December 20 Friday roundup

You can now watch the latest episode of my podcast, “Somebody To Hate,” about the ways immigrants have been targeted under law for more than a century and how we can push back on that today. It’s available on YouTube, or you can listen to it on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and anywhere else you get your podcasts. (A reminder: the Friday podcast is a multimedia version of the written post on politics and history that comes out in the newsletter each Tuesday, so don’t be surprised if you notice overlap.)

I focused this week on Trump’s threat of mass deportations and the long, linked history of immigration detention as the basis for twentieth-century concentration camps in the U.S. and around the world. I was delighted to talk with immigration policy expert Aaron Reichlin-Melnick of the American Immigration Council about what we can realistically expect to see after Trump’s inauguration on January 20. At the end, we list specific things you can do to help shore up immigrant safety on a national level in in your own backyard.

Also worth a read this week is Hamilton Nolan’s interview with Heather “The Heat” Hardy and the reasons she took up the boxing career that gave her profound brain damage this year, as well as Jamelle Bouie’s opinion piece “Now Is Not the Time for Surrender,” on what Democratic Party and elected officials should be doing right now in the face of Republican overreach.

Through the end of the year, for the holidays, we’ll have posts that will be lighter than our usual material, but still—I hope—meaningful in and relevant to our historical moment. The Tuesday post will include a strategy for talking to your difficult relatives at family gatherings, one I guarantee you’ve never heard before. It’s something I learned from years of teaching self-defense and karate. And, no, it doesn’t involve violence, so don’t get your hopes up.

If you’re not already a subscriber, I encourage you to become one! If you’re a subscriber but not a paid one, I encourage you to upgrade. You’ll guarantee yourself access to all Degenerate Art posts going forward, and you’ll also be supporting my work on this newsletter, the podcast, and my books.

On another note, I have a completely unscientific hypothesis that the state of the country is currently mirrored by its drivers, so stay safe on those roads if you’re heading out to see family!