The current Republican presidential candidate Trump has been spouting off a lot recently about building a wall between the USA and Mexico and suspending immigration from certain countries that ‘have a history of terrorism.’
*I wrote a better post on this subject years ago called Arizona Immigration Law – A Unique Perspective. But you know what, I feel like writing a little more on it and this time to my own descendants.
Let’s remember that America was founded by immigrants who came in waves over time and the ethnicities that comprised these waves were all vilified at some time or another by the people already in the USA. I’d like to point out that these people, the ancestors of the current population, were almost all poor trying to escape from poverty and bad conditions in their homeland. Those that were already here most certainly would have liked to build a wall to stop the WOPs, the Micks, and pretty much anyone who was not already in the USA. What many have forgotten is that WOP means ‘with out pass’ and so the Italians, like the big wave of Mexican immigrants today did not have documentation and were ‘illegal.’ These immigrants were on the lowest rung of the social scale in their homelands and the aristocracy was most likely very glad to be rid of them.
Fast forward a little over 100 years or so the descendants of these illegals now feel entitled and are doing to the new arrivals what others had done to their own ancestors long ago. If forgetting history wasn’t enough these people still cling to the same religious beliefs their ancestors did – religion runs in the family! Most religions teach compassion, forgiveness and helping the poor but they seem to have very hard time comprehending this.
So, they go to church on Sunday in their finest, riding in a very expensive carriage called an SUV, go through all the motions to show how devout they are; then they go home feeling quite holy only to support a demagogue who preaches the opposite of what they just heard in church.
The USA became strong on the backs of immigrants and I would argue that by impeding immigration it actually makes the USA weaker.
In school the children are taught that they should be open to new ideas, make friends with those that are different from them, be kind! Yet this is not what is practiced by many of their parents. If they were honest with themselves they would admit they feel more comfortable with those that are exactly like them; they want to hang around people of the same color, the same religion, the same social status etc. This is only natural for those who have never really experienced the world, who have lived in the same place all of their lives so they really cannot be blamed.
It would just be right to come clean and get to the root of why these people want to stop immigration and that is because they do not like people that are different from them.
As for suspending immigration from countries with a ‘history of terrorism’ that is code for ‘let’s persecute Muslims.’ If the USA went ahead and did that the first country on the list should be Saudi Arabia but anybody who knows anything about international affairs knows that is not possible.
