HispanicPRNow

It is deeply troubling and morally offensive to me as a Latino and an American to see the criminalization of hard work take place in this country. 

I’m referring to yesterday’s roundup and arrests of close to 1,200 undocumented immigrants in various states throughout the country and a number of executives at the firms where they were employed, according to today’s headlines in the Hoy New York and La Opinion editions in Los Angeles.

We all want to feel safer within our borders but aren’t we throwing out the baby with the bathwater here?  Need we express the obvious: That not all undocumented immigrants are criminals!   Criminalizing hard working people is contrary to creed of this great nation.  Have we forgotten that we all came from somewhere else and how the great contributions of sweat, hope and dreams of immigrants have made this country the “Oasis” of global freedom that it is today?

Apparently so!  I-for one-am concerned that we are sending our younger generations a very strangely mixed message.  We glorify the actions of criminals and their behaviors and lifestyles for the sake of entertainment in movies and on TV, yet here we are sending hard working people to jail because their paperwork is not in order.

We must ammend our laws to be more compassionate and just than this.  Please remember that these people-who mostly are decent folks seeking greater opportunities and livelihoods for themselves and their families-do not issue their own paperwork in this country. It is our government and its agencies that do so.  This is clearly not a criminal issue but simply an administrative one that we control.

I feel that these people and their employers have done nothing wrong and am reminded of some of the more repugnant instances in history with the words “nazis” and “internment camps” sadly coming to mind.  Those were horrible mistakes and so is the criminalization of the work ethic which makes this country famous.

Is it my imagination or are Americans renowned for working harder than most?  It has been clearly documented that Americans work more hours and take less vacation than workers in most industrialized nations. That means even if you’re an undocumented immigrant in this country, everyone is expected to work hard.  Is that not what these people were doing when they got arrested?  We are contradicting the virtues for which our country is famous. I strongly urge our government to tread carefully here, the world and our own children may never forgive us for it.

J.M. De Jesus

President

QUADRANT TWO PR

info@q2pr.com

One only has to watch the evening newscasts of late to realize what a huge deal Immigration is in the US today.  No one should know this more than us Hispanics as so many of us are newer immigrants, seeking a better life through better opportunities, in the land of dreams.  Recent marches and manifestations of civil protest clamoring for sensible immigration reform have dominated the information pipeline in most of the major media.

The choices, though many, are not easy ones to make.  Some bills have been introduced to criminalize hard working efforts of immigrants and their employers, which thankfully it seems, have been altered to more sensible-less criminal-versions of these proposals. 

By any accounts, it would appear that the two top issues in the proposed immigration reform include greater safety and security for U.S. borders, and a reasonable measure to deal with the massive flow of illegal immigraiton into the country.  Some have proposed a 700 mile wall which is somehow reminiscent of Berlin, in this writer’s mind.  It also leads me to ask the rather unpopular question, How can we help Mexico to bolster its economy without international corporate welfare?  Is there any way in which we could support or pressure this great latin american country into creating better and more opportunity within its own borders?  Is it possible in a society of have’s and have not’s to the umpteenth degree and elitist corruption, to create jobs for people that will keep them at home within their own borders.

Beyond this it must be said that their are more far-reaching implications to this immigration reform issue that goes well outside of the U.S.-Latino world.  One thing I noticed in the coverage of the protests in New York was though many of the faces were Latino, many others also joined in on chorus of those asking for fairness and justice to prevail in giving immigrants a chance to make lives for themselves.  Asians-of many types and races-and other people from all over the world have also joined the immigration reform choir. 

It seems almost unthinkable that this great oasis of freedom and equality for all, would shut its doors to the rest of humanity on earth, but it is closer than many of us would like to admit.  Economic realities and justification based on the reaction to the 9/11 attacks have triggered it in this fashion.  No one can blame any of us for being a little paranoid in the age of terror.  I just hope that this dose of paranoia does not cloud the thinking of the sons-and daughters-of liberty to the point of drowning out the principles of freedom and justice for all, made famous by our pledge of allegiance.