That mentality (and I've been guilty of it myself) is part of the problem. The belief or perspective that if it isn't happening to me, near me or in places where I can see ... then it doesn't affect me.

If others are reporting it, showing it, displaying it, talking about it in another part of the country, then it should ring alarm bells for all of us. Just because it isn't happening to us, it does not mean that there is no problem.

The worry is that once we all normalize this kind of behaviour and control by government and public institutions, eventually over time, the more we allow it all ... it will eventually affect us directly as well.

It all harkens back to the poem written by German Lutheran pastor Martin Niemöller in Post WWII Germany ... 'First They Came'

If we sit idly by and watch them bully immigrants, then eventually they'll move on to another minority, then another, then another and eventually it will become the group of people you are seen as being part of.