Make America Nice Again
Storing children in warehouses is not nice.
The other day, recuperating from all the craziness, I decided to play hookey. I took a vacation in the past. I went to the Norman Rockwell Museum in Stockbridge, Mass.
“Norman Rockwell” —it’s not just a name, it’s an adjective. It means a time when life in these United States was slower, sweeter, simpler, more innocent. Nicer.
I don’t mean to ignore the racism and misogyny of those times. Certainly not all was well back then. But Rockwell spent his long career, from the Roaring Twenties to the Rockin’ Sixties, showing us our nicest selves. He held up a mirror, and showed us—not ourselves, warts and all—but what we aspired to be in our best moments.
Rockwell must have been a nice person, in the best sense of that overused word. He had a particular soft spot for seniors, whom he depicted as warm, loving, and active participants in life.
And he plainly had a keen understanding of the hopes, fears, and aspirations of children. He’s not unlike Mr. Rogers, whom he resembled physically as well as perhaps spiritually. The best of Rockwell’s work conjures some of what Mr. Rogers was getting at with those famous, simple, sacred words: Won’t you be my neighbor?
As the 60s came along, Rockwell started to look harder, peering under the veneer of niceness, and creating art that is surprising in its power. He was increasingly frustrated by the Saturday Evening Post restriction that people of color could only be depicted in subservient roles, and finally quit the Post in 1963 because of the issue.
And this one—I’d never seen this one before I visited the museum: a subtle painting that appears to be merely a pretty Arizona landscape at first.
Knowing it’s a Rockwell, you look for the joke. But then, slowly, you realize it’s a Navajo family gazing into a future that has been devasted for them by the building of the Glen Canyon Dam. (That’s the abomination that the Monkey Wrench Gang was trying to blow up, for any Edward Abbey fans out there.)
But mostly, Rockwell painted Nice.
You know who’s not nice? Trump. He’s the Anti-Nice. And his administration’s brutal policy towards immigrants is the Merriam-Webster definition of Not Nice. In fact, it defines Evil pretty well.
You know the appalling facts. More than 70,000 souls in detention, the majority by far with no criminal record. Minimal health care. Sexual abuse. Thousands of children detained by ICE over the past year. Thirty-one deaths in ICE custody in 2025, and already 14 deaths so far in 2026.
You’re probably aware of the organization Indivisible and the great work they do. These days they’re teaming with an organization called Detention Watch Network. Here’s what Indivisible says: “Department of Homeland Security has been quietly working to scale up their ability to detain and disappear people in massive numbers.
DHS is actively scouting, purchasing, and planning to convert 23 warehouses nationwide into new detention and processing facilities. This would massively expand their detention capacity, make it even more difficult to expose the inhumane conditions immigrants face in ICE custody, and increase the likelihood for abuse and death.
Local activists have helped prevent the construction or conversion of 12 new detention centers across the country. This includes warehouses in rural areas and deep red states, where we’ve even seen some Republican Members of Congress publicly oppose DHS’s planned warehouse conversions.
On April 25, we’re joining Detention Watch Network for a coordinated, nationwide mobilization against the Trump administration’s reckless expansion of ICE warehouse detention centers.
Our partners will host six major events at frontline sites -- communities where new detention centers are actively being proposed. We’re also asking folks to host visible, peaceful, non-violent actions in your own communities to draw attention to the cruelty of Trump’s detention agenda and to pressure our local officials to resist the construction of new detention centers.”
In spite of all the crazy stuff going on to distract us, this is an issue it’s important not to lose sight of. The least we can do is contact Congressional reps and demand an end to the detention of children.
My favorite Rockwell painting is this one. It’s called Working on the Statue of Liberty. It shows workmen cleaning the lamp, which used to be done once a year. (Nowadays floodlights are used to light up the torch, which is a replica—the original is in a nearby museum.) If you look closely, you’ll see that Rockwell shows the workmen as a diverse group—even though it was painted in 1946.
So I was appalled to see that DHS is using Rockwell’s art, including this very painting, to promote their unholy message of white supremacy. I wasn’t the only one who was appalled. Rockwell’s family was outraged, and promptly spoke out: “If Norman Rockwell were alive today, he would be devastated to see that not only does the problem Ruby Bridges confronted 65 years ago still plague us as a society, but that his own work has been marshalled for the cause of persecution toward immigrant communities and people of color,” his group of 10 relatives wrote.
“We — as his eldest son, grandchildren and great-grandchildren — believe that now is the time to follow in his footsteps and stand for the values he truly wished to share with us and all Americans: compassion, inclusiveness and justice for all.”
Working on the Statue of Liberty isn’t in the Norman Rockwell Museum. It’s in the White House, where for many years it hung in the Oval Office, behind the Resolute Desk. It’s not on the gold-laden walls of the Oval right now, however. It’s probably in a basement storeroom somewhere, because Trump removed it to make room for more faux-gold decor.
But it’s a good image to keep in our minds as we go about the grinding, soul-destroying work of trying to beat back the cruelty of ICE. Rockwell was reminding us that democracy takes work. So does Nice.
Dear Friends,
Are you furious about the state of the world and wondering what to do about it? I hope you’ll continue to check out The Optimistic Activist.
Every now and then I post some ideas for doing something. How to get out the vote, spread the word, and support progressive candidates. Ideas for simple but effective activism. As easy, as practical, as do-able as I can make them.
Together, I think, we can really make a difference.
“Optimism is a strategy for making a better future.”
--Noam Chomsky
