"A group of immigrants has entered the United States en masse, bringing with them many things that Americans found objectionable. Poor, Catholic, uneducated, and different, these immigrants became the biggest scapegoat of the American public. They worked difficult, menial jobs that no American citizens wanted to do, often in unsanitary and dangerous conditions with low pay. The men would get odd jobs when they could as handymen, janitors, and carpenters. The women would get jobs as waitresses, nannies, and housekeepers. There were many conflicts with people already established in this country over jobs, and one of the biggest groups they had problems with was African-Americans. They lived many families to a single room, sometimes with no daylight or even running water, where the American public would complain that they were turning their neighborhoods into ghettos. There was public outcry over the rise in crime that accompanied these immigrants, and the American public wanted them gone.
-- http://migramatters.blogspot.com/2006/04/immigrant-path-to-acceptance.html
The Italians, also faced similar stigmas and persecutions.
This picture of Italian day laborers, was taken in New York.
Society is doing it again. When faced with an ever-increasing immigrant population, we do what we have always done and attempt to repel the immigrants. However, if history is to teach us anything it is that the immigrants who are immigrating to our country are not our enemies, they are hard working men and women just like our grandparents and great grandparents were before we. We should truly embrace the positive addition they will bring to our already diverse American culture.
I leave you now, with a softer suggestion, as far as our new neighbors are concerned. J.D.? Turk? Take it away...
4 comments:
Working conditions were unbelievably bad. We should celebrate more those individuals who helped bring about unionization in the labor sector. We should also help those who are now in the service sector to unionize, because that is the only way that people working at Wal-Mart are going to make a living wage.
Maybe you could say that anyone with Irish or Italian ancestry would be hypocritical to oppose more benefits for the many hispanic immigrants that are currently in the US.
Anonymous #1: Yeah, like Tom Joad!
Anonymous #2: No what I am trying to say is that discrimination against any immigrant population is wrong, and I wanted to highlight the fact that a majority of our own ancestors faced the same challenges as today's hispanic immigrant population. A lot of people seem to forget that "the immigrant struggle" is not something that was invented by our new hispanic neighbors. This "struggle" is inherent to the actual process of immigration regardless of what country you are from or going to and/or what point in history you have decided to immigrate.
What is even more bothersome is that Mexican immigrants have been traveling between Mexico and U.S. for hundreds of years and have provided a labor force that has been important to the success that this country has seen economically.
The whole immigrant issue is about fear mongering and a scape goat for those U.S. citizens who are out of work.
I work with a number of company's that wouldn't mind giving the work to U.S. citizens but can't because the work is too labor intensive, pay is too low, etc.
It seems we want our cake and eat it too.
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