By Emma Kaplan
On July 29, anti-immigrant law SB1070 will go into effect. This law will make life even more horrific and unbearable for millions of immigrants and millions more who look like they are from another country. This is a leap in the whole bigoted storm trooper culture that was unleashed under Bush and has been offered a place to stay in the Obama administration. This culture was strategically developed after 9/11 when the powers that be widely promoted that there was nothing too vile, sadistic or inhumane when it comes to “ America and American lives.”
It began with the round-ups, preemptive war, Guantanamo Bay, indefinite detentions, and the ripping apart of families. Now, here in the U.S, armed right-wing militias run around cutting open gallons of water that volunteers leave in the desert to save immigrants from dying of dehydration, while another right-wing group in Utah sent the addresses and phone numbers of those who are of Latino descent (including pregnant women) to law enforcement agencies and demanded that they be deported. Reactionary tea partiers are tweeting they will “kick the ass of illegal advocates” and “no citizenship for illegals, go home” (side note: isn’t “Go Home” what the Iraqi and Afghanistan people have been telling the U.S military for 8 years?).
It began with the round-ups, preemptive war, Guantanamo Bay, indefinite detentions, and the ripping apart of families. Now, here in the U.S, armed right-wing militias run around cutting open gallons of water that volunteers leave in the desert to save immigrants from dying of dehydration, while another right-wing group in Utah sent the addresses and phone numbers of those who are of Latino descent (including pregnant women) to law enforcement agencies and demanded that they be deported. Reactionary tea partiers are tweeting they will “kick the ass of illegal advocates” and “no citizenship for illegals, go home” (side note: isn’t “Go Home” what the Iraqi and Afghanistan people have been telling the U.S military for 8 years?).
In the face of all this, Obama could have called on his “grassroots movement” of the millions that voted for him to go to Arizona to force the government to retract this law and to stop this whole anti-immigrant sentiment. Instead he called on people to get “past the two poles of debate” and referred to SB1070 as understandable but misguided. Excuse me? How can you get past a pole of debate that compares Latinos to a rat infestation? Furthermore, there is nothing understandable about a law that will mean misery, detentions, deportations and possibly death to innocent people. The philosophy of common ground and conciliation with an unwavering fascist force paved the path to the gas chambers.
This racist atmosphere will not be lifted by Latinos pledging their allegiance to America any more than when certain Jews attempted to pledge their allegiance to Nazi Germany. It will not be lifted by pointing out that immigrants do the work that “nobody else will do” and re-asserting the notion that people’s worth is based on whether they can be exploited to serve American interests. No, this atmosphere will only be lifted with a culture that challenges people to stop thinking like Americans and start thinking like human beings.
If it’s illegal to think that human beings deserve the right to live without being hounded, harassed or degraded because they are brown, we should all be illegals.
If it’s illegal to think children should not die of starvation and poverty because of the history of the U.S.’s role in exploiting, stealing and plundering their land, we should all be illegals.
If it’s illegal to support or comply with this Nazi-like atmosphere, we should all be illegals.
Throughout history, it is known that the only way things change is when people refuse to go along with business as usual and fight for their vision of a better world. It doesn’t come from legislation or a savior from the Democratic Party; it comes from the masses of people not waiting for the criminals at the top to move and moving on our own. This is what is being called of us now.
TODOS SOMOS ILLEGALES!
People are in Arizona right now protesting this inhumane and illegitimate law. On July 29th, the people are coming together for a day of non-compliance with this law. People have shut down street corners and have been arrested. Revolutionaries have plans to make “no deportation zones” in Arizona where people are refusing to allow their neighbors or their co-workers to be grabbed by the authorities and be taken away. This is what we need and what must spread. Stay tuned to worldcantwait.org and revcom.us for updates.