ok, the whole immigration thing.

Ok. Today's three articles were from eReserves, which I finally managed to work, and they were on the whole illegal immigration deal. The first two were about the Hazleton law and the other one was obviously a biased editorial in favor of multilingualism.

So, let's talk.

There's not much I can stress about the content of these articles that we haven't already discussed in class, especially 'Lingo Jingo' [which I didn't like at ALL].

My opinions on the articles are these: I agree with the Hazleton ordinances. Maybe I'm the only one who does, but whatever. I agree on certain conditions, though - I understand that maybe it's not because of illegal immigrants that their crime is going up, or that people feel threatened, or what have you. I think that the new laws are in general, a good idea. Call me selfish or what have you, but the way I see it is that while I work 50 hour weeks during the summer to make money to afford this college education, I pay a lot of damn taxes to the government. And sure, I get some of it back, but not all of it. What happens to what I don't get back? Some of it goes to government funded projects, like public assistance, etc. Keeping in mind that public assistance, in some cases [like soup kitchens, homeless shelters, which I think are good ideas] does not ask you if you are a legal citizen. I don't mind helping people who also used to pay taxes, because I think you should help and recieve help in return, but we get SQUAT back from these illegal immigrants. A good argument against this is, of course, 'but if we help them stay here, they can BECOME legal and THEN pay taxes!!!!!!11' A lot of these illegal immigrants do come from Mexico, because it's simply ten times easier to come to the grand ol' States illegally [you need a passport/visa to enter the country by any means other than jumping the border]. These people send the non-taxed money that they earned home, to Mexico, where it's worth like 200% more [not really, but you get my point].

In support of Barletta's argument that illegal immigrants bring more crime and drug traffic, most smuggled drugs and illicit substances are smuggled in via our neighbors to the south, Mexico. Because, like I just said, it's ten times easier to just jump the border rather than go through the hassle to be here legally, even if you're just here on a 30-day visa or whatever.

Someone on here, I forget who, mentioned that people are living out of fear of having to assimilate to another culture because they've been here so long. I remember during the last class having brought up how experience of not assimilating can cause that fear. I'm going to tell you all right now - to be threatened with violence, just because you don't speak another language, is something that most people will not and do not want to experience. What if you were targeted as a victim of violence, because you didn't speak a certain language? I know that that isn't really happening right now [some places it is, but those are crazy extremists], but with the support of claims that illegal immigrants are violent and bring more violence, who is to say that can't happen? This fear and want to not bring that kind of violence and uproar to this country is what's causing this legislation [obviously, way to state the obvious Jen]. I forget where I was taking this, but it was kind of important.. and I'm sure I'll remember later.

Anyway... woo, time to go discuss this in class!

I thought that the articles were an interesting read, and I still think it's interesting that we're debating political content in an English Composition class.