Meet the millions of immigrants who travel each year to our land for a better life- or Public Enemy #1, according to the state of Arizona.

I’m pretty sure a lot of people have heard about what’s going on in Arizona. If you haven’t do a quick Google search and fill yourself in nicely, with arguments with both sides, please. (I have included a couple of links below-not enough, just a few)

Now, I’ll continue.

It was on a plane to Miami that I came across a story on CNN that brought me to tears. It’s story of one family’s struggle to establish themselves as hard-working Americans, who out of fear of deportation, threats, and bankruptcy; they must now leave their home of almost twenty years. Now I don’t usually cry watching cable news (although Larry King is scary looking and Nancy Grace looks like a deranged shark out for blood a la “Jaws” style), but this story brought a twenty-year-old in mid-flight to sniffles. There’s something precious about the American Dream-the idea that you can work your way to a better life for you and your family. Hard work=success.

To me, that Dream is sacred-it’s what TRULY founded this country. Colonist came here to work, not to vacation, own mansions, or blow their earnings in a consumerist culture gone rabid. They came to work the ground, fight the unknown, and set up shop for their culture and Crown. Hell, immigrants nowadays just want a driver’s license and health insurance-such underachievers. Did I mention those predecessors also brought other humans to do the work for them, against their will? This is the stuff employee of the month was made for. I’ll stop the sarcasm for a moment…

Fair point...

In short, my point #1: our country was founded by workers. Not monarchs, popes, or invading tribes of Visigoths-your average European bloke trying to earn a couple of coins to send back to the wife and kids or to save up for a hand in marriage. The American Dream is that you can work yourself to a better situation. I believe that should be open to anyone who makes that pilgrimage; Pilgrims of all eras included.

“Keep, ancient lands, your storied pomp!” cries she
With silent lips. “Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!”

-Emma Lazarus

But one coastal landmass wasn’t enough. We claimed (i.e. stole) this territory from sea to shiny sea. We stole from natives and yes, our neighbors to the south once claimed California and a few bordering states their home turf. Well, it must have driven map makers in the president’s cabinet crazy that there was such unevenness in an otherwise pristine, yet unique shape of land mass. So it was taken from under the inhabitants’ feet, faster and far more violent than any eviction notice.

Whoops-you got your country in my state line!

Point #2: This land isn’t our land. History has shown that lands can change owners time and time again, sometimes faster than the average person changes clothes. What brings Americans together is not land, its commonality. It can be over sports, religion, politics, or even TV shows. I am from one state, you another, and our friend yet some other, but we all share some experience alike. With that we relate to one another. State lines can change, but we are a part of a United States of America.

Cut to more modern days. Birth Control and refrigerators were all the rage, and many Americans went to the Drive Ins to catch the latest double feature. But wait, make sure you file to bathrooms that are not only separated by sex, but segregated by race. Feeling uncomfortable, yet? It’s not the big bouffant on your head, it’s Jim Crow laws. In case you forgot, because chances are you weren’t born yet,  second class citizenship was legally protected by our government as late as the late-sixties. There’s a whole slew of laws that segregated races from each other, some include colorfully named ordinances like the Asian Exclusion Act and Japanese American Internment. This country already has a beautifully long list of race-driven declarations; let’s leave them there. Stop adding discriminating legislation that only serves to hurt people and leave scars of resentment for generations after. That’s right-human beings. Not Marvin the Martian, E.T., or Chewbacca under the guise of “illegal immigrants,” these are people with families we’re talking about here. Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer (name drop!) won votes over claiming it was a safety measure against the drug cartels. Wow, way to stereotype here, just like when Southern politicians scared white voters to vote Jim Crow laws into rule lest black men marry their daughters. The scandal: scare tactics haven’t changed much in over a hundred years.

Hospitality, an American specialty.

Point # 3: Racist is Racist is Racist. Call it by any other name: protection, nationalism, or state pride-it is still the same. Manure is poop is crap. The first is merely a polite way to describe a fertilizer preference. Protection from criminal drug cartels is merely a logical mean of self preservation. Poop is the layman’s term for excrement and stereotyping immigrants to drug dealers is propaganda. Crap is the more vulgar of terms for the last two synonyms, and isolating and persecuting a group of people based on unsound evidence or suspicion is unjust in EVERY sense of the word. Case in point: it’s all bullshit to me.

There are now millions of modern-day pilgrims who won’t get the chance to make the memories or dare to dream lest they risk deportation. This recent law has effectively exterminated that chance for millions in Arizona. In its place, something much more sinister nature has set in. Embitter and betrayed, hundreds of thousands of people have packed their belongings and headed for the border of anywhere that doesn’t look like it would be America’s next top racist state. The political leaders won’t represent you, and the entities sent to serve and protect are now your hunters. I wish these kinds of terrors only stayed in “The Twilight Zone.”

Picture: Inappropriate

What we’ve created in Arizona is the American nightmare. Stigmatized for being different, persecuted for speaking another language. No matter how hard these people work, they will never have the chance to work themselves out of poverty, have social security, earn an education, or even the chance to enter the white collar workspace. We are creating a new segregation, a new slavery system.

It’s already happening. Immigrants without papers are forced to look for illegitimate jobs. They are exploited in their position, and there is nothing they can do about it. They can’t sue, because they’ll be reported. They can’t take it to their boss, because they will get deported. They can’t unionize in order to demand fair wages, because the company will report on their own workers and their families at home and merely recruit fresh blood from the border once more.

I don’t know about you, but I’d like my children to be proud of their heritage. I’m paraphrasing a BU Alum here, but I’d like my kids to live in a society where color didn’t matter. I’d like to road trip with my friends one day and not be asked to step out of the car because the last name on my license reads “Castillo.” I would like to see my father not get pulled aside while going through airport security because he shares the same last name and happens to be carrying a laptop. I would like to know that my mother does not always have to carry her U.S. passport while driving home from work. I’d like to see my sister have the same chance at a non-segregated school district where she would get the chance to interact with all kinds of people, regardless of their race or economic background.

The Grim Reaper of Millions of Dreams, Gov. Jan Brewer

Shame on the country that stood by and watched millions of lives ruined. Shame on the people who think by white-washing their communities, they can eradicate crime. Shame on Jan Brewer for turning on her legally registered Latino voters only to send them to a foreign country or to force them to carry legal documents at all times. Shame on law enforcement if they actually pull over drivers for the color of their skin or for picking on non-English speakers.

This shouldn’t be the old days of yesteryear. We have come so far in appreciating the value of a human life. Better health care, better work environment, and better of quality of living has progressed enormously within the past forty years. For some reason, racism still exists. Oh, the target’s changed through the years, from Russian-Americans wrongfully accused of Communism during the Cold War years to the post-9/11 persecution of American Muslims. By hiding the facts behind the mask of an ethnic stereotype boogie man, politicians and war mongers hide the human side to their struggles. Again, immigrants didn’t come to a country that despises foreigners for rest and relaxation. They come to work for their Dream, provide better for their families or to restart their lives in the land of opportunity. They are doing what the first pilgrims did, showing up un-announced to work for money.

One Nation, for us all?

People have got to start seeing illegal immigrants for who they really are: people. Just like us, with hopes, dreams, and families too. Only when society begins to re-humanize the people they are persecuting, can acceptance begin.

Until then, stand back and watch yet another episode in the American shit show.

Links

Roger Ebert’s take on another case of racism in Arizona: lightening kid’s faces on a school mural. What better way to tell kids we are all equal by purposefully altering the appearance of classmates. Also at the bottom is possibly one of the worst Fox News interviews I’ve ever heard- folks, that’s saying A LOT.

The Fed Gov. vs. The State of Arizona. If we want to make sure this kind of legalized discrimination stopped with the Civil Rights struggle in the ’60s, it needs to be stopped at the National level. Let’s keep this country free of hate for all.
Arizona Sheriff tells CNN, “It’s opening jobs for U.S. Citizens.” Meet Arizona’s Miss Congeniality 2010!

GOP Remarks on Immigration. It’s not as negative as you think.

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