News & Views of Phillips Since 1976
Sunday December 21st 2025
FEAR AND TYRANNY
By SHELIA BLAND
The peculiar thing is–
When fear and tyranny rear their ugly heads
Neither fear nor tyranny is mentioned.
People are more afraid of being afraid than they are afraid of tyranny.
So, they go on fearing the things they fear,
Feeding their fears and feeding tyranny.
Tyranny grows, eating up everything in its wake while the people sit silently.
The people, out of fear, elect leaders who willgovern in silence in the face of tyranny
eating away at the people who elected them.
And fear and tyranny swell to ever expanding heights.
Engulfing ever more space
So, the freedom to move shrinks,
Squeezing out ever more air
Eliminating all freedom of speech.
Silence builds empires–
supports enslavement–
Incinerates and exterminates whole people.
This silence, that fear and tyranny feast upon also grows
As silence becomes justified—
Silence to build wealth,
Silence to advance careers,
Silence to feed families…
A silence justified.
Now, fear, tyranny, and silence reign.
A justified silence becomes a pervasive silence—
Keeping pace with the ravenous gluttony of an ever-expanding tyranny
A tyranny breeding more silence and fear.
The weight of the triumvirate
The malicious trinity
Tyranny, fear, silence
Crushes the people completely.
Devouring their flesh and bones
Fear and tyranny die of starvation
Leaving only silence
Shelia Bland lives in Midtown Phillips.… Read the rest “FEAR AND TYRANNY”
From the Desk of State Representative Hodan Hassan: April ’23
By REP. HODAN HASSAN, District 62B
One of my top priorities this session is strengthening rights and protections for renters in Minnesota. We are in the middle of a housing crisis, with rental prices soaring and affordable, quality units in short supply. This problem has disproportionately affected communities of color, which tend to have a higher renter rate than white communities. Coupled with fewer and fewer young families being able to afford to purchase a home, residents are in a perfect storm for landlords to take advantage of tenants.
My colleague, Rep. Esther Agbaje, is carrying a bill package to strengthen tenants’ rights, and many pieces of legislation I have authored over my past several terms are included in the proposal. Once passed, this bill will create a host of much-needed protections for renters in Minnesota and put a stop to many predatory practices used by landlords. The list of protections this package will create is long, so I’ll jump right in.
Once signed into law, this bill package will prohibit sellers, landlords, real estate agents, and brokers from discriminating against individuals receiving public assistance. It will require landlords to be upfront about rental prices and prohibits hidden fees.… Read the rest “From the Desk of State Representative Hodan Hassan: April ’23”
PHC: The Simple Life
By MARTI MALTBY
During a recent discussion at Peace House Community regarding our favorite childhood board games, one of our volunteers brought up some experiments that showed that people who felt they were richer than those around them became less compassionate and less willing to help others. If you’re wondering about the connection between the two, one of the experiments involved a game of Monopoly where one player was given twice as much money as the other player, was allowed to roll two dice where the other could only roll one, and was generally given every advantage imaginable. Almost universally, the winners (those with all the advantages) claimed they won because of their superior strategy, and said almost nothing about the way the game was rigged in their favor.
(If you want a summary of the experiments, which has some really funny moments, check out Paul Piff’s TED Talk “Does Money Make You Mean?” at https://www.ted.com/talks/paul_piff_does_money_make_you_mean.)
I happened to know about the experiments the volunteers mentioned, but just at that moment I missed the import of what we were really talking about. I thought we were making a minor digression from our main topic, but it was only later that I realized we had been discussing the life lessons that games teach us.… Read the rest “PHC: The Simple Life”
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