August 15, 2025 • 29 mins
Humberto provides a deep dive on US immigration.
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00:00 Visa Para Un Sueño
08:35 Immigration in Colombia
21:24 What would it take to leave Seattle?
23:23 Is it irrational to consider leaving?
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August 15, 2025
The Psychology In Seattle Podcast ®
Trigger Warning: This episode may include topics such as assault, trauma, and discrimination. If necessary, listeners are encouraged to refrain from listening and care for their safety and well-being.
Disclaimer: The content provided is for educational, informational, and entertainment purposes only. Nothing here constitutes personal or professional consultation, therapy, diagnosis, or creates a counselor-client relationship. Topics discussed may generate differing points of view. If you participate (by being a guest, submitting a question, or commenting) you must do so with the knowledge that we cannot control reactions or responses from others, which may not agree with you or feel unfair. Your participation on this site is at your own risk, accepting full responsibility for any liability or harm that may result. Anything you write here may be used for discussion or endorsement of the podcast. Opinions and views expressed by the host and guest hosts are personal views. Although, we take precautions and fact check, they should not be considered facts and the opinions may change. Opinions posted by participants (such as comments) are not those of the hosts. Readers should not rely on any information found here and should perform due diligence before taking any action. For a more extensive description of factors for you to consider, please see www.psychologyinseattle.com
This episode is sponsored by BetterHelp. Give online therapy a try at betterhelp.com/KIRK to get 10% off your first month.
00:00 Visa Para Un Sueño
08:35 Immigration in Colombia
21:24 What would it take to leave Seattle?
23:23 Is it irrational to consider leaving?
Become a member: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCOUZWV1DRtHtpP2H48S7iiw/join
Become a patron: https://www.patreon.com/PsychologyInSeattle
Email: https://www.psychologyinseattle.com/contact
Website: https://www.psychologyinseattle.com
Merch: https://psychologyinseattle-shop.fourthwall.com/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/psychologyinseattle/
Facebook Official Page: https://www.facebook.com/PsychologyInSeattle/
TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@kirk.honda
August 15, 2025
The Psychology In Seattle Podcast ®
Trigger Warning: This episode may include topics such as assault, trauma, and discrimination. If necessary, listeners are encouraged to refrain from listening and care for their safety and well-being.
Disclaimer: The content provided is for educational, informational, and entertainment purposes only. Nothing here constitutes personal or professional consultation, therapy, diagnosis, or creates a counselor-client relationship. Topics discussed may generate differing points of view. If you participate (by being a guest, submitting a question, or commenting) you must do so with the knowledge that we cannot control reactions or responses from others, which may not agree with you or feel unfair. Your participation on this site is at your own risk, accepting full responsibility for any liability or harm that may result. Anything you write here may be used for discussion or endorsement of the podcast. Opinions and views expressed by the host and guest hosts are personal views. Although, we take precautions and fact check, they should not be considered facts and the opinions may change. Opinions posted by participants (such as comments) are not those of the hosts. Readers should not rely on any information found here and should perform due diligence before taking any action. For a more extensive description of factors for you to consider, please see www.psychologyinseattle.com
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
All right, welcome to our third and final chapter on
(00:04):
immigration and psychology. So let's get into it. The first
chapter was the past, the second was the President, and
now is the future. Yeah, so start a soft birdle.
Speaker 2 (00:17):
Okay, Well, I wanted to start with another song. This
one is actually a song by an artist from Latin
America named Juan Luis Guerra, and he wrote amazing songs.
In fact, I learned when I learned to dance medenga
and salsa. My cousin Adiana taught me and it was
(00:38):
dancing to his songs. This guy songs. But he's got
a song called Visa barra, which means a visa for
a dream, and it's literally about the dream of getting
a visa to come to the United States. And the
lyrics go include things like I'll sing a little bit,
then I'll talk about what it says.
Speaker 3 (00:57):
Ana sla manyana semi naistaun overo call me vince yah
you knowin SAOs.
Speaker 2 (01:09):
Okay, so we're talking about it's five in the morning. Uh.
Seminaris is like, uh, I don't know, some some professional
and also like so someone okay, a professional I went
to college, and also a person that is just uh,
like they work in construction, you know, so white collar,
blue collar, with a thousand papers proving that they're solvent,
(01:35):
that they have means and none of it means anything.
It won't matter. And then the next part is like
it's now seven in the morning, one by one to
the mataedro, which is the the but the.
Speaker 1 (01:50):
I'm give you. So the song is about someone two people.
Speaker 2 (01:54):
No, everyone trying to go get a song is.
Speaker 1 (01:57):
About a variety of you know, from white blue collar. Yeah,
and even though they're solvent, Yeah, they have all.
Speaker 2 (02:05):
The papers, they have all the best intentions, that doesn't matter,
and they're all dreaming to please get this visa so they.
Speaker 1 (02:11):
Can have a better life. But it doesn't matter, yeah,
is the yeah.
Speaker 2 (02:15):
And then so like the next line here is like
one by one to the what do you call in spa.
In Spanish, there's a word called mataedo, which is the
where they kill cows, you know, where they kill the
a slaughterhouse. Okay, right, right, one by one to the slaughterhouse.
And each one has its price, and they're all looking
they're all buskando visa by I own. They're looking for
(02:38):
a visa for a dream. So the song is about
this idea that all of us who grew up in
Latin America are aware of, certainly from that generation Price
still right, which is, man, things seem better up there
in the United States. If I could just get a
visa and go there, I could have a better life,
(03:00):
is a very common sentiment. Now this is of course
going to create an imbalance in the force, right because
you have how many people live in Central and South America,
like hundreds and hundreds of millions Brazil alone, right, And
there is a perception rooted in a lot of facts
in reality that life can be better if we could
(03:23):
get in to that other country in the north. And
so you got to ask questions like, well, first of all,
why is why are the United States so much better off?
You know, it's an important question. If you ask the
wrong kind of people, they'll say, well, because the United
States is made up of better people that are smarter
and know how to do things better. Right. If you
ask other people, they might say like, well, actually, because
(03:44):
the way that a lot of the South American countries
were instituted, where from the get go set up as
criminal hierarchies, that we're never going to have a great
chance of success, but then you had a country that
was able to take advantage of that, which was the
United States, and blah blah. So there's a lot of
different theories and reasons, but the fact is that economically speaking,
(04:06):
there are way more people that are better off in
this country than there are in South American countries. So
this song is and it was a very famous song,
and it represents that feeling of like, man, I could
just get that visa, could go there. As a kid,
I didn't have to worry about getting a visa because
my parents had already done that part. But I could
(04:28):
definitely relate to that feeling of man, the United States
seems so cool. Everything seems so much better. I even,
you know, at the time, I didn't know, but I
was like, oh, Reagan seems so cool. You know, he's
in that one video with the little clamation figures, even
though I in the video they're actually you know, the
(04:49):
Genesis West, Superman. Where are you now?
Speaker 1 (04:53):
Those aren't clamation Those are guys in masks.
Speaker 2 (04:55):
No, no, no, the clamation video with not you're talking
about Pete Peter Gabriel Gabriel, Yeah, the Man of Steel.
I'm choosing Joe Body. Yeah, there's too many things, too
many people. It's not clamation.
Speaker 1 (05:13):
Well that's a Phil Collins song or a Genesis song.
Speaker 2 (05:16):
Yeah, Okay, maybe I just misremembered it as being clamation.
But either way, the point is that in my mind,
all of it was cool. MTV was cool, the music
was cool, the TV shows were cool, the technology was cool.
Everything was great. I dreamed of coming to the United States,
and luckily, in my case, my parents had already made
(05:39):
the leap and had, you know, kind of established a beachhead,
so to speak.
Speaker 1 (05:44):
I'll put the video on your screen that you can see. Yeah,
I guess it kind of looks like claymation.
Speaker 2 (05:48):
That's why I thought it was claimation. I mean, that's claimation.
Not all of them are masked, some of our puppets.
It's a mix. Yeah. So but anyways, all of that
is irrelevant because the point is that even though they
were making fun of Reagan in that song, I didn't care.
I actually thought the whole thing was awesome. Yeah, and
that was a common sentiment. Not everyone felt that way,
(06:10):
but it was a common sentiment, and it was this idea.
Speaker 1 (06:13):
I can relate because even for me living in the States,
I saw America in a certain way. You know, it's
before awareness about the real history and the underbelly of
American society. You know, the eighties was such a different time.
It was a reaction, it was a pendulum swing away
from Vietnam War. It was this attempt to whitewash everything.
(06:38):
And you know, as a ten year old, I believed
the hype. So I can imagine being outside the States
and singing.
Speaker 2 (06:46):
And when I watched Superman, you know, I believed in
Superman and in that movie, they were even like I
believe in truth, justice in the American way.
Speaker 1 (06:54):
Yeah, And for the record, I still believe in those ideals.
Those ideals aren't American. They are human, and I believe
in those ideals. If we attach that to America, or
to humans, or to the higher mindedness of our species,
then I still absolutely believe in those ideals. And I
(07:16):
don't think that they're dead. And I don't think it's silly.
I don't think it's traite. I don't think it's naive
to have virtues, you know.
Speaker 2 (07:23):
And so a whole generation, no not one generation, multiple
generations from the Southern countries grew up with that feeling,
and in many cases really struggling to try to get
a visa to try to come here, and even nowadays.
So just in the last couple of weeks in Colombia,
(07:44):
it costs. It was costing I think something like one
hundred and fifty dollars to get a visa to come visit.
Now one hundred and fifty bucks to you, and I
doesn't sound like that much. One hundred and fifty bucks
in Columbia is quite a bit of money, but they
just tripled it now costs like close to five hundred
bucks or something like that to make it harder. But
(08:04):
it's a paradox, right because you think, oh, well, hold on,
we're trying to make sure illegal people don't come in
and blah blah, so we're making it harder for legal
people to come and what I don't understand. And it
only makes sense if we start realizing that it's not
actually just about the illegal folks. It's about the culture
and the race and all that. So yeah, anyway, so
(08:28):
this song, this song had a special significance as a kid,
but it has taken on a new significance for me.
And there's something that's been happening in Colombia that is
very interesting. And in parallel, Columbia has been experiencing a
refugee crisis as well, because Venezuela and refugees have been
(08:48):
coming to Colombia for the last I don't know, ten
years maybe, and it's been massive. And if we think,
you know, oh, we have such a problem with immigration
here at the border, our problem is insignificant if you
compare it percentage wise with the Colombian situation. In Colombia,
you know, let's keep in mind that when we say
in this country, let's say a million people came, okay,
(09:11):
but we have three hundred million people, right, so that's
one in three hundred million, or sorry, it's one million
for three hundred million, okay. But in Colombia, when you
say three million refugees in a country, has I think
thirty million people. Maybe it's it's a totally different situation, right.
Speaker 1 (09:30):
Yeah. When I was visiting Bogatah with you, yeah, I
one night took an uber by myself and the uber
driver and I were talking because I don't know, sometimes
you strike up a conversation and he was a Venezuelan refugee,
and he talked about how he and his parents and
his siblings had mostly made it out, and in Venezuela
(09:53):
they were professors and professionals, you know, he himself, but
the system in Colombia didn't allow for them to continue
their profession. You know, there's different regulations and different licenses
and stuff, and so they had to find ways to
make money, including driving ubraight. And so my guess is
(10:14):
that because they were privileged in Venezuela, they were actually
able to get out right yea, as opposed to many
others that weren't.
Speaker 2 (10:21):
And so what ends up happening, sadly, is that folks
in places like Columbia that are experiencing that don't extrapolate
and say, oh wait a minute, we got to let's
learn from the lessons of what we don't like that
the United States is doing and make sure we don't
do the same things. But it's tricky because again, you know,
three million people coming over in a country like what's
(10:43):
ten percent of the population, that's gigantic. Gigantic.
Speaker 1 (10:48):
Well, correctly if I'm wrong, but there's a lot of
conservatives or anti immigration people in Colombia that are decrying.
Speaker 4 (10:56):
Crimes exactly the same exact fear and if anything, in
that case, like they have a point, even though it's
the same kind of problem.
Speaker 1 (11:08):
But the reason for crime is not because these are
criminals coming over the border. It's because you have people
that are forced into situations economically that they have to
turn at least a petty crime to survive. They're going
to starve otherwise.
Speaker 2 (11:24):
Yes, yes, And when you have three million people coming over,
if two percent of them are criminals, that's a lot
more criminals that you just imbibed into your country. Of course,
you were just saying, hey, maybe this person was privileged
so they were able to make it out. Guess who
else is able to make it out hardcore criminals that
have means. So it's a disproportionate sampling. In other words,
(11:48):
even though it's a minority of the percentage of the
three million people that are actually hardcore criminals, the criminals
that make it over are the ones looking for the
biggest opportunity, and they end up taking over a lot
of the gang activity in the streets. So you know,
there are problems on top of this. Columbia already has
a huge problem with internal any placement.
Speaker 1 (12:07):
Just to drill down to this a little bit more,
gang leaders only have power because they have gang members,
and the only reason why anyone would turn to be
in a gang was because they are not given opportunities otherwise.
Speaker 2 (12:19):
That's right, that's correct. And by the way, you didn't
need three million Venezuelans. If you have the gang leaders
coming over, they will find many displaced and disenfranchised Colombians
that are also ready to do crime because they have
no other opportunities. Speaking of which, the Colombian population is
(12:40):
the second highest in the world of internal displacement, meaning
people that within the same country have had to flee
their homes because of war and other problems. They have
six point eight million Colombians displaced within the country. It's insane, okay. So,
(13:02):
and this is because they've had like insurrections going back,
you know, fifty sixty years and all these things, and
horrific leadership at terrible leadership, the mafia, all the organizations stuff.
And hearkening back to our previous episodes where we talked
about like people not dealing with root cost effects things
like that, Colombia has had all these very very powerful
(13:24):
drug gangs, and they've had very very powerful drug gangs
because those gangs are able to sell a lot of
expensive drugs up in countries like the United States, and
you know, they can fund their activities and so yeah,
So as a combination of all this displacement and the
Venezuelan crises, Colombia has basically become what's also known as
(13:47):
a transit country because in reality, not all that immigration
can in fact be absorbed by Columbia. Folks keep going north,
and so a lot of the Venezuelans that make their
way all the way up to the US been coming
all the way from Venezuela through Colombia through a place
called the Darien Gap. It goes into Panama and then
(14:07):
all the way up. So we were talking about like migration,
you know, how like how can people migrate that far?
What you can when you have no other options? And
so yeah, because I don't think a lot of times
people may think that all the Venezuelan and refugees just
like came in planes or something, but no, they're having
to make their way through Central America. And of course
(14:29):
this creates a horrible situation in Colombia. Like you said,
a lot of right wingers going like, you know, the
Venezuelans are ruining the country, right. Well, yeah, the Venezuelan
conflict is ruining the Venezuelan country, and as a result,
all those people that come over are now don't have
enough money and place to work in things, which of
course makes the country even worse in Colombia, right, and
(14:51):
then a lot of those people keep immigrating north, and
then it causes problems here as well. So it's really
fascinating as I visit there because I have a lot
of the same conversations there that I have here, but
the context is different. And I think you experienced this too,
which is like people talking about Venezuelans the way that
here people talk about Mexicans or Venezuelans, right, and blaming
(15:15):
everything and even you know people that I love, close
family members that like blame just everything on the Venezuelans
and sort of demonize them as a group, like, oh
those Venezuela.
Speaker 1 (15:26):
Wait. I thought racism was an American thing.
Speaker 2 (15:29):
Right, Yeah, I know, we invented it, but it was
exported recently. Yeah, and it sucks because it's not even
how can you even be racism? It's it They look
the same, like it's like weird nationalism, but there is
an element of racism because they talk slightly with a
different accent, I guess, and their ethnic composition is just
slightly different. It's just so weird.
Speaker 1 (15:50):
So would they is it akin to race? Would they
see Venezuelans as a different race? Ish a little bit,
but in the same way that we might see French people,
you know, white Americans might see French people as a
different race or a different culture or something.
Speaker 2 (16:07):
Definitely, And this already happens even in Colombia, like even
within the same country, where there's racism between the central
part of the country against the coastal parts of the
country and the southern parts of the country, both because
of actual different mixture of races. Like there's definitely more
Afro influence in the in the race in the coastal areas.
(16:29):
There's more native indigenous influence in the southern parts of
the country. So yes, there's going to be more you know,
quote pure Spanish blood in the center parts of the country.
But on top of that, they also speak with different accents,
and they also have less money, and so there's there's discrimination, racism,
and all of it mixed. Then let alone if now
(16:50):
you're coming from a different country, so then you add
that to the bucket So you know, I'm bringing this
up because one, I'm not sitting here saying, oh, yeah,
the Republicans in the United States, they're the only problem
in the world, and they're the only racist, and now
these problems exist throughout the world. In fact, the reason
(17:11):
we have so many immigrants here is because of problems
in other countries.
Speaker 1 (17:14):
Yeah. I don't know that much about Japan's immigration policy recently,
but I do know that the Japanese government and the
people can be some of the most racist bassards on
the planet right historically and currently yeah, yeah, and yes,
and racists not only against the barbarian white people, yeah,
(17:36):
but Korean's, Vietnamese, Chinese, you know.
Speaker 2 (17:39):
Right, And yet we have the reality which is that well,
damn it. For a while, for a while, it seemed
like this place here in the United States was a
little more stable, a little more and and it's And
some folks might hear me say that and say, like
you're dreaming, you're you're on drugs, dude, Like, name any
(18:01):
time in US history, and I will point to a
place in the world where the US was victimizing and
ABUSU involved, And I'm like, fair enough, fair enough, including Columbia,
at the same time, I personally so maybe now I'm
just gonna get selfisher. I had never ever felt under
threat because I felt discrimination certainly. You know I've talked
(18:24):
about before how when I was in high school, I
had my physics teacher who would constantly make jokes about
Pablo Escobar and all these kinds of things. I had
an English teacher that taught an AP class.
Speaker 1 (18:36):
And to be clear, the jokes were constantly about you
being a drug dealer, yeah.
Speaker 2 (18:41):
And my uncle being Pablo and all these kinds of like.
Speaker 1 (18:43):
Oh, let you know, oh the drug the drug lord
is raising his hand, let's call on him, those kind
of jokes, those kinds of things. Yeah, not just like
mild jokes.
Speaker 2 (18:52):
No, no, no, And you know, and I always dismissed it
because I was his best student and I got great grades,
and I always thought he was like his way to
bond with me. No, he was being completely an abusive dick,
you know that said and then there are other cases,
like you know, a teacher that didn't let me in
their class because according to her, the class was full,
but I really it wasn't full. And I really think
(19:14):
it's because she didn't think I could hack it because
I was maybe this isn't my original language. Who knows, anyways,
But in spite of all that and other things, I
never actually felt like either threatened or ever ever ever
once thought, Man, maybe someday I'm just gonna have to
leave this country. I never ever ever thought that. Never
(19:35):
once did I think that. And unfortunately, as of the
last six months now, I'm in a situation where I've
literally been having those conversations. And I was just in Columbia.
I went down for three weeks. I was a little
concerned about what would happen trying to get back. Luckily,
in my case, it was trivial. I actually had no inconveniences.
(20:00):
Same thing with my mom. My mom traveled. We were
all fine. So, you know, from that perspective, I guess
I'm fine. I'm privileged. I'm cool, at least for now.
But when we watch all the all the news and everything.
While we were down there, my mom actually was freaking out.
She was like, I think we need to sell I
think we need to move to Columbia. I think, you know,
(20:21):
she was having these conversations. This wasn't theoretical. We were
having the conversation. My relatives down there. Of course, were like, dude,
you guys got to come down. This country is no
walk in the park. There's we have tons of political
issues here. Don't think that you're coming here. And they're
absolutely right, right, and and and the meanwhile, I'm going,
(20:42):
like what come? What am I am? I really having
conversations about like what should we consider like selling our
place and like, but that that is the point where
we're at, and I find it surreal, like I never
thought we would get to this point, and I feel,
you know, it's like we've been in a bubble. You
know all these there's countries all around the world where
(21:04):
people are like, yeah, welcome to the club, Like that's
our daily reality. We've fled multiple times. Yeah, fair enough,
we've been in a bubble. But now our bubble has
been started to burst.
Speaker 1 (21:15):
Well, let's take a break. When we get back, let's
burst more bubbles. What do you say, Let's do it
right back from the break?
Speaker 2 (21:25):
Yeah all right. So I add a couple of questions
for you. What would it take for you in reality,
like if you could picture, like what kind of things
would it take for you to decide you needed to
leave this place?
Speaker 1 (21:38):
I don't know I've never thought about it. I don't
even like to consider moving out of Seattle within the
United States. Yeah, So I don't know.
Speaker 2 (21:49):
Or would you do it? Just basically go down fighting
no matter what.
Speaker 1 (21:53):
Probably not. I mean if it came to life and
death and there was an option to move to Canada
or something, then.
Speaker 2 (22:01):
Yeah, okay, so in your mind it might be like, well,
life and death might be in question kind of thing.
Speaker 1 (22:06):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, but not political strife. Yeah, because I'm
old enough to remember various eras of political strife. Yeah,
arguably even worse than today. So it would take a
lot of quote unquote political strife for me to consider moving. Plus,
as your family will tell you in Bogata, political strife
(22:28):
and racism and otherism and problems are not an American
thing totally. Not that there aren't other countries that are
doing better in these areas, but it's a naive notion
to think that leaving the United States would solve all
your problems.
Speaker 2 (22:43):
Right, Yeah, that makes sense. I guess. Another question would
be what if all of a sudden, for whatever reason,
the administration started targeting Japanese people, and targeting meaning like
or maybe even like.
Speaker 1 (22:59):
Well, I'm not I'm not welcome anywhere. Yeah, so where
would I go? Yeah, Japan's they don't like me, and like,
so where would I go?
Speaker 2 (23:10):
Yeah? It'd be hard because I I've been struggling with
this because I I don't you know, when I was
a kid, the situation I was living in Colombia was terrible.
It was dangerous, literally dangerous day to day, right Yet
you know, day to day I was just a kid,
So I never really thought of it in terms of
(23:31):
like this keeps getting worse, maybe we should get out
of here. The only reason I left is because mostly
my mom lived here and I wanted to be with
my mom. Now, it'd be silly for me to imagine
that very le subconsciously I wasn't also feeling afraid, and
that I was also not like, man, it'd be so
much calmer over there, you know. I'm sure it's just
(23:53):
that on the surface. As far as I remember, and
I could be misremembering, most of it was like do
I want to live with my mom around? And in
fact also it was the positives like it's cool, it's
the US, I get to be in the US, you know,
that kind of thing, Whereas in reality, if like if
I could have stepped back. I would have been like, well,
hell yeah, look at all the Look at what just happened.
There were bullets, there were things. Right now I'm sitting
(24:15):
here and like, you know, I still live in a pocket.
I still live in a bubble. I'm not touched day
to day by the other than maybe a couple prices
going up or something. And so I asked myself the
questions of like, well, are there thresholds? Are there thresholds
beyond which I would have to consider moving or leaving?
What are those thresholds, you know? And and it's and
(24:36):
it's been this weird game in my head because part
of me feels like I'm like just overreacting. I'll have
conversations with some people and it's like, dude, you need
to calm down. It's like, okay, fair enough. And then
the next day I hear something from a very powerful
person in this country that scares the living shit out
of me. And like I said, when I start hearing
things about like we will feed sixty five million latinos
(25:01):
two alligators, like what am I am? I supposed to
just be like hah. You know, people say the craziest
things and at which point do I stop? And when
we have the president going like oh we should just
remove the citizenship of black person, or suing people because
they said the wrong thing or all these things, and
I think, am I being irrational for thinking like maybe
(25:25):
I need to consider options? Like you know that's what's
been going through my head. Do you think I'm being irrational?
Speaker 1 (25:32):
Well, there's no irrational or rational. It's a feeling and
it's a choice, and it's an option, so only you
can you know. It's like saying should I get married,
or should I get a divorce, or should I get
a new job. It's dependent on your own personal journey.
There's nothing right or wrong about what you're saying.
Speaker 2 (25:52):
Fair enough, that said, you could imagine, like imagine if
the first time in twenty sixteen, when Trump one the
first time, imagine if I had called you that day
or the next day, Kirk, I'm leaving the country. You
were like, why, Well, you know what this means, they're
going to come after us.
Speaker 1 (26:12):
Well, I get it, But maybe I'm particular in this way.
As a therapist, hearing people proclaim a lot of rash
impulses along these lines of like divorce is the one
I just have adopted a point of view of how
would I know what's right for someone else. I have
(26:33):
what I'm doing, and I guess I have my mild
opinion about someone else's choice. But you know, it's a
you know, there's a lot of reasons why people make
choices about things like that that are not definable, are
not concrete, maybe not relatable. So I because you know,
you know, during that time and really previous, I would
hear a lot of my friends and people in my
(26:55):
circle making such proclamations or exploring those kinds of things,
and I'll though it would suck because I don't want
to not live near my friends, you know, to have
them leave the area. I also understand that, you know,
people don't make those decisions lightly.
Speaker 2 (27:10):
So that's fair. I think maybe a distinction to be drawn.
Let's take the pandemic for example. I imagine if I had
called you up on April of twenty twenty, and I'm like, Kirk,
I'm afraid. I looked outside of my window and my
neighbor has COVID and I saw him. I made eye contact.
I think I'm gonna die. Yeah, I'm guessing you would
(27:33):
have probably talked me off that ledge. Yeah, you would
have said it doesn't work that way, transmission blah blah blah. Yeah, right,
because I was making a claim that was you know,
it is my feeling, but it's disprovable. You know, it's
like it's too many bridges too far. So I think
there's similar categories like if again, but if.
Speaker 1 (27:54):
You had said, because of that experience, I am now
moving to a rural area to get away from people,
I wouldn't argue with that, sure, right, I might say
something like, well, well that's not terrible. Yeah, that's not
what I'm gonna do. Right.
Speaker 2 (28:11):
Similarly, if right now I was saying to myself or
to you or to whoever, is like, I am literally
afraid that tonight or any one of these nights in
the following few weeks, Ice is gonna come raid my
house and take us all away to El Salvador. Right,
I'd like to believe that I'm being that I'm exaggerating
(28:33):
the risk in my head. Yeah, right, and that I
should probably look at the data more right, So fair enough, right, So,
like that might be too many bridges too far? What
I don't know, and I hear you maybe there's just
no knowing. What I don't know is like, is there
a point, is there a data point? Is there a thing?
(28:54):
As an example, like I myself have more I don't know,
like I became a citizen thirty years ago, blah blah blah.
I have relatives in Florida that I know for a
fact would be in a lot more riskier status. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (29:12):
Well, so I want to get into something along these
lines because I do have a way of thinking and
helping people with this. But let's do that after the
break the rest of this episode, the final chapter.
Speaker 2 (29:24):
Final chapter is for patrons of.
Speaker 1 (29:28):
The podcast, so if you're a patron, just continue listening.
If you're not, then this is goodbye for now, and
take care of yourself because you deserve it.
All right, welcome to our third and final chapter on
(00:04):
immigration and psychology. So let's get into it. The first
chapter was the past, the second was the President, and
now is the future. Yeah, so start a soft birdle.
Speaker 2 (00:17):
Okay, Well, I wanted to start with another song. This
one is actually a song by an artist from Latin
America named Juan Luis Guerra, and he wrote amazing songs.
In fact, I learned when I learned to dance medenga
and salsa. My cousin Adiana taught me and it was
(00:38):
dancing to his songs. This guy songs. But he's got
a song called Visa barra, which means a visa for
a dream, and it's literally about the dream of getting
a visa to come to the United States. And the
lyrics go include things like I'll sing a little bit,
then I'll talk about what it says.
Speaker 3 (00:57):
Ana sla manyana semi naistaun overo call me vince yah
you knowin SAOs.
Speaker 2 (01:09):
Okay, so we're talking about it's five in the morning. Uh.
Seminaris is like, uh, I don't know, some some professional
and also like so someone okay, a professional I went
to college, and also a person that is just uh,
like they work in construction, you know, so white collar,
blue collar, with a thousand papers proving that they're solvent,
(01:35):
that they have means and none of it means anything.
It won't matter. And then the next part is like
it's now seven in the morning, one by one to
the mataedro, which is the the but the.
Speaker 1 (01:50):
I'm give you. So the song is about someone two people.
Speaker 2 (01:54):
No, everyone trying to go get a song is.
Speaker 1 (01:57):
About a variety of you know, from white blue collar. Yeah,
and even though they're solvent, Yeah, they have all.
Speaker 2 (02:05):
The papers, they have all the best intentions, that doesn't matter,
and they're all dreaming to please get this visa so they.
Speaker 1 (02:11):
Can have a better life. But it doesn't matter, yeah,
is the yeah.
Speaker 2 (02:15):
And then so like the next line here is like
one by one to the what do you call in spa.
In Spanish, there's a word called mataedo, which is the
where they kill cows, you know, where they kill the
a slaughterhouse. Okay, right, right, one by one to the slaughterhouse.
And each one has its price, and they're all looking
they're all buskando visa by I own. They're looking for
(02:38):
a visa for a dream. So the song is about
this idea that all of us who grew up in
Latin America are aware of, certainly from that generation Price
still right, which is, man, things seem better up there
in the United States. If I could just get a
visa and go there, I could have a better life,
(03:00):
is a very common sentiment. Now this is of course
going to create an imbalance in the force, right because
you have how many people live in Central and South America,
like hundreds and hundreds of millions Brazil alone, right, And
there is a perception rooted in a lot of facts
in reality that life can be better if we could
(03:23):
get in to that other country in the north. And
so you got to ask questions like, well, first of all,
why is why are the United States so much better off?
You know, it's an important question. If you ask the
wrong kind of people, they'll say, well, because the United
States is made up of better people that are smarter
and know how to do things better. Right. If you
ask other people, they might say like, well, actually, because
(03:44):
the way that a lot of the South American countries
were instituted, where from the get go set up as
criminal hierarchies, that we're never going to have a great
chance of success, but then you had a country that
was able to take advantage of that, which was the
United States, and blah blah. So there's a lot of
different theories and reasons, but the fact is that economically speaking,
(04:06):
there are way more people that are better off in
this country than there are in South American countries. So
this song is and it was a very famous song,
and it represents that feeling of like, man, I could
just get that visa, could go there. As a kid,
I didn't have to worry about getting a visa because
my parents had already done that part. But I could
(04:28):
definitely relate to that feeling of man, the United States
seems so cool. Everything seems so much better. I even,
you know, at the time, I didn't know, but I
was like, oh, Reagan seems so cool. You know, he's
in that one video with the little clamation figures, even
though I in the video they're actually you know, the
(04:49):
Genesis West, Superman. Where are you now?
Speaker 1 (04:53):
Those aren't clamation Those are guys in masks.
Speaker 2 (04:55):
No, no, no, the clamation video with not you're talking
about Pete Peter Gabriel Gabriel, Yeah, the Man of Steel.
I'm choosing Joe Body. Yeah, there's too many things, too
many people. It's not clamation.
Speaker 1 (05:13):
Well that's a Phil Collins song or a Genesis song.
Speaker 2 (05:16):
Yeah, Okay, maybe I just misremembered it as being clamation.
But either way, the point is that in my mind,
all of it was cool. MTV was cool, the music
was cool, the TV shows were cool, the technology was cool.
Everything was great. I dreamed of coming to the United States,
and luckily, in my case, my parents had already made
(05:39):
the leap and had, you know, kind of established a beachhead,
so to speak.
Speaker 1 (05:44):
I'll put the video on your screen that you can see. Yeah,
I guess it kind of looks like claymation.
Speaker 2 (05:48):
That's why I thought it was claimation. I mean, that's claimation.
Not all of them are masked, some of our puppets.
It's a mix. Yeah. So but anyways, all of that
is irrelevant because the point is that even though they
were making fun of Reagan in that song, I didn't care.
I actually thought the whole thing was awesome. Yeah, and
that was a common sentiment. Not everyone felt that way,
(06:10):
but it was a common sentiment, and it was this idea.
Speaker 1 (06:13):
I can relate because even for me living in the States,
I saw America in a certain way. You know, it's
before awareness about the real history and the underbelly of
American society. You know, the eighties was such a different time.
It was a reaction, it was a pendulum swing away
from Vietnam War. It was this attempt to whitewash everything.
(06:38):
And you know, as a ten year old, I believed
the hype. So I can imagine being outside the States
and singing.
Speaker 2 (06:46):
And when I watched Superman, you know, I believed in
Superman and in that movie, they were even like I
believe in truth, justice in the American way.
Speaker 1 (06:54):
Yeah, And for the record, I still believe in those ideals.
Those ideals aren't American. They are human, and I believe
in those ideals. If we attach that to America, or
to humans, or to the higher mindedness of our species,
then I still absolutely believe in those ideals. And I
(07:16):
don't think that they're dead. And I don't think it's silly.
I don't think it's traite. I don't think it's naive
to have virtues, you know.
Speaker 2 (07:23):
And so a whole generation, no not one generation, multiple
generations from the Southern countries grew up with that feeling,
and in many cases really struggling to try to get
a visa to try to come here, and even nowadays.
So just in the last couple of weeks in Colombia,
(07:44):
it costs. It was costing I think something like one
hundred and fifty dollars to get a visa to come visit.
Now one hundred and fifty bucks to you, and I
doesn't sound like that much. One hundred and fifty bucks
in Columbia is quite a bit of money, but they
just tripled it now costs like close to five hundred
bucks or something like that to make it harder. But
(08:04):
it's a paradox, right because you think, oh, well, hold on,
we're trying to make sure illegal people don't come in
and blah blah, so we're making it harder for legal
people to come and what I don't understand. And it
only makes sense if we start realizing that it's not
actually just about the illegal folks. It's about the culture
and the race and all that. So yeah, anyway, so
(08:28):
this song, this song had a special significance as a kid,
but it has taken on a new significance for me.
And there's something that's been happening in Colombia that is
very interesting. And in parallel, Columbia has been experiencing a
refugee crisis as well, because Venezuela and refugees have been
(08:48):
coming to Colombia for the last I don't know, ten
years maybe, and it's been massive. And if we think,
you know, oh, we have such a problem with immigration
here at the border, our problem is insignificant if you
compare it percentage wise with the Colombian situation. In Colombia,
you know, let's keep in mind that when we say
in this country, let's say a million people came, okay,
(09:11):
but we have three hundred million people, right, so that's
one in three hundred million, or sorry, it's one million
for three hundred million, okay. But in Colombia, when you
say three million refugees in a country, has I think
thirty million people. Maybe it's it's a totally different situation, right.
Speaker 1 (09:30):
Yeah. When I was visiting Bogatah with you, yeah, I
one night took an uber by myself and the uber
driver and I were talking because I don't know, sometimes
you strike up a conversation and he was a Venezuelan refugee,
and he talked about how he and his parents and
his siblings had mostly made it out, and in Venezuela
(09:53):
they were professors and professionals, you know, he himself, but
the system in Colombia didn't allow for them to continue
their profession. You know, there's different regulations and different licenses
and stuff, and so they had to find ways to
make money, including driving ubraight. And so my guess is
(10:14):
that because they were privileged in Venezuela, they were actually
able to get out right yea, as opposed to many
others that weren't.
Speaker 2 (10:21):
And so what ends up happening, sadly, is that folks
in places like Columbia that are experiencing that don't extrapolate
and say, oh wait a minute, we got to let's
learn from the lessons of what we don't like that
the United States is doing and make sure we don't
do the same things. But it's tricky because again, you know,
three million people coming over in a country like what's
(10:43):
ten percent of the population, that's gigantic. Gigantic.
Speaker 1 (10:48):
Well, correctly if I'm wrong, but there's a lot of
conservatives or anti immigration people in Colombia that are decrying.
Speaker 4 (10:56):
Crimes exactly the same exact fear and if anything, in
that case, like they have a point, even though it's
the same kind of problem.
Speaker 1 (11:08):
But the reason for crime is not because these are
criminals coming over the border. It's because you have people
that are forced into situations economically that they have to
turn at least a petty crime to survive. They're going
to starve otherwise.
Speaker 2 (11:24):
Yes, yes, And when you have three million people coming over,
if two percent of them are criminals, that's a lot
more criminals that you just imbibed into your country. Of course,
you were just saying, hey, maybe this person was privileged
so they were able to make it out. Guess who
else is able to make it out hardcore criminals that
have means. So it's a disproportionate sampling. In other words,
(11:48):
even though it's a minority of the percentage of the
three million people that are actually hardcore criminals, the criminals
that make it over are the ones looking for the
biggest opportunity, and they end up taking over a lot
of the gang activity in the streets. So you know,
there are problems on top of this. Columbia already has
a huge problem with internal any placement.
Speaker 1 (12:07):
Just to drill down to this a little bit more,
gang leaders only have power because they have gang members,
and the only reason why anyone would turn to be
in a gang was because they are not given opportunities otherwise.
Speaker 2 (12:19):
That's right, that's correct. And by the way, you didn't
need three million Venezuelans. If you have the gang leaders
coming over, they will find many displaced and disenfranchised Colombians
that are also ready to do crime because they have
no other opportunities. Speaking of which, the Colombian population is
(12:40):
the second highest in the world of internal displacement, meaning
people that within the same country have had to flee
their homes because of war and other problems. They have
six point eight million Colombians displaced within the country. It's insane, okay. So,
(13:02):
and this is because they've had like insurrections going back,
you know, fifty sixty years and all these things, and
horrific leadership at terrible leadership, the mafia, all the organizations stuff.
And hearkening back to our previous episodes where we talked
about like people not dealing with root cost effects things
like that, Colombia has had all these very very powerful
(13:24):
drug gangs, and they've had very very powerful drug gangs
because those gangs are able to sell a lot of
expensive drugs up in countries like the United States, and
you know, they can fund their activities and so yeah,
So as a combination of all this displacement and the
Venezuelan crises, Colombia has basically become what's also known as
(13:47):
a transit country because in reality, not all that immigration
can in fact be absorbed by Columbia. Folks keep going north,
and so a lot of the Venezuelans that make their
way all the way up to the US been coming
all the way from Venezuela through Colombia through a place
called the Darien Gap. It goes into Panama and then
(14:07):
all the way up. So we were talking about like migration,
you know, how like how can people migrate that far?
What you can when you have no other options? And
so yeah, because I don't think a lot of times
people may think that all the Venezuelan and refugees just
like came in planes or something, but no, they're having
to make their way through Central America. And of course
(14:29):
this creates a horrible situation in Colombia. Like you said,
a lot of right wingers going like, you know, the
Venezuelans are ruining the country, right. Well, yeah, the Venezuelan
conflict is ruining the Venezuelan country, and as a result,
all those people that come over are now don't have
enough money and place to work in things, which of
course makes the country even worse in Colombia, right, and
(14:51):
then a lot of those people keep immigrating north, and
then it causes problems here as well. So it's really
fascinating as I visit there because I have a lot
of the same conversations there that I have here, but
the context is different. And I think you experienced this too,
which is like people talking about Venezuelans the way that
here people talk about Mexicans or Venezuelans, right, and blaming
(15:15):
everything and even you know people that I love, close
family members that like blame just everything on the Venezuelans
and sort of demonize them as a group, like, oh
those Venezuela.
Speaker 1 (15:26):
Wait. I thought racism was an American thing.
Speaker 2 (15:29):
Right, Yeah, I know, we invented it, but it was
exported recently. Yeah, and it sucks because it's not even
how can you even be racism? It's it They look
the same, like it's like weird nationalism, but there is
an element of racism because they talk slightly with a
different accent, I guess, and their ethnic composition is just
slightly different. It's just so weird.
Speaker 1 (15:50):
So would they is it akin to race? Would they
see Venezuelans as a different race? Ish a little bit,
but in the same way that we might see French people,
you know, white Americans might see French people as a
different race or a different culture or something.
Speaker 2 (16:07):
Definitely, And this already happens even in Colombia, like even
within the same country, where there's racism between the central
part of the country against the coastal parts of the
country and the southern parts of the country, both because
of actual different mixture of races. Like there's definitely more
Afro influence in the in the race in the coastal areas.
(16:29):
There's more native indigenous influence in the southern parts of
the country. So yes, there's going to be more you know,
quote pure Spanish blood in the center parts of the country.
But on top of that, they also speak with different accents,
and they also have less money, and so there's there's discrimination, racism,
and all of it mixed. Then let alone if now
(16:50):
you're coming from a different country, so then you add
that to the bucket So you know, I'm bringing this
up because one, I'm not sitting here saying, oh, yeah,
the Republicans in the United States, they're the only problem
in the world, and they're the only racist, and now
these problems exist throughout the world. In fact, the reason
(17:11):
we have so many immigrants here is because of problems
in other countries.
Speaker 1 (17:14):
Yeah. I don't know that much about Japan's immigration policy recently,
but I do know that the Japanese government and the
people can be some of the most racist bassards on
the planet right historically and currently yeah, yeah, and yes,
and racists not only against the barbarian white people, yeah,
(17:36):
but Korean's, Vietnamese, Chinese, you know.
Speaker 2 (17:39):
Right, And yet we have the reality which is that well,
damn it. For a while, for a while, it seemed
like this place here in the United States was a
little more stable, a little more and and it's And
some folks might hear me say that and say, like
you're dreaming, you're you're on drugs, dude, Like, name any
(18:01):
time in US history, and I will point to a
place in the world where the US was victimizing and
ABUSU involved, And I'm like, fair enough, fair enough, including Columbia,
at the same time, I personally so maybe now I'm
just gonna get selfisher. I had never ever felt under
threat because I felt discrimination certainly. You know I've talked
(18:24):
about before how when I was in high school, I
had my physics teacher who would constantly make jokes about
Pablo Escobar and all these kinds of things. I had
an English teacher that taught an AP class.
Speaker 1 (18:36):
And to be clear, the jokes were constantly about you
being a drug dealer, yeah.
Speaker 2 (18:41):
And my uncle being Pablo and all these kinds of like.
Speaker 1 (18:43):
Oh, let you know, oh the drug the drug lord
is raising his hand, let's call on him, those kind
of jokes, those kinds of things. Yeah, not just like
mild jokes.
Speaker 2 (18:52):
No, no, no, And you know, and I always dismissed it
because I was his best student and I got great grades,
and I always thought he was like his way to
bond with me. No, he was being completely an abusive dick,
you know that said and then there are other cases,
like you know, a teacher that didn't let me in
their class because according to her, the class was full,
but I really it wasn't full. And I really think
(19:14):
it's because she didn't think I could hack it because
I was maybe this isn't my original language. Who knows, anyways,
But in spite of all that and other things, I
never actually felt like either threatened or ever ever ever
once thought, Man, maybe someday I'm just gonna have to
leave this country. I never ever ever thought that. Never
(19:35):
once did I think that. And unfortunately, as of the
last six months now, I'm in a situation where I've
literally been having those conversations. And I was just in Columbia.
I went down for three weeks. I was a little
concerned about what would happen trying to get back. Luckily,
in my case, it was trivial. I actually had no inconveniences.
(20:00):
Same thing with my mom. My mom traveled. We were
all fine. So, you know, from that perspective, I guess
I'm fine. I'm privileged. I'm cool, at least for now.
But when we watch all the all the news and everything.
While we were down there, my mom actually was freaking out.
She was like, I think we need to sell I
think we need to move to Columbia. I think, you know,
(20:21):
she was having these conversations. This wasn't theoretical. We were
having the conversation. My relatives down there. Of course, were like, dude,
you guys got to come down. This country is no
walk in the park. There's we have tons of political
issues here. Don't think that you're coming here. And they're
absolutely right, right, and and and the meanwhile, I'm going,
(20:42):
like what come? What am I am? I really having
conversations about like what should we consider like selling our
place and like, but that that is the point where
we're at, and I find it surreal, like I never
thought we would get to this point, and I feel,
you know, it's like we've been in a bubble. You
know all these there's countries all around the world where
(21:04):
people are like, yeah, welcome to the club, Like that's
our daily reality. We've fled multiple times. Yeah, fair enough,
we've been in a bubble. But now our bubble has
been started to burst.
Speaker 1 (21:15):
Well, let's take a break. When we get back, let's
burst more bubbles. What do you say, Let's do it
right back from the break?
Speaker 2 (21:25):
Yeah all right. So I add a couple of questions
for you. What would it take for you in reality,
like if you could picture, like what kind of things
would it take for you to decide you needed to
leave this place?
Speaker 1 (21:38):
I don't know I've never thought about it. I don't
even like to consider moving out of Seattle within the
United States. Yeah, So I don't know.
Speaker 2 (21:49):
Or would you do it? Just basically go down fighting
no matter what.
Speaker 1 (21:53):
Probably not. I mean if it came to life and
death and there was an option to move to Canada
or something, then.
Speaker 2 (22:01):
Yeah, okay, so in your mind it might be like, well,
life and death might be in question kind of thing.
Speaker 1 (22:06):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, but not political strife. Yeah, because I'm
old enough to remember various eras of political strife. Yeah,
arguably even worse than today. So it would take a
lot of quote unquote political strife for me to consider moving. Plus,
as your family will tell you in Bogata, political strife
(22:28):
and racism and otherism and problems are not an American
thing totally. Not that there aren't other countries that are
doing better in these areas, but it's a naive notion
to think that leaving the United States would solve all
your problems.
Speaker 2 (22:43):
Right, Yeah, that makes sense. I guess. Another question would
be what if all of a sudden, for whatever reason,
the administration started targeting Japanese people, and targeting meaning like
or maybe even like.
Speaker 1 (22:59):
Well, I'm not I'm not welcome anywhere. Yeah, so where
would I go? Yeah, Japan's they don't like me, and like,
so where would I go?
Speaker 2 (23:10):
Yeah? It'd be hard because I I've been struggling with
this because I I don't you know, when I was
a kid, the situation I was living in Colombia was terrible.
It was dangerous, literally dangerous day to day, right Yet
you know, day to day I was just a kid,
So I never really thought of it in terms of
(23:31):
like this keeps getting worse, maybe we should get out
of here. The only reason I left is because mostly
my mom lived here and I wanted to be with
my mom. Now, it'd be silly for me to imagine
that very le subconsciously I wasn't also feeling afraid, and
that I was also not like, man, it'd be so
much calmer over there, you know. I'm sure it's just
(23:53):
that on the surface. As far as I remember, and
I could be misremembering, most of it was like do
I want to live with my mom around? And in
fact also it was the positives like it's cool, it's
the US, I get to be in the US, you know,
that kind of thing, Whereas in reality, if like if
I could have stepped back. I would have been like, well,
hell yeah, look at all the Look at what just happened.
There were bullets, there were things. Right now I'm sitting
(24:15):
here and like, you know, I still live in a pocket.
I still live in a bubble. I'm not touched day
to day by the other than maybe a couple prices
going up or something. And so I asked myself the
questions of like, well, are there thresholds? Are there thresholds
beyond which I would have to consider moving or leaving?
What are those thresholds, you know? And and it's and
(24:36):
it's been this weird game in my head because part
of me feels like I'm like just overreacting. I'll have
conversations with some people and it's like, dude, you need
to calm down. It's like, okay, fair enough. And then
the next day I hear something from a very powerful
person in this country that scares the living shit out
of me. And like I said, when I start hearing
things about like we will feed sixty five million latinos
(25:01):
two alligators, like what am I am? I supposed to
just be like hah. You know, people say the craziest
things and at which point do I stop? And when
we have the president going like oh we should just
remove the citizenship of black person, or suing people because
they said the wrong thing or all these things, and
I think, am I being irrational for thinking like maybe
(25:25):
I need to consider options? Like you know that's what's
been going through my head. Do you think I'm being irrational?
Speaker 1 (25:32):
Well, there's no irrational or rational. It's a feeling and
it's a choice, and it's an option, so only you
can you know. It's like saying should I get married,
or should I get a divorce, or should I get
a new job. It's dependent on your own personal journey.
There's nothing right or wrong about what you're saying.
Speaker 2 (25:52):
Fair enough, that said, you could imagine, like imagine if
the first time in twenty sixteen, when Trump one the
first time, imagine if I had called you that day
or the next day, Kirk, I'm leaving the country. You
were like, why, Well, you know what this means, they're
going to come after us.
Speaker 1 (26:12):
Well, I get it, But maybe I'm particular in this way.
As a therapist, hearing people proclaim a lot of rash
impulses along these lines of like divorce is the one
I just have adopted a point of view of how
would I know what's right for someone else. I have
(26:33):
what I'm doing, and I guess I have my mild
opinion about someone else's choice. But you know, it's a
you know, there's a lot of reasons why people make
choices about things like that that are not definable, are
not concrete, maybe not relatable. So I because you know,
you know, during that time and really previous, I would
hear a lot of my friends and people in my
(26:55):
circle making such proclamations or exploring those kinds of things,
and I'll though it would suck because I don't want
to not live near my friends, you know, to have
them leave the area. I also understand that, you know,
people don't make those decisions lightly.
Speaker 2 (27:10):
So that's fair. I think maybe a distinction to be drawn.
Let's take the pandemic for example. I imagine if I had
called you up on April of twenty twenty, and I'm like, Kirk,
I'm afraid. I looked outside of my window and my
neighbor has COVID and I saw him. I made eye contact.
I think I'm gonna die. Yeah, I'm guessing you would
(27:33):
have probably talked me off that ledge. Yeah, you would
have said it doesn't work that way, transmission blah blah blah. Yeah, right,
because I was making a claim that was you know,
it is my feeling, but it's disprovable. You know, it's
like it's too many bridges too far. So I think
there's similar categories like if again, but if.
Speaker 1 (27:54):
You had said, because of that experience, I am now
moving to a rural area to get away from people,
I wouldn't argue with that, sure, right, I might say
something like, well, well that's not terrible. Yeah, that's not
what I'm gonna do. Right.
Speaker 2 (28:11):
Similarly, if right now I was saying to myself or
to you or to whoever, is like, I am literally
afraid that tonight or any one of these nights in
the following few weeks, Ice is gonna come raid my
house and take us all away to El Salvador. Right,
I'd like to believe that I'm being that I'm exaggerating
(28:33):
the risk in my head. Yeah, right, and that I
should probably look at the data more right, So fair enough, right, So,
like that might be too many bridges too far? What
I don't know, and I hear you maybe there's just
no knowing. What I don't know is like, is there
a point, is there a data point? Is there a thing?
(28:54):
As an example, like I myself have more I don't know,
like I became a citizen thirty years ago, blah blah blah.
I have relatives in Florida that I know for a
fact would be in a lot more riskier status. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (29:12):
Well, so I want to get into something along these
lines because I do have a way of thinking and
helping people with this. But let's do that after the
break the rest of this episode, the final chapter.
Speaker 2 (29:24):
Final chapter is for patrons of.
Speaker 1 (29:28):
The podcast, so if you're a patron, just continue listening.
If you're not, then this is goodbye for now, and
take care of yourself because you deserve it.
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