High school students who took to the streets of Houston last week in an unprecedented protest against efforts to clamp down on illegal immigration may have scored a victory of sorts in giving voice to a community that until now has been largely silent. But in the process, they also may have accelerated the growing unease felt by the American public at the presence of as many as 12 million immigrants in the country illegally, said Rice University sociologist Stephen Klineberg.
I found the sudden burst of public debate on the issue of immigration to be rather refreshing. For once, people seem to be actually trying to understand an issue…although you’d never know it by listening to or reading the opinions of various and assorted pundits and politicians.
Immigration is an issue that clearly seems to evoke some strong emotions on both sides of the political divide. Certainly, there is the matter of law. Strictly speaking, it’s called “illegal immigration” because it’s, well, against the law. Illegal immigrants are here in this country illegally, and that is a problem. No one, regardless of where you find yourself on this issue, should condone breaking the law. More than that, though, we need to understand what it is that drives illegal immigrants to often risk life and limb ito sneak into the US- and that will involve honestly considering our own complicity in this dilemma.
Let’s face it, folks: these people aren’t sneaking into the US in search of the latest PlayStation. They’re searching for a better life, for an opportunity to make the living they cannot where home is. They come because there is a market for their cheap labor, and because Americans are only too willing to enjoy the benefits of this cheap labor while some of us attempt to demonize those providing said labor. If this sounds like a recipe for demagoguery, that’s because it is.
Illegal immigrants are the folks who clean our houses, pick our fruits and vegetables, landscape our yards, pick up our garbage, and build our roads and homes…among other things. The common denominator among these jobs is that they’re jobs that Americans won’t do. The fact that Americans won’t take these jobs doesn’t mean that the demand for these services diminishes. This demand creates the market, and illegal aliens provide the labor to complete the transaction. It’s simple market economics. We’ve become addicted to this cheap labor, and if we ever had to pay the costs associated with paying those who perform these menial jobs benefits a living wage I think we’d be in for a real surprise.
Let’s not forget what drives illegal immigrants to risk so much in order to come here. These are people who cannot make a living at home, so they try to come to a place where they can. The meager wage they may earn here still represents a significant improvement over anything they might find at home. How many of us can honestly say that we wouldn’t be doing exactly the same thing if we were faced with similar circumstances?
Simple human decency would seem to dictate that, since we are willing to exploit the cheap labor provided by illegal immigrants, we have a responsibility to legalize their presence in this country. I’m not saying that I know what the answer is in this dilemma, but the current system is both inhuman and inhumane. If we are willing to enjoy the benefits of the labor provided by illegal immigrants, we owe it to those providing these services to stop treating them as second-class humans.
If we can go to the moon, surely we can find a solution to this problem. Or are we really so addicted to cheap, invisible labor that we’re willing to countenance a situation that is only just barely above slavery? I’d like to think that we’re better than that, but listening to those on the Right who are willing to demonize those we exploit leaves me wondering.
We are blessed to live in the freest, most properous country in the world. Perhaps it’s time that we begin to act as if we understand how terrifically blessed we truly are. Let’s stop expecting those who perform so many of our “menial” jobs to fade into the shadows when their useful to us has lapsed. We’re better than that.
