It was on Tuesday afternoon, July 8, that I discovered that I was irrelevant.
I am an 85 year-old former professor of management who was used to having their ideas taken seriously. I spent my career in Canada, but I now live in Cambridge. I am also British by birth, and a naturalized Canadian citizen and a naturalized U.S. citizen. Over the past year, I have published in our local paper six highly critical short op-eds concerning the activities of president Donald Trump and his administration (see Nov. 1; Dec. 1; Jan. 3; Feb. 18; April 11; and May 26). I also post and comment frequently on Facebook. Those postings have nothing good to say about Trump.
On that Tuesday afternoon, my wife and I were returning to Boston from a holiday in Europe. We had read a lot about how innocent people were being hassled at the immigration control points. People were being arrested for failing to declare research materials. People had been refused entry to the United States for having an unflattering portrait of the vice president on their phone. My phone was loaded with critiques of the president. An Australian New Yorker writer was shipped back to Australia because he had written about the recent student protests at Columbia.
As we approached landing, I wondered what I would do if challenged. If they asked me about the president, I would say that I thought he was a craven popinjay, the embodiment of a living Taco. I hoped that if I were refused entry, I could get a flight to Toronto, where I had many friends. I probably could get summer accommodation at Massey College, where I had lived for two years at the turn of the century.
After disembarking from the flight and having a short wait at immigration, it was the turn of my wife and I with the immigration officer. He took face scans, he examined our passports, and said “welcome home” and gestured for us to continue into the United States.
That was it. No request for phones. No third degree from Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents about my positions on tax cuts for the rich, deregulation for big companies, Medicaid and Medicare cuts for the poor, the deportation of immigrants, birthright citizenship and the denaturalization of multinationality people like me.
What a relief, but also what a disappointment. My tiny contributions to the resistance had gone unnoticed. The massive media sweeps by artificial intelligence engines had not picked up my contributions and my name. I was safe at home; safe to continue writing my polemics against Trump and his sycophantic minions. Right on, Martin; write on.
Martin G. Evans is a writer in Cambridge whose contributions on managerial and political issues have appeared in The Boston Globe, Cambridge Chronicle, MetroWest Daily News, Providence Journal, Toronto Star, Globe and Mail of Toronto, National Post of Toronto and the former Toronto Financial Post. He has taught at the Rotman School of Management at the University of Toronto, London Business School, George Mason University, Rutgers University and the Harvard School of Public Health.
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It was on Tuesday afternoon, July 8, that I discovered that I was irrelevant.
I am an 85 year-old former professor of management who was used to having their ideas taken seriously. I spent my career in Canada, but I now live in Cambridge. I am also British by birth, and a naturalized Canadian citizen and a naturalized U.S. citizen. Over the past year, I have published in our local paper six highly critical short op-eds concerning the activities of president Donald Trump and his administration (see Nov. 1; Dec. 1; Jan. 3; Feb. 18; April 11; and May 26). I also post and comment frequently on Facebook. Those postings have nothing good to say about Trump.
On that Tuesday afternoon, my wife and I were returning to Boston from a holiday in Europe. We had read a lot about how innocent people were being hassled at the immigration control points. People were being arrested for failing to declare research materials. People had been refused entry to the United States for having an unflattering portrait of the vice president on their phone. My phone was loaded with critiques of the president. An Australian New Yorker writer was shipped back to Australia because he had written about the recent student protests at Columbia.
As we approached landing, I wondered what I would do if challenged. If they asked me about the president, I would say that I thought he was a craven popinjay, the embodiment of a living Taco. I hoped that if I were refused entry, I could get a flight to Toronto, where I had many friends. I probably could get summer accommodation at Massey College, where I had lived for two years at the turn of the century.
After disembarking from the flight and having a short wait at immigration, it was the turn of my wife and I with the immigration officer. He took face scans, he examined our passports, and said “welcome home” and gestured for us to continue into the United States.
That was it. No request for phones. No third degree from Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents about my positions on tax cuts for the rich, deregulation for big companies, Medicaid and Medicare cuts for the poor, the deportation of immigrants, birthright citizenship and the denaturalization of multinationality people like me.
What a relief, but also what a disappointment. My tiny contributions to the resistance had gone unnoticed. The massive media sweeps by artificial intelligence engines had not picked up my contributions and my name. I was safe at home; safe to continue writing my polemics against Trump and his sycophantic minions. Right on, Martin; write on.
Martin G. Evans is a writer in Cambridge whose contributions on managerial and political issues have appeared in The Boston Globe, Cambridge Chronicle, MetroWest Daily News, Providence Journal, Toronto Star, Globe and Mail of Toronto, National Post of Toronto and the former Toronto Financial Post. He has taught at the Rotman School of Management at the University of Toronto, London Business School, George Mason University, Rutgers University and the Harvard School of Public Health.
Like this:
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A stronger
Please consider making a financial contribution to maintain, expand and improve Cambridge Day.
We are now a 501(c)3 nonprofit and all donations are tax deductible.
Please consider a recurring contribution.