the common good of all people.
I will repay my debt to all the decent, freedom loving people before me that worked for the future, my future by acting in their times bravely, outside their comfort zones, beyond their fear of danger to themselves and others for a BIGGER COLLECTIVELY BETTER FUTURE than their own.
I fight as best I can and am not afraid to fail at times as long as I grow braver as I continue learning about myself and fighting to change the world whenever I MIGHT.
I belong to We the People working for, protecting each other..
Thank you, Becca! I respect this, your experience. I am 66 and my mother had a lot of the same experiences you've described (and I've had some myself!).
Especially, "I belong to We the People working for, protecting each other.." because in truth we do bring each other along! 💞🕊️
I am with you 100% Becca!!
I think, therefore I am. Two ‘I’ statements in the western world’s predominant ideology for centuries. A paradigm shift is not possible until we try something like the Ubuntu philosophy of, ‘I am, because you are’. Democrats and Republicans, Americans and Canadians, woke and MAGA, all serve themselves first and that is the bitter reality. BTW- Shel Silverstein is somewhere smiling. Fantastic poem. Or, requiem?
This really hit home. What also struck me is that under the Trump DOJ, the personal and professional risk of speaking out is far greater. The cost of bravery isn’t theoretical when the system itself is weaponized.
What makes this moment even more dangerous is how that fear isn’t irrational. We’ve seen whistleblowers smeared, careers ruined, and the machinery of government used for retribution. When a justice system becomes a political weapon, the choice to stay silent can feel like self-preservation, but it also chips away at the foundations of democracy.
This litany of regret sounds all too familiar. Unless we're dyed in the wool activists, this is how most of us feel. It's a form of denial on the one hand (if you saw your child about to come to harm, would you hesitate?) If you smelled smoke, would you hesitate? Of course not. But there is something about these ongoing assaults on our way of life that somehow feel too fantastic, unreal. As I learned during the HIV/AIDS crisis of the 80s and 90s silence is not the answer while people are dying. In fact, the motto "Silence = Death" that emerged during that time fits today, perfectly.
I have one solution to the author's lament and subsequent outcome: Change "I" to "we". We can do together what I would find it impossible to do.
We all have our "buts." Those "buts" are real and valid.
B. U. T.....
Do what you can, with what you have, from where you are.
That is an absolutely necessary mindset.
That is available to anyone and everyone.
So...no more "buts."
Just brilliant, and devastating!. And here's a thing: when you see the tide sucking out and realize a tsunami is on the horizon, to imagine you need to climb onto the roof of your house is to risk death, for fear of 'losing everything.' Passivity in the face of such great force is not an option. And here I am, an old and not famous person with limited means spending hours a day doing everything I can to push back. This doesn't mean nobodies like me are heroic, but it does mean we have eyes to see and hearts that care.