An undocumented poet’s visit to the land of his ancestors Mexico-born poet and writer Marcelo Hernandez Castillo grew up undocumented in the US. In his memoir Children of the Land, he talks about growing up in California after having crossed the US-Mexico border, and his attempt at living despite the US policy’s failure to recognise his existence.

In this excerpt from the book, Hernandez Castillo visits his mother’s ranch in Mexico for the first time. An apparent stranger in the land of his ancestors, Hernandez Castillo recounts the deep connection he has with this landscape. "Everything seemed familiar because I had imagined it endless times growing up. During Christmas, during a birthday party, or even just on a Sunday afternoon, anytime the adults would gather, the only topic of conversation was always Mexico and the ranch. I found the pig corral where my mother fell in as a child and was nearly eaten by a sow exactly where I had envisioned it. The three large avocado trees that my mother dreamed about looked nearly petrified, and probably didn’t bear fruit anymore, but nonetheless they were there, just as I imagined."

His evocative language transports us both in time – to see moments of his family’s history – and in space to a land now abandoned.

Irene, First 1,000 Days correspondent Literary Hub: ‘A journey to the home of my ancestors’ (reading time: 10 minutes)
What does it mean to abolish the police? What if George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, and Elijah McClain had survived police brutality and racial profiling? What if they hadn’t died? They probably would have been arrested and prosecuted.
Would we have recognised the violence of their experiences?
Police abolition sounds unnatural when we’re trying to protect what we feel is normal. We think policing is normal, because when you have no other option, calling 911 is everything. But alternatives are there. They begin with “community and accountability”, reflects Derecka Purnell in this must-read article.

Sabrina, editorial assistant The Atlantic: ‘How I became a police abolitionist’ (reading time: 11 minutes)
Why we must resist the temptation to call racists ‘mentally ill’ There is a truism about headlines that reading this piece on VICE reminded me of: if a headline asks a question, the answer is generally no. "Is racism a mental illness?" asks Shayla Love, and then goes on to present solid arguments why it isn’t - and why we mustn’t fall into the trap of believing it is.

For starters, people with mental illnesses tend to be victims and not perpetrators of violence. Then, labelling racists as mentally ill could help them get away with hate crimes by using the insanity defence. As professor of psychiatry Sandra Gilman says in the article: "I wish [the belief that racism is a mental illness] were true, because what it says is that normal people like you and me should never kill people in Auschwitz. The reality is normal people regularly killed people in Auschwitz."

Powerful and extremely urgent given racism and mental health have become relevant anew in the public discourse. Read, reread and share this one.

Tanmoy, Sanity correspondent VICE: ‘Is racism a mental illness?’ (reading time: 15 minutes)

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