Don't Fence Me In
As I was driving to work this morning, I saw a large Mexican flag being waved by a group of high school students on Grand Avenue. Then I saw the protests on CNN in Detroit, Washington DC, LA and other major cities and I decided to write a little more on the topic of illegal immigration and the border fence.
Now I am someone who believes one of the main sources of conflict is the very concept of borders and nationality. We live in a world where people are forced to identify themselves as "American" , "Mexican", "Persian" or "Chinese", despite the fact that one might have little else in common with fellow countrymen other than the address. I couldn't be more different than Cletus Smith from Bumfuck, Kansas (this is what my friend Roberta calls her hometown :-) ), but he and I are both considered "American".
When I was in Europe, anytime anyone would ask me where I was from or what nationality I was, my answer would always be "Californian", not "American". But then again, I feel that large conglomerations are always less effecient and more explotative than individual entities. Whether that's the United States (a highly ineffecient way to govern a continent, when people in Kansas are voting for something that only affects people in Coastal states) or at JP Morgan Chase Bank One.
The sad thing to me is that the Americans forget how important immigration is to our success as a nation. Whether you count the original immigrants who pushed the natives off the land, the slaves who helped to build our economy, the Chinese who built our railroads and provided cheap labor, the Eastern Europeans who came over during the early part of the 20th, or the Jewish scientists who came over during WWII to help defeat the Axis powers, this country would be long gone without our accepting of immigrants.
I don't know about you, but making criminals out of people searching for a better life seems almost EVIL to me. Americans consume more than twice the resources of any other nation (including the EU), yet we complain when the prices of these goods go up due to scarcity. The demand for goods in the US is higher than anywhere else, which means we need to manufacture these goods. We complain about outsourcing, about sweat-shops in the third world and about illegal immigrants "stealing" the unwanted jobs that only the most down-and-out Americans are willing to take. Immigrants are willing to work harder, longer and cheaper than anyone who was born with the American Silver Spoon in their mouth.
A McDonalds worker makes about $11,000 a year, which is pathetic and impossible to live on in cities like SD, SF, NYC, DC and LA. But these people are coming from countries like Mexico (10,000 gdp/capita), Vietnam (2,500), India (3,000), El Salvador (4,300), and China (5,600) where working for $5.50 an hour and only having to work 40 hours a week isn't even something that most people in those countries even believe is possible. We waste so much energy fighting illegal immigrants while we eat at our local taco shop, buy lettuce, tomatoes and avocados from Vons and get our car handwashed for $10. Where do you think those things come from?
3% of this country immigrated illegally, and that 3% is like the mortar that keeps the bricks together. They may not be the foundation, nor the walls or ceiling, but without them the structure would collapse with a stiff breeze. If we build a fence, it might not be long before we find ourselves on the wrong side of the walls wanting to climb over. Because without the Mexicans, this country will wither away and die.
As I was driving to work this morning, I saw a large Mexican flag being waved by a group of high school students on Grand Avenue. Then I saw the protests on CNN in Detroit, Washington DC, LA and other major cities and I decided to write a little more on the topic of illegal immigration and the border fence.
Now I am someone who believes one of the main sources of conflict is the very concept of borders and nationality. We live in a world where people are forced to identify themselves as "American" , "Mexican", "Persian" or "Chinese", despite the fact that one might have little else in common with fellow countrymen other than the address. I couldn't be more different than Cletus Smith from Bumfuck, Kansas (this is what my friend Roberta calls her hometown :-) ), but he and I are both considered "American".
When I was in Europe, anytime anyone would ask me where I was from or what nationality I was, my answer would always be "Californian", not "American". But then again, I feel that large conglomerations are always less effecient and more explotative than individual entities. Whether that's the United States (a highly ineffecient way to govern a continent, when people in Kansas are voting for something that only affects people in Coastal states) or at JP Morgan Chase Bank One.
The sad thing to me is that the Americans forget how important immigration is to our success as a nation. Whether you count the original immigrants who pushed the natives off the land, the slaves who helped to build our economy, the Chinese who built our railroads and provided cheap labor, the Eastern Europeans who came over during the early part of the 20th, or the Jewish scientists who came over during WWII to help defeat the Axis powers, this country would be long gone without our accepting of immigrants.
I don't know about you, but making criminals out of people searching for a better life seems almost EVIL to me. Americans consume more than twice the resources of any other nation (including the EU), yet we complain when the prices of these goods go up due to scarcity. The demand for goods in the US is higher than anywhere else, which means we need to manufacture these goods. We complain about outsourcing, about sweat-shops in the third world and about illegal immigrants "stealing" the unwanted jobs that only the most down-and-out Americans are willing to take. Immigrants are willing to work harder, longer and cheaper than anyone who was born with the American Silver Spoon in their mouth.
A McDonalds worker makes about $11,000 a year, which is pathetic and impossible to live on in cities like SD, SF, NYC, DC and LA. But these people are coming from countries like Mexico (10,000 gdp/capita), Vietnam (2,500), India (3,000), El Salvador (4,300), and China (5,600) where working for $5.50 an hour and only having to work 40 hours a week isn't even something that most people in those countries even believe is possible. We waste so much energy fighting illegal immigrants while we eat at our local taco shop, buy lettuce, tomatoes and avocados from Vons and get our car handwashed for $10. Where do you think those things come from?
3% of this country immigrated illegally, and that 3% is like the mortar that keeps the bricks together. They may not be the foundation, nor the walls or ceiling, but without them the structure would collapse with a stiff breeze. If we build a fence, it might not be long before we find ourselves on the wrong side of the walls wanting to climb over. Because without the Mexicans, this country will wither away and die.
posted by Dan Pasternack at 3:47 PM
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