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Boycotting Arizona’s Racism
Arizona was the only territory west of Texas to secede from the Union and join the Confederacy during the Civil War. A century later, it fought recognition of the Martin Luther King Jr. federal holiday. This week, an anti-immigrant bill was signed into law by Republican Gov. Jan Brewer. Arizona Senate Bill 1070 empowers state and local law enforcement to stop, question and arrest whoever they suspect may not be in the state legally. The law is an open invitation to sweeping racial profiling and arbitrary detention.
The law ostensibly offers “cooperative enforcement of federal immigration laws throughout all of Arizona.” It provides that a “law enforcement officer, without a warrant, may arrest a person if the officer has probable cause to believe that the person has committed any public offense that makes the person removable from the United States.”
Thus, if a police officer suspects a Latino person of being an undocumented immigrant, he or she can lock that person up. Day laborers are targeted. It is illegal to accept (or make) a job offer in some roadside settings, and even makes “communication by a gesture or a nod” in accepting a work offer an arrestable offense. S.B. 1070 goes further, facilitating anonymous reporting of businesses that anyone suspects has undocumented employees.
President Barack Obama denounced the bill, saying: “Our failure to act responsibly at the federal level will only open the door to irresponsibility by others, and that includes, for example, the recent efforts in Arizona, which threaten to undermine basic notions of fairness that we cherish as Americans, as well as the trust between police and their communities that is so crucial to keeping us safe. In fact, I’ve instructed members of my administration to closely monitor the situation and examine the civil-rights and other implications of this legislation.”
There is a serious backlash against the bill in Arizona and around the country. Rep. Raul Grijalva, a Democrat from Tucson and co-chair of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, is front and center in opposing the controversial law. He told me: “It’s a license to racially profile. It creates a second-class status for primarily Latinos and people of color in the state of Arizona. ... Arizona’s been the petri dish for these kinds of harsh, racist initiatives.”
Legal groups are mounting challenges to the law. Sunita Patel is a staff attorney with the Center for Constitutional Rights. According to Patel, “It allows the local law-enforcement agencies to check not only the FBI databases, which they’ve traditionally always done, it also allows them to sync up with immigration databases, which are notoriously unreliable because of errors with the data entry because they just have incorrect information on citizenship status ... so you have this very broad net being cast.”
Grijalva is calling on the federal government to refuse to cooperate with Arizona. “Immigration is a federal law, and if we’re asking the president for him not to cooperate in the implementation of this law through Homeland Security, through Border Patrol, through detention and a noncooperative stance by the United States government and the federal agencies, [it] would render much of this legislation moot and ineffective,” he said.
He also is calling for people to boycott his own state: “I support some very targeted economic sanctions on the state of Arizona. We will be asking national organizations, civic, religious, political organizations not to have conferences and conventions in the state of Arizona. That there has to be an economic consequence to this action and to this legislation. And good organizations across this country, decent organizations that agree with us that this bill is patently racist, that it is unconstitutional and it’s harsh, it’s unjust, that they should refrain from bringing their business to the state.”
Already, the American Immigration Lawyers Association has decided to move its fall 2010 annual conference from Arizona to another state. San Francisco Board of Supervisors member David Campos, saying that Arizona “with a stroke of a pen set the clock back on a generation of civil-rights gains,” is confident that his resolution calling for the city to boycott Arizona will pass. Similar city boycotts are being considered in Oakland, Calif., and El Paso, Texas. Sportswriter Dave Zirin is supporting a boycott of the Diamondbacks, Arizona’s major league baseball team.
Close to 30 percent of the Arizona population identifies itself as Hispanic. It was a boycott that eventually forced the state to recognize Martin Luther King Jr. Day. It is a shame that similar tactics are needed again.
Denis Moynihan contributed research to this column.
- Posted in
219 Comments so far
Show AllDivest and Boycott.
But not Arazona Tea, if you drink it. They weren't involved in this fascist c##p.
I thought Arizona Tea was made in New York.
Might be picky, but there was no "Arizona Territory" to vote for slavery. There was a New Mexico Territory, however, an area that included both present-day Arizona and New Mexico. I believe Utah Territory (with the Mormons) supported slavery until the Emancipation Proclamation of 1862. None of this contradicts what Amy Goodman says, but she should get the facts right.
There was a (declared) Arizona Territory--although it included part of New Mexico:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arizona_Territory_%28Confederate_States_of_America%29
A better law may have been that anyone desiring to work in the USA who is not a legal resident or citizen must pay a tax to pay for all welfare and unemployment compensation with a state.
If illegal workers are going to take jobs from citizens they may as well pay to support them, too.
Forget it. Liberals don't care about this side of the issue.
Worse, they lower wages being paid to Americans.
Most of the jobs we have lost were exported to Asia and South and Central America, facilitated by NAFTA prohibiting protections of worker wages and conditions in other countries. Frequently the jobs were moved abroad from profit-making companies and after the employers got subsidies and tax-breaks to keep jobs here. Pure greed. One solution might be to give workers partial ownership rights that prevent the social sin of devastating communities by moving jobs.
What about forcing employers to pay immigrants properly so there is no unfair competition with US born workers? Also how about a drive to unionize all workplaces so all people have rights?
Joe
USans complaining about the cost of social services to undocumented immigrants are the same characters who applaud Mexico's failure to provide public benefits in Mexico, while these same characters support the "free enterprise" system in which highly organized/subsidized USan criminals work to corner the Mexican corn market via illegal dumping.
These USans want to, inadvertently or not, put the Mexicans between a rock and a hard place. Inadvertently because most USans don't understand markets while at the same time they compete feverishly in them. These USans don't understand such things as a people's rights to produce for their local markets. These USans have no idea how the Mexicans are going to earn a living in Mexico.
Of course, the best way to end the influx of illegal workers would be to nail the corporations that profit from their 'services'. But that would be to suggest that the right wingers actually do something productive about solving a problem rather than make political hay...
Yes, but there is a huge split between the corporate republicans and the tea bagger republicans on the immigration issue.
I agree. I live in Arizona and no one seemed too concerned about the "illegals" when affordable labor was needed as fuel for the "red hot housing market".
It's the same logic that enables people to be up in arms over government spending when it comes to health care when they've been silent about 8 years of deficit spending to fund war.
You have a democratic president and congress. Quit blaming republicans for your ineptitude.
Liberals are the ones going berserk right now.
Good for Arizona for at least trying to bring the problem to a halt.
Ask yourself, would you open your home to unlimited visitors-forever?
If you want to stop people from coming across the border, perhaps you should try preventing them from getting hired. If they can't get jobs in the States, they're not going to go to the states are they? Of course you might want to look at the responsibilities of the states and the Fed, you'd notice that immigration control isn't the responsibility of the state. What did your 'hero' bushie do to stem the flow from Mexico? Besides jack and squat, that is...
Heck, your other 'hero' reagan pardoned a few million of them and gave them all citizenship. Perhaps that's why they seem to think that they too will get to the 'promised land'. Too bad that promised land has been promised into bankruptcy with the national debt and the de-industrialization of the country...
Every country has laws on immigration, spelling out how you can legal enter the country and how to become a citizen. Even Mexico has immigration laws.
Phoenix is second only to Mexico City in the number of kidnappings for ransom. Drug and gang violence runs rampant in all of the border states and is spreading to all 50 states.
Most liberals that write articles on illegal immigration are of the opinion that all illegals in the US only want to work and provide for their family. There is no mention of the drug trade from Mexico and of the gang activity. If you disagree with them, they brand you as a racist instead of discussing the issues. They do not offer any plan to stop the flow of illegals.
I would like to read one liberal paper on how to control the borders so we would know who is entering this country and why. When I fly to Canada and England, I have to go through their security and explain why I am entering their country, what is the purpose of my visit, and how long I will be in their country. Why do we expect the US to be different?
Your post reveals the classic reactionary statement - devoid of historical context and an actual understanding of the US Constitution. Before you venture into a world where the readers are in possession of both, familiarize yourself with "due process," the historical legacy of "Jim Crow," as well as the fact that the country you love so much was founded in genocide and nurtured through theft, murder, and corruption - especially around the so-called "border" that you are so intimidated by.
This post is nothing but an attack on liberals. It is irrelevant to the racist Arizona law, about which you have failed to comment. Why don't you express your opinion on the actual subject of discussion?
Sioux Rose
ARKIE: Then the logic of your post is such that the DRUG "WAR" should be what comes under the microscope. I would add to that NAFTA and how economic survival south of the border has been divorced from its agricultural roots due to unfair trade policies, like US subsidies to corn farmers for starters. The elites work the chessboard that pits low income group against low income group, while also LOWERING incomes (and assets) for all... and then stands back while the "little people" fight it out. The CAUSE factors are taking place on a policy level, and it's the policies that stink to high heaven. Creating a legal basis for enforcing prejudice is hardly a step forward for mankind, or any form of improvement to this nation's already much maligned "report card."
First they came for... the Mexicans... and then they came for...
Here we have yet another attempt at setting precedent that could be used against ANY of us.
The president can arrest someone at will.
That someone can be held in prison WITHOUT an attorney, or WITHOUT knowledge of the charges against him/her.
People are being picked up on "probable cause," so that the very premise of THE presumption of innocence is tossed.
We're looking at CENTURIES of law being rolled back like Wallmart's alleged prices.
Who benefits from such initiatives? Certainly not any sane, moral, or humane society. Already ours cuts school programs but makes sure there is plenty in the pot to build a new generation of nuclear weapons.
What the f--k is wrong with this picture?
Arkie:
You're missing the point completely. The issue has nothing to do with immigration laws and border entry, which, by the way, fall under the purview of the federal government and not the states. Instead, this issue involves blatant, unconstitutional, racial profiling --discrimination-- and not illegal vs. legal immigration. This 'law' will subject people who happen to appear to be Hispanic, regardless of citizenship, to the arbitrary and capricious whims of local police officers, which could result in their arrest and detention if they fail to produce citizenship documents on demand at any place at any time. This is in no way comparable to providing documentation upon entry into the country. It is highly unlikely that people with white skin who possess, for instance, British, Australian, Irish, or Canadian accents will be randomly targeted by AZ cops to produce proof of citizenship. Any suggestion to the contrary is disingenuous.
As for "liberal" newspapers, please, name one. In my opinion, a liberal/leftist newspaper would seek justice and report truth rather than simply amplify establishment positions through propaganda filters while paying homage to the 'center' and 'creed of objectivity' in order to placate ruling class elites and their profit-driven, narrowly focused agendas, regardless of party affiliation. "Liberal" newspapers--those in search of truth-- don't exist in the state capitalist/corporate-controlled US media--and even if they did, your point is irrelevant. Unconstitutional discrimination is not a liberal/leftist vs conservative/right issue--at least it shouldn't be. By making it one, you show your ignorance.
Controlling illegal immigration is not the priority of the US national security state. If it were, corporations that hire illegal immigrants would be targeted and punished and 'free-trade' agreements, which, in reality, are protectionist and state interventionist, such as NAFTA, would be rescinded. Instead, US multi-national corporations continue to enjoy the profitable exploitation of poor people both here in the US and in Mexico.
'Illegal immigration' and bashing of the poor become 'wedge' issues, usually during election years, to keep ill-informed people like you distracted from the real causes of our economic woes: undemocratic, neoliberal economic and political 'principles'-draconian structural adjustments-- that inure to the benefit of a privileged minority, while most of the population faces social and economic disaster.
Giovanna;Thank you and one other thing is how the American political establishment has infuenced and down right bribed Mexican politicians. They pretty much helped elect the last two presidents of Mexico. Tony
Well-stated and a breath of fresh air, Giovanna.
You reply just proves my point. Most liberals are elitist and assume their viewpoint is the only one that is valid and if you disagree you must be either stupiid, racist or both.
Arkie:
Re: "You (sic) reply just proves my point. Most liberals are elitist and assume their viewpoint is the only one that is valid and if you disagree you must be either stupiid (sic), racist or both."--Arkie
How, exactly, did I prove your point?
First, nothing I wrote is indicative of a liberal-elitist perspective. In fact, the content of my reply to you reflects just the opposite. I'm a leftist/socialist, not a liberal or elitist; there's a difference. Briefly, leftists support extreme democracy, from the bottom-up, as opposed to the top-down, managed, and increasingly authoritarian system of neoliberal 'democracy' practiced in the US and supported by both liberal democrats and republicans. Further, philosophically, leftists are obsessed with social and economic equality and justice --egalitarianism-- which are antithetical to elitism. Thus, no one who knows me would ever accuse me of elitism, which is usually a term I would reserve for those individuals who support discriminatory (race/class-based), reactionary legislation such as Arizona Senate Bill 1070. Any legislation that targets a single ethnic group --in this case, Hispanics-- for harassment by state law enforcement officers is not only inegalitarian, but the definition of elitist.
Second, nowhere in my reply to you did I say you were stupid or a racist. I said you were ill-informed, as evinced by your earlier comments, and merely pointed out that you are conflating two distinct and separate issues: federal immigration/border control laws with the obvious intent of Arizona SB 1070 to randomly and racially profile Hispanics, including American citizens, based exclusively on their physical characteristics, which in my opinion, is an unconstitutional aberration.
Very well said, Giovanna.
Sorry, but Phoenix is nowhere close to Mexico City or a half-dozen different border towns and towns in the Eastern Sierra Madre for drug-related kidnappings or drug-related violence in general.
Check the murder figures for Juarez, for example.
How would Arizona police "reasonably" believe that someone is an illegal alien? What kind of country do bigots want us to become?
Perhaps illegal aliens could be persuaded to sew a yellow star on their shirts. That would make the job of the police much easier.
More Nazi-yellow star stuff. Before the German Jews were forced to wear the Jew-star the SA goons often demanded that a suspected male Jew, stopped in the street, bare his penis to see if the male had been circumcised. I plead with all of you to stop the insane comparisons with Nazi Germany. The Arizona law is odious but it is not the Nuremberg laws. Moreover, in our country there is still a possibility of redress in the courts. In Nazi Germany the court was a concentration camp for a complainer.
Sioux Rose
CROWSNEST: I didn't know about the "zipper test."
Let me explain why some of us see an analogy with the Nazis. Think of each of these as patches being sewn into a legal quilt, and the potential ramifications of its full design:
1. Precedent has been set for a president to start an illegal war of aggression (in direct violation of The Geneva Conventions) without penalty or legal accountability.
2. A lot of noise is made as per "prisoner" or "enemy combatant," as a means to ease away from things like Habeas Corpus. In theory, anyone can now be arrested and disappeared... just like in Chile.
3. Although against our constitution to have a standing army, it's been pointed out that there are now soldiers stationed "at home."
4. Precedent has been set to NOT hold the Unitary Exec and his enablers accountable for breaking a law such as the illegal spying on citizens.
5. Pre-emptive arrests have taken place where the plans of those against "the establishment" have been intercepted.
6. The congress does NOT answer to the people in the least. The entire machinery of a so-called representative democratic republic is sold out. And the Supreme Court just put more grease into THAT engine.
7. Economic conditions, in terms of unemployment as well as debt, added to the disconnect between what Wall St alleges access to, and the actual amount of earned money in the pot... all mirror the same factors that brought about The Great Depression
8. Homeland Security adds another layer of militarization to our society, which already has: Sheriff departments, police departments, highway patrol, marine patrol, DEA, FBI, CIA, etc.
9. There are 2.2 million in prison, and an estimated 5 million chained to the prison-industrial complex thanks to the indentured servitude of probation or community control devices.
10. Media is bought out by the same corporations that profit from war, big pharma, and a Wall St that has become no different from a Vegas casino betting with OUR chips. Seldom if ever is the voice of alternatives heard! This marginalization of content presents the appearance that there IS no other way.
11. Media is also awash in violent imagery, creates the presumption there is always a good guy and a bad guy, or an enemy to fight. This loosens society's boundaries when it comes to the use of violence which is an epidemic in our midst.
12. Schools are increasingly robotic and militaristic due to enforcing rules and standardized tests in lieu of a LOVE for learning.
Many other factors can be taken into the mix, but the net result is a society that is being shaped to LOSE its humanity, and last vestiges of compassion. Each is taught to compete inside a diminishing pool of fiscal possibilities. Resources necessary to keep the industrial engines running remain committed to old, effete models that are literally tearing the great ecosystems that hold the weather patterns in place asunder.
If these factors taken together don't make you think about Naziism, then I guess you haven't read Parenti, Hedges, or Wollin lately.
Sioux Rose;I bow to your superior erudition with this post showing that the whole leadership of the empire have no clothes. Tony
Sioux Rose
Hi, Tony: I think I only related the basics. I'm sure RICH M could add MUCH to this list. I hope that CROWSNEST reads it, as when it comes to finding parallels with what turned Germany into a totalitarian hell, we should not look for exact play by play details, but rather, examine the entirety of the big picture. Although the armed guards are not amassed in Arizona, what takes place there may represent a Litmus Test, take the nation's temperature insofar as what it will tolerate in the way of authoritarian inroads into further erosions of what's left of our civil liberties.
Honestly, I see a striking parallel with "The Drug War," as the beginning of the "Zero Tolerance" campaign opened the door to eviscerating the right to privacy, the presumption of innocence, and probably other privileges contained in The Bill of Rights. Because drugs are always associated with criminals and society's less than savory characters, few stood up against these Draconian laws that really did set the template for more attacks on liberty to follow. Of course 911 and its incessant fear campaign began to use the concept of security as a means for stealing yet more of the citizenry's freedoms. Now, awful economic conditions manufactured by our very own Disaster Capitalists create the social equivalent of a pot about to boil over... so to appease persons in pain, a scapegoat is taken from the mix to serve as the target for so much growing angst. This tactic works wonders to dissipate the anger and deflect collective action against the TRUE agents of their fiscal and social discomfort.
This chain of events has happened throughout history, only the specific target population (or elected scapegoat) changes. The dynamic remains painfully the same. And what I've described is but a skeletal view of the new anatomy of 21st century fascism, American style, a/k/a inverted totalitarianism. It CAN happen here. In fact, that now appears to BE the case.
And Tony, thanks... you are very generous with compliments to persons in this forum.
Sioux Rose;you are welcome and it has been my pleasure to praise or even acknowledge that there is much to be learned and understood by some very astute minds here on CD.Have never been to old to learn.Tony
Sioux Rose: when I delve into the history of our country I find that all of what you say is as American as apple pie, was not learned from Nazi Germany and has therefore no relation to it.
When the Federal Government refuses to work and pass needed immigration legislation, States have the responsibility to do so. There are deadly drug wars just across the border from Arizona. The people there are looking to protect themselves from drug wars expanding into Arizona. The people of a State have the right to legislate Constitutional Laws. The extreme left has gone nuts on this issue. If the law is abused or unconstitutional it will be struck down. If you want to talk about racism, talk about racism on Wall Street. There is a much bigger issue there.
The new Arizona law is a ridiculous, racist piece of idiocy. However, we do need to come to grips with the immigration problems of our southern border.
This, aside from being legally erroneous, is ridiculous tripe. Arizonans there are not trying to protect themselves from drug wars. They are swept up in racist anti-immigration hysteria, and Arizonan politicians have used that hysteria to gin up cheap racist support by passing a draconian law that will severely burden the fundamental liberty interests of Hispanic AMERICANS. It's blatantly racist, and anybody endorsing the law is a cretin and should be confronted about the reality of what they represent.
Were they looking to protect themselves against drug wars, they could legalize the drugs.
There are no difficulties whatsoever in logistics: it requires no enforcement and would free up Arizona law enforcement to contribute to the security of residents. .
It eliminates organized crime in the drug business, and it is the only measure that has ever done so.
It's cheap: it even makes money. Hopefully Arizona will benefit from the California legalization of marijuana that is likely to pass this fall, though I suppose it's likely to be a drop in the bucket, particularly with the ramifications of this idiocy.
One might imagine that AZ does want to stop the drug war, but is only foolish. This may be someone's motive, but it does not make much sense in general. The law is not directed against drugs or vendors, nor even, strictly, against immigrants, but against people who might "reasonably" be suspected of being immigrants: the poor, the Hispanic, and Native Americans.
There is little cause to imagine that the professional legislators who back a bill that so explicitly demands racial and class profiling and so explicitly creates legal liability for officers who do not engage in racial profiling could be so misguided about their own ends as to not realize that they promote a racist law.
What happened to the 4th Amendment? What happened to "probable cause?"
This sounds like an election year ploy.
Immigration is essentially driven by America's OWN grievously immoral, underhanded, fraudulent and criminal actions under a policy of neo-liberal exploitation that has occasioned massive theft, political intrigue and election-tampering, coups, propping-up of corrupt dictators and brutal autocrats, blackmail, assassinations and death-squads, institutionalized terrorism, IMF/WTO/World Bank-imposed privatization and 'restructuring' and subsidized agricultural exports that have displaced huge numbers of small farmers, 'drug-war' skullduggery and forced de-funding of critical social services and public infrastructure -- the concept of 'illegal immigration' falls-apart. It is actually economic and political self-defense.
Illegal immigration is a wedge issue primarily because most Americans are ignorant about, in denial, or unwilling to face the fact that America has taken outrageous advantage of and abused the basic civil and human rights of Latin American citizens in order to prop-up America's bloated standard of living and overextended debt. The principles of rule of law governing allowable and acceptable economic trade practices and respecting the sovereignty of foreign nations have been consistently violated by America's appeal to its imaginary sense of exceptionalism -- which constitutes a huge nationalistic blind spot.
Americans in general tend to be astonishingly uninformed and misinformed about genuine history and the real consequences of American foreign policy-- thanks in large part to its disingenuous mass media and the co-opted public education industry. For all the popular rhetoric about America's National pride, honor and sense of values, and championing the causes of freedom, peace and justice, to a very large extent the American public is clueless about how hypocritical and self-serving the US has been, and how complicit they are by not holding their leaders and policymakers accountable for America's devastating Imperialist pretensions.
I strongly believe that they should close the border to Mexico. On one condition, which is you close it not only to people but to resources. If you say you want to
close it to people but not resources, what you're saying, one thing, is that you're a racist, but another thing you're saying is - I don't want you but I want the coffee that's grown on the land that used to be yours.
Why is this migration taking place? It's not taking place because suddenly a bunch of people from Guatemala decide they want to take an eco-tour of the strawberry fields in the San Joaquin valley. It's because their communities are being destroyed through the theft of the land. If you don't want these people moving up here then don't steal those people's lands, pretty simple solution.
Yes it is a xenophobic sleight of hand but it is used, as it has been for centuries in America preceding Republican-Democrat nonsense, to point the finger at the victim so as to keep the eyes averted from the horrors being perpetrated upon those victims and to ignore or rationalize the colossal banditry for the beneficiaries. The liberal class is particularly hypocritical and criminally ignorant on this point.
The problem is really quite simple as is the solution.
The problem: El Norte is pushing them there "illegals" off of their ancestral lands so as to steal the resources that reside in Chiapas e.g.
The solution: Stop El Norte from stealing the resources of the people in Chiapas e.g.
NAFTA is merely the latest acronym-IMF the latest international syndicate-World Bank only the latest MoneyChanger in this ongoing colonial conquest.
Neither the employer or the "immigrant" are really the fundamental issue.
Qualifier: Many who do employ "immigrants" exploit them and should be themselves forced to work in the broiling hot sun for 14 hours/day or forced to do backbreaking early death work in the maquiladoras.
Let the truth be the frame.
As for higher paying jobs these too are part of the problem and also obfuscate the issue.
People shouldn't need or even desire to make 70k/year(or even 25k). The problem is that it takes so much to live in our HP society. The solution- Elimination of rent-Free Health Care- Food stipends.
Everyone needs to be (allowed to) getting by with less-MUCH LESS.
Wealth is the problem, poverty it's necessary offspring, and it requires the aforementioned theft from other lands to maintain this obscene standard of living- a standard of living that has death of brown skinned people as one of its prerequisites.
Sioux Rose
MCOYOTE: Brilliant points! Thank you for laying the case out better than most attorneys could. Let's see if those who take themselves for liberal/progressive, but resent "others" living in their state(s) can find any way to counter the TRUTH in what you've related. Thank you for taking the time to structure a well-layered set of arguments.
Sioux Rose
Only if you want to believe a regurgitation of business and their shills justification of the exploitation of these people.
Americans are benefiting from these illegal aliens? Please don't embarrass yourself Mr. Coyote by spreading such banal blather. Each illegal alien is costing Americans by the most generous accounting and averaging at least $800 plus no matter where they reside, each year, each illegal, man, woman and child.
SR, Mr Coyote has not told you the truth. The truth is this has little to do with racism. If these folks were all Eastern Europeans and white, all these folks falsely claiming racism would be screaming "stop it", there would be none of this absurd claim of "racism"
I am surprised that at this late date, since every canard Mr. Coyote used from 1986 and 2007 has been proven false, that you would fall for it. These are the same reasons and stories used then to justify the continuing flow of cheap labor.
The only thing people that argue for illegal immigration are supporting is business's exploitation of these people. Did you ever wonder what happened to these folks when they can no longer swing a hammer (they aren't given nail guns, cut up a chicken or cow, clean a toilet or lay a brick? What happens to them if they suffer an injury that ends their ability to work? I can tell you for a certainty they are put on the street at no cost to their employer but high cost to the local community.
And when they begin to slow down? Get older? Aren't as productive? Or ask for more money? They are replaced by a younger wave of illegals who will take the same or even less pay. Mexico is littered with used up workers that were here illegally. Its a horrible position to be in. And many here in the same situation. Where is the compassion for them?
Where is the compassion for the victims of illegal immigration? Those that have been injured or killed by illegal aliens in car wrecks, murdered, raped, robbed, beaten, kidnapped. Where do you see one word about these people?
When did this discussion become about the well being of citizens of other countries? Where is the compassion for American kids that can't get a job because an illegal has it or for their parent in the same position or for the average working man who is forced to subsidize business's employment of these illegals, their medical care, the education of their children and the cost of criminality?
Why does any one favor a foreign citizen over their own citizens? Because they are poor?
Racism? Considering that Latino and Hispanic Americans are almost (they come in about 67-68% rather than 75-80%) a mirror image of whites, blacks and Asians opposing illegal immigration so that puts the lie to that old card.
Xenophobia? Considering our racial make up, our acceptance of over a million plus immigrants of every creed and color each year, anyone should be embarrassed to make that claim.
The real reason is money and power. Business provides the funding for racist organizations like MALDEF, LULAC and LaRaza that shill for cheap labor, politicians that are bought and who hope for new voting blocks, churches that hope to obtain power and money because most are Catholic. Unions that benefit from it like SEIU.
We have already had this discussion, we have already heard these same arguments, these same justifications, these same lies as we passed a "Comprehensive Immigration Reform Bill" in 1986. You can see the results plainly and what the real plan was. In fact the same promises and the same justifications were heard in 1956.
Most of the people advocating for illegal immigration have an interest in profiting from it or are removed from its costs and obligations. Removed from its impact on their lives. Removed from seeing its effect on the illegals themselves.
I frankly am surprised you fall for it.
To forestall any of the predictable posts from others...
To those that would call me racist, you are contemptible liars.
To those that say I'm wrong, the facts are quite plain and there for anyone to see.
To those that say I lack compassion or just don't understand, you are so wrong it hurts. The folks that lack compassion here are those that favor illegal immigration, they obviously have never seen its consequences and don't understand its real costs now and in the future.
If I didn't think so much of you SR I wouldn't have taken this much time and effort. Let me also tell you this whole thing is political theater. They have no thought that they will get Amnesty or legal status for these poor people. I believe they have already put it off again and put Cap and Trade up front again. They are well aware they have no chance of passing anything. Over 80% of Americans oppose this. Push poll's/ false reporting/ lies and misdirection won't change that.
People need to look through the prism of right and wrong rather than racial politics. Illegal immigration is simply wrong for everyone concerned.
My respects to you.
Your post is entirely bizarre. mcoyote is not "advocating for illegal immigration." mcoyote is arguing against colonialism, imperialism, racism and greed.
Your inability to raise your thought and vision above your obsessive focus on "illegal immigration" makes you incapable of even recognizing what other people are saying.
Your blithe dismissal of the international context of greed, resource exploitation, and the intentional disruption of nations and cultures, which drives this issue, makes the rest of your argument miss the mark completely. True that the corporate exploitation of criminalized labor on the ground in Arizona is in play, but that is not the key driver in the global exploitation that mcoyote is speaking to, it is just mopping up some of the spillage.
Your limited argument plays into the hands of the exploiters at every level.
Sioux Rose
WEBWALK: Thanks for saving me the trouble.
VERITAS: IF your argument was one truly based on compassion, all the valid noise you made about what happens to the immigrant when he's no longer fodder for the work factory, etc... then certainly you'd win my applause. There's no question that foreign "illegal" labor is profitable to the industries that rely on these laborers who have no rights. However, to have the modest homes of these people jack-booted down, families split up, and fees, fines, and prosecution placed atop their already over-worked shoulders is hardly a humane answer, or way to address this conundrum.
As WEBWALK pointed out, the real medicine belongs up the food chain... that is, in creating policies that don't close off avenues of subsistence agriculture or factory jobs in one land, so that its people must risk their lives to cross an increasingly dangerous border.
The real problem is that wealth has been ENGINEERED to remain in the hands of the fewest, with less and less rewards or even money to support basic life necessities, trickling down. America does have a piss poor industrial economy, and too many people are out of work. However, to blame these conditions on the dark skinned "alien" who takes some of the worst jobs (cleaning hotel bathrooms, cleaning up the carcasses of animals in "industrial meat" packaging plants, etc) instead of those that have set up inhuman policies, is to really miss the boat.
You want to treat a mortal wound with a bandaid and call that compassion. No. One MUST take in the big picture to really understand all the aspects of this problem; and MCOYOTE spelled those out quite effectively... for those with eyes to see. And a heart that can feel, and not lose its capacity for feeling through the arbitrary human device known as a manmade geographical border.
Let's ratchet it up a notch, Web, and look at in terms of darker side of human nature, which is a spiritual problem that we all share, even you (In response to your assertion to what is the 'key driver' [greed, racism, imperialism, colonialism]). Be careful before you push that condensation button, and/or proclaim someone's post bizarre or irrelevant.
"Your blithe dismissal of the international context of greed, resource exploitation, and the intentional disruption of nations and cultures."
"Your inability to raise your thought and vision above your obsessive focus on 'illegal immigration' makes you incapable of even recognizing what other people are saying."
In other words, you are declaring Vertis's response irrelevant, and stating that he is incapable (unwilling would have been a bit more tactful) because he is 'obsessed with the issue of illegal immigration--isn't that what we're discussing here with regard to boycotting Arizona? Okay, indirectly because Arizona enacted this objectionable law in an attempt to stem the tide.
The implication was that because the US leadership was/is guilty of these crimes that we should accept illegal immigration and/or owe these undocumented individuals--if not, how is it relevant to the article of Boycotting Arizona?
Are any of us exempt from participation in this whole, and are you, yourself aware of such a connection? Should we accept the potential destruction and decay of our infrastructure out guilt for past political misdeeds? Who would that benefit? If the standard of living for the general public is lowered, does that really benefit the illegal worker who has come here for a better life?
Most importantly, given the corruption of human nature, what's to keep these people from oppressing their perceived oppressors once their numbers reach a critical mass? If so, do you believe it would serve us right, like a penance for evil past deeds?
My point is that compassion and kindness does not always involve giving people or groups of people what they want, regardless of past mistreatment. A big part of the cause of the increasing darkness we're seeing on this earth is our unawareness of the connection with the whole of life. We're so busy taking sides and joining agendas, that we cannot see the forest for the trees. Most of all, it serves as an avoid-dance from looking within.
You, Me, Vertias all have our blind-spots. They usually are in accordance with the strength of ATTACHMENT to our particular points of view. And it's always easier to cast aspersions than to look deeper. Historical analysis without understanding human nature, in my view, is virtually useless. Human kind is filled with atrocities, past and present. This will not change unless the majority of individuals change and transform.
With regards to desperate and poor people from the south: they, like anyone else in their position will grab what they can. On the other side, those exploiting them will grab what they can as well. Both will play us against the other to grab more--this is what the dark side of human nature does, in spite of what it might claim otherwise. With 7 billion people on the planet it is becoming a very dangerous game indeed.
Understanding this game on a deep level is what is needed, not endlessly debating historical events and passing blame without a real clue as to the root cause. Look at your personal and business relationships and see what dynamics are at work--how fear gets us to kiss up to one individual, and self-righteousness to berate another, especially when they are helpless to strike back. Then multiply this dynamic X 7 billion, and then you will understand why things are as they are.
It also helps us step down off our 'horse of pomposity.'
Thanks for the effort. It would resonate better without the assumptions you include about me and my beliefs and understandings. You cast a lot of aspersions yourself.
i also find it amazing that you believe you understand what human nature is, and its corruption, and the ways we need to transform. i certainly agree we need compassion and kindness. i think that this would involve vastly reducing the so-called "standard of living" in this society, in keeping with an awareness of "the connection with the whole of life." Pomposity is deeply woven into our culture, what we think we need, what we are afraid to lose.
The question of migration that the Arizona law pretends to address goes directly to the intentional disruption of nations and cultures. This is not "endlessly debating historical events." Any effort to protect "the standard of living for the general public" that does not prepare to stop this intentional disruption, has a gigantic blind spot. And yes that is not the end of the story, nor did i say that it is in my brief retort to Veritas.
Again, i do appreciate the effort. i'm working hard to stay off that horse and i know i tend to walk around with my knives sharpened and ready. But your statements about me, your assumptions about what i must be implying, and the evident attachment and fear in your projections of future degradation that will ensue from continued "illegal immigration" make it easy to see you as being no less pompous than i am.
Veritas, Americans are benefiting from exploited labor without shame and then blaming them for our destroying their living sanctity in Mexico which pushed them here. As a soldier who served in Vietnam just like I did (yes, I remember you Thomas More), please take the time to recognize the similar Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) these immigrants are suffering similar to what those of us who have served in these futile wars have suffered. Read my separate post on this thread and also please read my discussion I had with Monica Benderman on this issue (http://www.commondreams.org/view/2010/04/28-0). I do not believe that you are a racist and as you know, I too am a fellow Texan although I live in El Paso not too far from the border.
Save it Veritas, they are convinced that their view is the only correct one. To keep these individuals in the shadows does indeed mean that they are used and discarded, hardly ever reporting injuries, severe or otherwise, at construction sites, etc. And that's the difficulty in general when one is feeling self-righteous: they are unable to put themselves in the other man's shoes, or see if there is any validity in the other side.
However, if THEY were asked to pony up, they'd squawk like raucous crows. Indeed, common sense, logic, and practical considerations seem bizarre to them, and the businesses that profit LOVE to have the onus of responsibility directed away from them, while laughing all the way to the bank. Suggest a special tax to have everyone pay for the amnesty of illegal immigrants, while providing them with common welfare, and you'll see where people really stand. Don't let their pot shots disturb you. Most are just full of hot air.
During the civil rights struggle I planned to participate in the March on Selma but my friends advised me not to go because I was still a "Green Carder" at the time. If I had been an American then I would almost certainly have gone.
I am therefore totally befuddled why the "left" advises me now to stay out of Arizona. Should we not show our solidarity and go to Arizona to participate in the demonstrations which have been and will continue to be held against the new law and be arrested by the tens of thousands? Has the "left" become chicken?
Excellent point.
The Left has no conscience left. Its simply all about political fashion, money, airtime and column space.
Most of them are too terrified and cowardly to do what you suggest.
Could you really envision Moore, Maher, or Maddow in the streets--on the front lines, in the faces of cops-literally standing up for something/someone?
Yes, the "left" has indeed become "chicken".
Thank god they weren't in their current positions back in the 60's.
The Tuscon Sheriff already said he is not going to abide by this law when it goes into affect in 90 days.
I think Obama's decision to delay immigration reform is a mistake. If someone like W knew about the need for immigration reform and was keen on passing it before 9/11, surely a Democrat shouldn't shy away from it.
I don't know what the statistics are, but it seems that any 'terrorist' would enter the US from Canada anyway, if that is the uproar from the wingnuts. White US citizens in the Southwest, Arizona and California especially, are particularly racist against Mexicans and Mexican-Americans.
To sit idley by while Arizona makes racism a call to arms for the tea baggers is a mistake.