Chicago, ICE, and the Lie of American Pastoral

This cynicism is not new, it has only been invigorated under the current regime. Allaying the fears of people who aren’t from here is a rite of passage among Chicagoans who didn’t grow up here. For example, the nickname “Chirag” is made ironic by the many picturesque riverside views and West Loop restaurant scenes featured in “Day in the Life” vlogs, which like to present the city as the last American bastion of yuppies without inherited wealth. (The best parody of the genre, created by comedian Mike Schwanke, shows “A Weekend as a 28-Year-Old in Chicago” as an endless cycle of prosaic hangouts — brunch, happy hour, dinner, repeat.) While New York expats romanticize difficulty, Chicago transplants humbly pride themselves on ease. Chicago, in our eyes, is well managed and ready to play. It’s quiet and safe enough that, if an outsider asks, it’s benign.

Can we critique this well-intentioned stance without tripping over the usual slippery claims about authenticity—that what’s real in a city is nowhere near its famous landmarks, or that life must be difficult to be real? Maybe we’ll laugh, as Chicago poet Brittney Black Rose Capri did in a video over the summer: “I know those bastards were never South Fucking Hyde Park, and that’s only because the university is over there. West? Oh dear, O’Hare. I get it, but it’s also very funny.” I get it, too: The sociology behind what constitutes violence in Chicago, and why such violence occurs in some areas and not others, does not fit into this kind of peacocking — and, in any case, the nuances have never meant much to conservatives, both inside and outside the city, except that any violence could justify policies that perpetuate inequality. But I don’t expect their feathers to be ruffled too much by the flattering images meant to combat their theatrics. These images of the city, reassuring in their homogeneity, seem to assume that any defense against fascist occupation must follow the rules of tourism. They bring to mind what writer and activist Sarah Shulman called “spiritual improvement,” a way of seeing that replaces “complexity and difference” with “sameness.” They are so attuned to a conservative outlook that they would have no problem turning the city into a playground for those who can afford it. This is the reactionary dream of any city, the city as suburbia, whose pastoral image, by the way, is an illusion of its own. chicago He is Beautiful but pastoral? Ha!

Pastoralism is the pretext. Reaganite conservatism had accomplished its mission of reimagining the ideal American citizen within the “Dick and Jane” fantasy of the American family. Today, the family has become the common language of politics: liberal and conservative politicians alike express policy in terms of what it may or may not do for “American families,” as if they were looking at a sea called “America,” inhabited by many private islands. Even though the “American Dream” has been discredited by stark inequality, we cannot shake its logic of individual pursuit, according to which, in the words of cultural theorist Lauren Berlant: “If you invest your energies in work and family, the nation will secure the broader social and economic conditions in which your work can gain value and your life can be lived in dignity.”

Crucially, this means “you” and “your”, not “we” and “our”. The ideal citizen, this thinking goes, looks for signs of the common good in private spaces — especially in that place of privacy in America, the family home. The ideal citizen is not encouraged to identify with the kind of masses whose government demands to do things for the people Collectively; Such an organization of crowds threatens the peaceful family image through which the citizen understands himself. In his pursuit of a good American life, he must justify the state’s contradictory behaviors—for example, that health care will not be universally taken for granted, but that bodies must be monitored and punished by law when the picket fence model is endangered.

Examples abound in our nation, but the very existence of something called the Department of Homeland Security — which is on the receiving end of piles of money to monitor, detain, maim, and kill people who live here in the name of public safety — is one place to look. Since January, DHS propaganda, broadcast on social media platforms like Instagram and X, has embraced the president’s distinctive penchant for slander and nonsense. The department released “Cops”-style clips. Ice Seizures, defamation of citizens, and laughter with sweaty intimacy on behalf of the company. A post from July shows a Chevy Silverado wrapped in Border Patrol branding, parked to appear as if its occupants were staring wistfully at the open desert at golden hour. “You seem happier,” says an imagined observer in the text. Response: “Thanks! ICE deports all criminal illegal aliens and there is no crisis at the border.” Another post describes a “one-way Jet2 holiday until deportation”, alongside footage of a chain gang being forced onto the plane. piece in Drifting Writer Mitch Theriot gave such messages the appropriate name “agit-slop.” In the chain gang video, one commenter said: “At first I thought this was a meme account.” Another one remained to point out.These are human beings with families just like you!!!!!!!”