Racism and Immigration

The presidential candidates have made immigration reform one of the major issues in their campaign and linked it to national security. None of the candidates such as John McCain, Barrack Obama or Hillary Clinton have directly said their views on whether their going to pass amnesty or not, but each candidate does have plans to improve our Immigration System.

But what exactly is amnesty, “Amnesties go farther than most incentives for illegal immigration because they make it impossible for illegal aliens to be forced to go back home. Amnesties reward the illegal alien with the pathway to U.S. citizenship. Millions of illegal aliens have been made part of the permanent, legal population of America since 1986.”

One question in mind is how does racism comes into play with immigration and can it be stopped. Immigration and racism has strong roots in the United States along the border between Mexico and the United States.

Last year, immigration had become a blazing issue that was all over the news and reached beyond Capitol Hill. People became so concern about our borders with Mexico then the war in Iraq, especially among black Americans. “Illegal immigration was being debated on black radio, in barber shops and during community meetings. The question on everyone’s lips was whether illegal immigrants were taking jobs from black Americans.” But by early winter, the issue had diminished. “According to a survey of likely black presidential primary voters conducted by the Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies, less than one percent of those surveyed identified immigration as the most important national problem. As a factor for the election, the answer is no,” said David Bositis, senior research associate at the Joint Center. “I conducted a poll in late fall 2007, and it just didn’t exist.” “When asked to self-identify the single most important problem in the country, 28 percent of those surveyed said the war in Iraq, followed by health care (20 percent) and jobs and the economy (15 percent). In 2004, a Joint Center pre-election survey of black adults (not likely voters), 31 percent identified jobs and the economy, followed by 22 percent who identified the war in Iraq.” Bositis said “he told BlackAmericaWeb.com the issue of whether immigrants, and Latinos particularly, are taking jobs from blacks is complicated and really breaks down into different discussions based on whether the focus is on skilled or unskilled labor.”

“Many unskilled jobs, observers say, go unfilled because black people have been urged to seek to higher positions. Maids, gardeners, day laborers and odd jobs helped many black households after slavery through the migration of black Americans from the south to northern industrial cities and into the civil rights movement. The late 20th century, black Americans saw education as a way out of lower-income, blue collar jobs and into professional or white collar jobs that provided opportunities for a high standard of living.”

”Peter C. Groff, publisher of Blackpolicy.org and executive director of the Center for African-American Policy at the University of Denver, told BlackAmericaWeb.com addressed the impact of illegal immigration on black Americans said, “there is this festering dilemma of competition for jobs, affordable housing and other resources -- this notion that ‘they’ are taking jobs from ‘us.’ That’s a troubling notion for black people, considering blacks have been here longer and fought so many years to attain higher levels of wealth, professional development and education.”

"So, the interesting question is this: Why should we want the low-end, entry level, manual labor jobs typically secured by non-English speaking and mostly Latino immigrants?" Some may say that has nothing to do with immigration but racism and prejudice.

“There is absolutely no empirical evidence that African-Americans are losing jobs to Latinos overall. There is a more vigorous debate in the academic community about the impact of immigrants on jobs and wages for American workers, particularly African-Americans, said Cecilia Munoz, senior vice president for the National Council of La Raza, the largest national Hispanic civil rights and advocacy organization in the U.S. The bulk of the empirical evidence shows that to the extent immigrant workers compete with American workers for jobs, this effect is felt the most by other immigrants and Latinos. The academic studies tend to show that immigrant workers don't undercut African-Americans in the workforce.”

“Since the initiation of Operation Gatekeeper, over 4,000 people have died trying to cross the border! And yet people continue to cross and will continue to cross as long as they continue to suffer! The workers of Mexico and South America suffer, female and male maquiladora workers suffer, families with lack of health care and decent housing suffer, hungry children without access to education suffer—and that is why people will continue to cross in droves so that they might suffer a little bit less on this side.”

Some may say “uneducated Americans of ALL RACES losing jobs or not being able to get a job because of illegal immigrants. What you're saying is the poor, uneducated illegal have more rights to American jobs than poor, uneducated AMERICANS. Do you not see something wrong with that?”

“Most of the jobs that Hispanics take are unskilled jobs, jobs like maids in hotels, private construction and agriculture, as farm workers. These are jobs that African-Americans are not interested in and wouldn’t work because they’re under paid. “

The skilled trade jobs such as being a plumber, electricians or carpenters, one can make a fairly decent living, and nobody in India or china is going to be there to take that job because they are jobs that are not going overseas. “A lot of these kinds of jobs are going to Hispanics.”

“Immigrant workers are a major presence in sectors of the economy like the service sector, which is highly diverse; the unions that are organizing immigrant workers, like the Service Employees International Union (SEIU) and UNITE HERE! (hotel and restaurant workers) also have significant of African-American memberships. Both do a good job of building a sense of common cause within a highly diverse workforce. These are sectors of the workforce where workers are attempting to make gains together,” she said. “The dynamics in the building trades are different and have made it difficult for workers of different backgrounds to develop a sense of common cause. So we are left with the notion of ‘us vs. them’ and direct competition, which has the effect of leaving immigrant workers on the outside, working the most dangerous jobs often without access to workers compensation when injured or other kinds of protections.”

As far as I concern, everyone has an immigrant background expect for the Native American’s, they are the original American’s. This is because somehow someone’s ancestries came from a foreign country, no matter how many years your family has lived in USA. There is this history of sacrifice that we share with immigrants in the United States. In many levels, we have these certain social and cultural bonds, particularly with Latinos, Africans and West Indians.

There are many bashing within ethnic groups such as, Blacks against blacks. For example, some Black Americans don’t not like West Indian Blacks because they fear there taking away their jobs. Another example, its Asians against Asians, I personally have a friend that is from Korea and he would react with a dirty attitude if anyone calls him a “Chinese man.”

People may wonder why some are racist and that comes from ancient years. For example, Parents may tell their children about what has happen to them in their past, such slavery, of how the Whiteman held them as slaves and ill treatment them. A story like that sometimes causes kids to hold that as a grudge, and when they grown up they become racist against whites for they did to their family. Another example, if one has a bad personal experience from another ethnic group such as, getting robbed, raped or simply being made fun of.

Racism in the USA can never be stop for many different reasons. The American nation has always had a specific ethnic crux and that crux has been white, the race of our founding fathers. Racism is like cancer, it’s a sickness that spreads rapidly and there is no cure for it.

I am a third generation Indian American Guyanese for my family with family. The United States Constitution, the Bill of Rights, the first amendment freedom of religion, speech and the press and the fourthteenth amendment, provide for equal protection of all persons being located in the United States. This is why many of us choose to be an American and so do I.