Heroes at the boundary

Every once in a while the news cycle heaves up an example of an individual who ignores prevailing categories for people, and in the face of official power, acts in favor of a kinder and more difficult concept of who belongs to ``us,'' rather than ``them.'' I wish I had remembered to post something on Vasily Arkhipov day, October 27th. That was the date in 1962, during the Cuban Missile Crisis, when Arkhipov refused to agree with two other officers on his Soviet submarine, who wanted to launch a nuclear-armed torpedo at U.S. warships. By refusing to think of his duty in terms of the Soviet Navy or the U.S.S.R, he may well have saved humanity from nuclear war.

Let me not miss my chance again. Here's the story of Manuel Jesus Cordova Soberanes, who'd snuck across the U.S.-Mexico border a little before Thanksgiving, looking for work. On Thanksgiving day in the desert he came across an injured 9-year-old boy, who'd been in a traffic accident (in which his mother had been killed). Soberanes gave the boy, Christopher Buchleitner, food and his own sweater, and stayed with the child throughout the night. That guaranteed that he would be deported, but those were not the terms in which he was classifying his experience that night. He himself is a parent, he said.

This essay by Eric Haas puts the story in the context. Thanks to Dan Kowalski, editor of Bender's Immigration Bulletin, for the tip.