The tragic and unnecessarily agonizing death of Hiu Lui Ng

[crowdog66]

EDITED TO ADD: *sigh* Allow me to be perfectly clear about something.

I'm not saying that my own home country, Canada, is absolutely blameless when it comes to immigration issues.

But what happened to Hiu Lui Ng is beyond heinous. It is a sterling example of depraved indifference.

That said...

Man whose US immigration notice was sent to the wrong address is detained with untreated spinal cancer until he dies, denied access to his wife and children.

Let me repeat that, with feeling:

Man whose US immigration notice was sent to the wrong address is detained with untreated spinal cancer until he dies, denied access to his wife and children.

He was seized, detained for months, accused of "faking" when he complained about the pain of the undiagnosed cancer, denied medical diagnosis and treatment, refused even a wheelchair when he got so weak that he couldn't walk, and eventually died in custody AND in agony.

I have to ask the majority of Americans (not necessarily the Americans on my Friends list, but those who have been saying that everything is hunky-dory in the "from sea to shining sea" land south of our border)...

... what the fuck is wrong with you people?

Can't you see that your country is becoming a police state, with all the inhumanity and thuggery that goes along with it?

When will you finally get fed up enough to demand accountability from your government? When will you stop listening to the feel-good spin of CNN and start smelling the blood?

How did you let things get to this point?

Maybe I'm just sensitized because of the Westboro Baptist Church creeps who recently entered our country illegally, but honestly... what happened to Hiu Lui Ng is fundamentally wrong and absolutely disgusting.

So, what are you going to do about it?

Comments

[metisbutterfly.livejournal.com]

That is tragic, and I feel for this man and his family and the hell they went through.
I know that the USA has a host of issues..but so do we. We have turfed people that were "illegally" here or sent home refugees to war-torn, impovershed places. Look at how many of the citizens in our own city are forced to live due to situations out of their control. We have communities in our own province that are worse than those in developing nations.
What are we going to do about it? I don't wish this to sound harsh, but I think before we start to ask this of the USA, we should ask this of ourselves and clean up our own back yards.

[spotts1701.livejournal.com]

I think the person who once described the United States as a "minimum security prison" has hit on something.

Oh, we can do as we please...as long as we don't try to leave or complain to the management.

And really, as long as the majority of Americans have reality TV and a steady supply of beer and pizza...they're content because "other people" will take care of it.

[raitei-amano.livejournal.com]

Um, I'm america, and I dont drink, firstly, I dont really watch TV either b/c Tv just stinks, especially the reality junk.

Most americans, believe it or not, are not sitting around saying America is so great right now. The president is hated by 70% of the nation, both the upcoming candidates are weak, and none of us see the government actually taking care if Iraq, the people from all over we have sitting in prisons indefinately, many without even the right to see a lawyer or have a court date set. When some officials try to say we are denying basic human rights of the people we have imprisoned, Bush and his tard-party all play the terrorist card, which is getting as old and unbelieveable to us as it is to the rest of the world.

Seeing posts about some assholes working for the governmet and federal systems making a huge, undeniable, and unforgivable mistake, and then seeing everyone sit around and blame EVERYONE living in that country.... sounds pretty foulish.

Everywhere has problems, sorry to tell you.

[crowdog66.livejournal.com]

Everywhere has problems, sorry to tell you.

This is very true.

But lately, at least from the perspective of a different country, things seem to be going wrong in the USA a LOT.

I think a lot of it has to do with your current administration, who only seem to care about lining their own pockets and those of their cronies. I know that most Americans are very unhappy with the government as it stands, and truly hope that come the next election you'll bring in a better set of people to help bring your country back to its former greatness.

And as I said... yeah. I'm just really testy right now because a group of whacked-out Kansans decided to invade our country against our express will. They KNEW they weren't supposed to cross our border and they snuck in anyway. At least they weren't stupid enough to stick their heads out of hiding, because if they had, our justice system would have collared them so fast their miniscule brains would still be spinning.

Thank whatever Gods may be that most Americans and saner and more decent than either the Westboro Baptist crowd or the Bush administration.

[raitei-amano.livejournal.com]

I do agree though that I am sort of ashamed that less is being done to combat the basic abduction of our government by some idiot texan who thinks we have no problems.

I remember when the whole Clinton impechement process was underway. I remember thinking yeah, its pretty sick, but was surprised that people were willing to go through so much to defend their seat of power from someone who they felt was so unworthly.

Now, 10 years later, here we are with a president who openly had his cousin cheat him in during the first election, and possible other foul-play during the second election, and no one is doing anything.

I think to myself, wow, its not okay if a president gets caught fooling around (and alot of the great ones like JFK did as well, and no one seemed to mind ><) but if one hijacks the White House and starts wars on false pretenses, ignores the UN's warnings not to go, wire-tps private citizens without a warrent, and basically changing the constitution around to suit his needs more times than 40-some other presidents COMBINED, no one says anything...

It is disheartening that no one seams to want to do anything about it. But not all americans are sitting there nodding their heads thinking in ignorant bliss that everything is fine (as the President does).

[spotts1701.livejournal.com]

*opens mouth, the closes it and shakes my head*

Did I blame anyone? No. What I said was that the country is apathetic to what's happening. Other than a small fraction of people who are actively protesting, it seems like most Americans are more worried about paying their bills and feeding their family than what abuses of power are happening in Washington.

Nor did I say America is hunky-dory. Believe me, I know it's not. But in the grand scheme of things we are not seeing the things people saw in the late 60's and early 70's, where the citizens rose up and demanded accountability from their leaders.

I don't want to, however, start an argument in someone else's blog about this. If you feel that strongly about it, please send me a message and we'll discuss it off-blog.

[raitei-amano.livejournal.com]

I wasnt just talking to you I was also talking to crow, and its just a good discussion not an argument. :)

[crowdog66.livejournal.com]

I don't mind you folks discussing this here -- in fact, part of the purpose of the original post was to get a good back-and-forth going on the subject.

So discuss away, if you like. :-)

[crowdog66.livejournal.com]

Oh, agreed. If chairs aren't flying, it's not an argument. ;-) And so far all the furniture is still firmly on the floor.

[lacontessamala.livejournal.com]

The nation's in a pretty sad state right now, but I'm going to take the optimistic tack (for one, lol):

1) The clowns who did this are being vigorously prosecuted.

2) The vast majority of the country is sick and damn tired of what's going on in general, so I think we're starting to see some big shifts in attitude and action because of that.

The big problem here is that our immigration system is totally broken. The processes and bureaucracy involved have reached a level of incompetence that is dizzying in its majesty. Real change will not happen until the whole damn thing gets gutted out and rebuilt from the ground up in a more streamlined, sensible way. It's long overdue.

[angry-geologist.livejournal.com]

Wait until November. Then, we can do something about it.

[cockatiel-art.livejournal.com]

**Moves a chair via telekinesis**

Sorry. I had to be a smartass. >:)

But about the states - I'm glad Americans are seeing and realizing what shits they have in power. They saw what they were getting into and for whatever reason Bush got into power TWICE. Hope Obama can handle the mop up job Bush Jr created. It's one reason why I could never go into politics.

/politics rant