Emergency Paywall!

In this capitalistic hellscape, your dollar is more powerful than your vote.

Dear Family…

I have had more friends/readers than I can accurately recall write to me in the past two months asking for ideas on what to do to support our kin around the world whose lives are now seriously endangered because of several of Trumps vicious new policies that end programs that genuinely help the helpless. If you read my recent article about the clean up of Agent Orange in Vietnam, you got a taste of what I’m referring to. But sadly, that is only the tip of the iceberg. The world over, efforts to do the right thing are being abruptly halted by The White House and the consequences are disastrous.

My family and I live mere miles from the Myanmar border where a war has been raging for decades. There are over 90,000 refugees from Myanmar now living in Thailand who have nowhere else to go because of the violence that continues in their home, a violence the media seldom even mentions, yet miraculously was nonetheless being recognized by the States and surprisingly some effort was indeed being made to offer care to those most effected by the war by them as well. However, President Donald Trump's recent decision to freeze foreign aid programs and effectively shut down USAID (the US government agency responsible for international development) is making it increasingly difficult for medical care to reach the camps in which many of these refugees reside. Furthermore, many who found asylum in the U.S. for years are now being told that they will soon lose their legal status and be forced to return into the battle zone if they don’t jump through several more hoops and pay hefty fines in order to acquire new visas. It’s almost as if the current administration forgot that NO ONE living on U.S. soil is actually from there other than native tribal peoples who ironically were forced off their land too by the same people now claiming said land is theirs! The irony is dizzying to say the least!

Daily I hear increasing accounts of people with legally acquired green cards being separated from their families at immigration posts throughout the U.S. where they are being held in detention centers for no reason whatsoever. This is terrifying and makes the so-called “melting pot” seem as if it’s quickly melting itself into a polarized nation of red hat wearing rich people who all think the same thing. Ew.

Racism and fasicm is rising swiftly in the so-called “Land of the Free” dear friends and now is not the time to passively sit by and watch it all as if it were but another HBO sitcom. I myself had hopes of returning to the States this summer so my daughter could play in the land of my birth with her grandma and grandpa. However, the climate there being as it is now makes us feel unsafe, uninspired at best and woefully unwelcome. (Who wants to live in a place where all the interesting people have been forced to leave?!) The fact is, it feels much safer to raise children outside of the U.S. where culture can thrive and life isn’t entirely dependent on making a six figures income.

I am not saying that everyone should up and leave. Colonization is of course what got us into this mess to begin with. I only live elsewhere myself because my wife is Thai and Thailand is kinder to foreigners than my country is. It pains me to write these words. It feels like a bad movie. I can’t believe we have to have this conversation. I was always told as a child that America was better than this. I hope so. Time will tell.

In the mean time, what can we do? Well, like it or not, as we edge ever closer to a post-modern hellscape where few of us have any real skills left beyond how to order things from amazon, how to post things on facebook and maybe how to invest in bitcoin, money is the main way to cast your vote. It’s all well and good to attend one of Bernies Rally’s (Thank gods for Bernie!). But what can we do?? Well, on behalf of my anonymous friends whose families’ lives are in serious danger now as a direct result of President Agent Orange’s extremely unchristian actions, I have opted to put up a paywall. This is something I can do. I never wanted to do this. But desperate times call for desperate measures. I feel very much called to help raise funds to support my friends and their families financially, because my country no longer is willing to do so.

My weekly stats suggest I have several thousand weekly readers. If half of you can agree to commit to contributing just $5 a month we could really help some people out. Any profit I make beyond the basic upkeep of supporting this little Substacky thing will go directly into the hands of those who need it most. People I know directly. To begin with, I will be donating funds to friends effected by the ongoing war in Myanmar who have lost all the financial support from the U.S. they had been desperately depending on. The government may fail, but we won’t.

Friends, no one is going to magically show up and make this troubled world better for us all. No technology or political movement or hippy riding in on a cloud from the heavens. Jesus will return all right, but He will do so from inside our heARTs, revealing the power of His Word by how kind we are to each other. We have to rise to this grand occasion ourselves and meet Him half way. We have dig deep and trust that we all have the ability to do this, to do something. A little each day. Si se puedes!

I promise to keep all subscribers well fed with ever evolving narratives. And don’t fear, I’m not going to turn this into another panicky forum for politics. Hiraeth will continue to first and foremost be a place for collectively honoring our mythical longing for home, our shared search for re-memberance and our grief-fueled efforts to joyously come alive again for the benefit of Her. I will continue to offer occasional free posts as we trudge through these peculiar, post-apocalyptic days, as unscripted and unplanned as ever, yet beginning tomorrow I will also start sharing something extra special each day for paid subscribers. I will end each of these unique offerings with a question, one I encourage readers to publicly respond to. My hope is that we really level up our courageousness and fuel our endangered ability to wisely communicate communally. No one has all the answers to the many issues we now face, but together we can fail forward into the cracks where the seeds that do know need to fall.

Everyone is safe here. Everyone will find a place at this table. Please, friends from all walks of life, come, and share with us. We need you.

Thank you for understanding. Thank you for reading my Substack. Thank you for your generosity and above all, thank you for caring deeply about our beautiful Planet Earth and the diverse, magnificent and colorful peoples who call Her home.

All Blessings,

Gregory Pettys

March 27, 2025

Thailand

image created by the Stay Kind Company

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Further Reading:

US judge finds Musk's USAID cuts likely unconstitutional, blocks him from making more cuts

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#mayallbeingsbehappyandfree