Caged
How the “Free World” Became a Fortress for the Frightened
By Dr. Ibis Fro
The so-called ‘land of the free’ has become a nation shackled by its fear. A fear that it legislated, exported, and now it cannot contain. Citizens now dread the very systems they once demanded, systems built to exclude, surveil, and suppress. They voted to build walls, now they’re afraid to leave their homes. They banned books, now they silence their children’s questions. They closed borders, and now they fear they won’t be allowed back in.
A brief trip to Canada after being detained for hours may now trigger future anxiety. A trip to Nigeria, even for a U.S.-born citizen, now invites suspicion. An academic exchange in China raises red flags. And for those with names like Ayo, Fatima, José, Imani, or Oluwaseun, speaking their mother tongue has become a risk. And now in the same “land of the free”, if you are visiting for 30 days or more, you are required to “register”.
And yet, with staggering audacity, it is Westerners, particularly Americans and Europeans, who enjoy near-global visa-free access. They roam freely, welcomed without scrutiny, despite being the heirs of 500 years of invasion, enslavement, and domination. These are the descendants of colonizers who arrived uninvited, overstayed for centuries, and left legacies of rape, genocide, cultural erasure, and economic plunder. Today, their nations still owe trillions in unpaid reparations, extracted through stolen gold, labor, land, and lives, while continuing to profit from modern neocolonial violence. From lopsided trade deals and IMF austerity to climate destruction and mineral theft, the extraction never ended; it evolved. Meanwhile, Global South citizens face travel bans, arbitrary visa rejections, over 50% for Afrikan countries, even after invasive screenings and degrading interrogations, often after paying hundreds of dollars per application with no guarantee of approval. The U.S., UK, and European Union earn billions annually from this exploitative system, monetizing mobility while criminalizing the very people they’ve displaced.