The debate over immigration is doing nothing if not intensifying. Those who are coming or who were previously allowed into this country complain about what they label as draconian rules and actions by the new administration. Those who are uninformed, both of foreign nationality and native American heritage, scream racism at those who oppose illegal immigration and those who seek to enforce immigration laws.
Most simply fail to go back to and consider the basics.
No country can accept everyone else’s citizens. No country can exist without borders. No country can exist without laws. No country can exist without some immigration, but that immigration must be orderly and compliant with the laws of the receiving nation.
In the current situation, many of those who have come to the United States illegally and many of those who seek to stay here in violation of law were lulled into the notion that they could come or stay at will. They were similarly lulled into thinking that they could do so and bring their issues, problems, politics, and personal preferences, and insist that the American people accept all of it.
Such thinking is unrealistic and simply ignores some of the most basic of rules that apply to any person seeking to reside in another country indefinitely:
1. Assimilate. Keep your ethnic roots, but adhere to the norms of the society that you seek to join and claim to want to be a part of.
2. Contribute. Don't look around at what other people have and expect that they will give it to you. Instead, open your eyes and see that in this country, much more so than in most countries, you have the opportunity to show what you are made of and not only get those things for yourself, but maybe even get more if you have what it takes.
3. Be Grateful. You may never be a billionaire, a millionaire, or even a high-net-worth individual. But in this country, those willing to work and realistically accept where they are at in their lives at any given moment will always have a home and a relatively good life. Certainly as compared to other countries, especially countries like Mexico and many of those in Latin America, Africa, and the non-affluent Middle East.
Until and if you make it, you may have to live in a poor neighborhood. You may have to drive an old beat-up pick-up truck vs. a BMW. You might have to buy your clothes at Walmart vs. Neiman's. And you may have to eat at Dominos, McDonalds, or a Taco Shack vs. Morton's or Ruth’s Chris.
But life will still be better than if you were back home in whatever third-world country you fled from to come here.
Most importantly, in this country you will continue to have the chance to advance to an even better life. In some cases, far beyond your wildest dreams.
4. Obey the Rules. Whether you accept them or not, laws dictate. Violate the laws and risk your freedom and your ability to remain here.
If you truly value the opportunity that has been handed to you, think twice before you take the risk.
5. Accept Reality. Immigration enforcement is not about racism. It is about the laws and norms of a nation and its society.
Wealth and wealth-building are not dictated by racism. Neither is investment strategy. Neither is social stratification. Neither is living in a multi-million-dollar home vs. a $50,000 home. Neither is driving a very expensive car vs. driving a very inexpensive one. Neither is owning a yacht vs. owning a dinghy.
There are elements of racism in all of those, immigration enforcement included, because they involve human behavior and actions. But the racism that actually dictates actions being taken or the results achieved is relatively nominal.
No one should expect to be allowed to come illegally or stay without status just because of their race, ethnicity, skin color, or nationality. No one should expect to be wealthy or not based on their race, ethnicity, skin color, or nationality. No one should expect to be able to make vast amounts of money and own expensive things based on their race, ethnicity, skin color, or nationality. And no one should expect to be a general, a CEO, a governor, a senator, a president, or to be invited to the Annual Meridian Ball, based on their race, ethnicity, skin color, or nationality.
Proving by means of a legal process that you are a person who will add to and not solely take from the American public dictates whether you can come to or remain in America.
Accomplishment in the scientific, military, government, financial, business, literature, academic, or medical fields, etc., and wealth, two things that usually go together, dictate whether you will have power and affluence or be allowed into the world of the powerful or affluent.
When there is racism, it goes both ways. No one that doesn't fit the preferred criteria is going to be invited, absent an anomaly. Not to a Klan party. Not to a Black Lives Matter party. Not to an Islamic Jihad party (if they ever have any). Not to a La Raza party.
These concepts and social rules apply everywhere and in every nation. In some more than others.
6. Don’t Expect of Americans what Americans Should Not Expect of Others. Except for the extremely naive or foolish, Americans are not moving to Mexico or any other country and trying to get them to speak English.
We are not asking them to give up soccer for football. Or expecting that they will spend their tax dollars to support us. Or relying on them to provide free health care just because we choose to be there.
We are not seeking or expecting free long-term shelter, much less an apartment or a home for the same reason.
Nor can we demand that they let us dictate policy or the enforcement or non-enforcement of laws.
We do not expect to live like the affluent, much less the social elite, just because we chose to move there.
Nor do we expect to get appointed/elected to a high office, or to get invited to a party thrown by the president or richest person in that country just because we think it should be so.
Any American that is doing or expecting any of the above-noted things will soon find out the folly of their thinking and the nonsense of their expectations.
Except for perhaps Canada, any American who goes to any other country and violates their immigration laws, much less their criminal laws, whether they agree with or accept those laws or not, will undoubtedly soon see the point. Arrest and expulsion. Without delay and likely without an audience before an immigration judge, a right of appeal to the Board of Immigration Appeals, a possible circuit court appeal or federal district court habeas proceeding, or a Supreme Court-like review process.
Any American who goes to another country and expects, much less demands, any of the other things, will soon find out the folly of their thinking and the nonsense of their expectations.
Rules and Reality.