Opinions

Immigration laws not strict enough

Most Americans have seen the recent news about the “vicious” immigration law implemented and reformed in Arizona. Demanding identification papers to constantly be carried around has led to racial profiling. Opponents argue that this leads to racism. It denies people rights!

But in fact, illegal immigrants are illegal; they are not entitled to our rights – only the right to remain silent as they are arrested for breaking the law. Rights of citizenship should apply only in a person’s home country. Immigrants should be encouraged to become legal instead of encouraging illegal trespassing.

Take a moment to remember post–9/11, a time of immense racial profiling toward Middle Easterners, where every Muslim was suddenly seen as a terrorist. Now, every Latino in Arizona is seen as an illegal immigrant. In any threat to national security, racial profiling is inevitable. It is a sad truth, but it is true.

To be clear, opposing illegal immigration is not racism; it is following the law, which all U.S. citizens are obligated to do. Being opposed to illegal workers does not mean hating Mexicans. There are numerous nationalities that are found illegally in our nation, those of Hispanic descent just happen to be the majority. To insist that strict immigration reform is racist in fact privileges race over the law, a practice at its root more racist than simply following U.S. immigration protocol.

Our nation cannot be excused from blame. Some U.S. policies encourage immigration, like unequal agricultural subsidies and control over foreign markets. However, immigrants are obviously aware that entering the States is illegal, as they crawl through holes in fences or cram in the trunk of a car to get here. To see illegal immigrants as moving blindly toward the American Dream supposes that they could not possibly understand American law, and discriminates against their intelligence.

Illegal immigrants are standing out on the streets of Arizona demanding their rights. But again, they have no rights here because they are not citizens. Just because our country is better off does not mean the unfortunate should automatically be allowed in. Such a position is childlike and taxing to our resources.

Why shouldn’t we enforce carrying identification? American citizens are expected to carry their driver’s licenses. We need them to prove our identity for numerous transactions. Why shouldn’t the laws by which legal Americans abide apply to everyone? If someone is not a citizen, they will not have identification and will be guilty of breaking the law.

Once an immigrant is legal, the problem is solved; he or she becomes endowed with the Constitutional rights that we hold so dear. Essentially, we are an immigrant nation. But it is citizenship that is the foundation upon which our ideals are built. To put it plainly, total equality in distributing citizenship is a utopian world of which only the naïve dream.

Educated individuals are capable of accepting differences between ethnicities and can rise above racism, but intellectuals are a minority. We need to begin treating nationality as the determinant of how we treat immigrants, not their ethnicities. The rest of the nation will inevitably continue to perpetuate “politically correct” racism for lack of knowing how detrimental it can be.

There will always be racial profiling. The human species is incapable of peace and unity. We need to do our best as a nation to protect our security, and stop perpetuating the false ideals of the American Dream to foreigners.