5 ms·

This situation in particular is more complicated than the media portrays. Separating children from parents is obviously bad, and needs to stop. Zero tolerance f

This situation in particular is more complicated than the media portrays. Separating children from parents is obviously bad, and needs to stop. Zero tolerance for illegal crossings, on the other hand, is probably actually good. The prior policy of letting anyone with children go & handing them a court date heavily incentivized human trafficking of children, because a child was a golden ticket into the USA (and indeed, many children were trafficked as a result). To eliminate that incentive, deportation after an illegal crossing needs to be enforced, even when a child is in tow. I think that the best answer is detention as a family during the process of prosecution and deportation, but I understand that there are some legal hurdles to that. They need to work them out, and fast.

mc32 8y ago
One of the issues --which I think has been recently addressed, is that not only political prisoners and people persecuted by a bad government could seek asylum, but other things would qualify --even things which affect Americans, would be grounds for asylum. Obviously many are economic migrants (the congress need to work on seasonal work visas), but that's not grounds for asylum. You even hear of how they get coached for the interview. What keywords to blurt out which trigger a greater consideration.
adjkant 8y ago
The basic problem with that line of thinking is that most don't think immigration is such a large problem that we must have a zero-tolerance policy that does such harm. Immigration is a highly politicized issue that in reality has limited effects. Yes, it's more nuanced than "this is evil", but it's pretty inhumane and overly nationalistic / American-centered if you ask me.
- sheepmullet 8y ago
  > is that most don't think immigration is such a large problem that we must have a zero-tolerance policy that does such harm. According to who? I don't think that's true at all. I think immigration is the most important policy to get right.
  - adjkant 8y ago
    What are the day to day effects you face every day due to current vs ideal immigration policy? What about most people? Do you really think that harm is more than the huge amounts of suffering this policy is causing? Where is your judgment for importance coming from? What's your reasoning for making it such a huge priority? In a country with over 300M people, how is this relatively small amount of people having this vast of an effect? What is it affecting? In terms of public opinion, consider this: https://news.gallup.com/poll/1675/most-important-problem.aspx https://news.gallup.com/poll/1675/most-important-problem.asp... I wish there was a ranked system to see more than the single importance, but the point being that very few see it as a high priority issue. I don't have specific data for this claim, but I think it's also safe to say the issue is a polarizing one: the group who sees it as the #1 issue thinks its a huge problem while many others see it as almost nothing. The disconnect there is exactly why I led with those questions above.
    - sheepmullet 8y ago
      > What are the day to day effects you face every day due to current vs ideal immigration policy? It's the key reason one of the richest states has some of the worst public schooling in the country. It impacts hundreds of thousands of school kids and ensures they end up with a worse education. I wish the techies who didn't care about the negative impacts had to send their kids to these schools.
      - adjkant 8y ago
        Do you have the stuff to show it's actually hundreds of thousands? How much of a difference is the education quality? Public schools are mostly funded by local taxes, yes? How exactly does this come into play? All of this is still to say that you think your kid going to a slightly worse school is worth messing up all these lives so horrifically? I'm not saying let's take every single person that goes to the US or that we shouldn't enforce immigration laws. I'm just saying let's not make a Holocaust in its name, and these policies are literally starting to mirror those types of events. I don't see how any equation of such direct pain to such a large number of people can possibly be justified by small effects on masses. That's a central utilitarian flaw in thinking this was a good idea. That and not caring about the lives of those being harmed. There's a difference between allowing one to immigrate and treating them as human.
int_19h 8y ago
From my experience talking to different people in US, most of them on both sides of the immigration debate have zero clue what their immigration laws are even like. One theme that's particularly common is hearing "they should just get into the line and wait for their turn". They genuinely don't understand that there is no line for the majority of those people - they don't have any legal avenues for immigration at all, except for winning the diversity visa lottery (the chances for which for any individual person are so slim, no-one in a sane mind would plan around that as a strategy).
- briandear 8y ago
  But that isn’t true. Asylum applications can be submitted to a US consulate. There is a process. Syrian refugees didn’t just show up in Laredo. Asylum can also be requested at a legal port of entry. These unlawful entry arrests are from aliens entering the country while avoiding ports of entry.
  - dagw 8y ago
    Quoiting from the first sentence on the main page about asylum on usembassy.gov, which is the first hit I got on Google: "The United States does not grant asylum in its diplomatic premises abroad. Under U.S. law, the United States considers asylum only for aliens who are physically present in the United States." So I guess it's understandable that some people might believe they have to be physically present in the United States to be apply for asylum
  - cr1895 8y ago
    >Asylum applications can be submitted to a US consulate. False. "To obtain asylum through the affirmative asylum process you must be physically present in the United States. You may apply for asylum status regardless of how you arrived in the United States or your current immigration status." "A defensive application for asylum occurs when you request asylum as a defense against removal from the U.S. For asylum processing to be defensive, you must be in removal proceedings in immigration court with the Executive Office for Immigration Review (EOIR)." https://www.uscis.gov/humanitarian/refugees-asylum/asylum/obtaining-asylum-united-states https://www.uscis.gov/humanitarian/refugees-asylum/asylum/ob...
refoundglory 8y ago
> enforced, even when a child is in tow. I think that the best answer is detention as a family during the process of prosecution and deportation, but I understand that there are some legal hurdles to that. No, there are no legal hurdles to that and families were being held together in detention until the Trump administration decided they didn't want to do that any more. This could stop today if anyone in the Trump administration wanted it to - but they want to keep doing it, and they also want to fool people into thinking that it isn't their personal decision to do so.
criddell 8y ago
> Zero tolerance for illegal crossings, on the other hand, is probably actually good. That's what I used to strongly believe then this weekend I listened to a Malcolm Gladwell podcast (yeah, I know, I know) and he made me think about it a bit differently. Back when the border was super porous, immigration was more circular and cyclical. People would come into the US, work for a season, then go home. When the border became difficult and expensive to cross, people would cross the border and then stay. There's an argument that can be made that a zero tolerance policy has created the current situation.

mc32 8y ago

One of the issues --which I think has been recently addressed, is that not only political prisoners and people persecuted by a bad government could seek asylum, but other things would qualify --even things which affect Americans, would be grounds for asylum. Obviously many are economic migrants (the congress need to work on seasonal work visas), but that's not grounds for asylum. You even hear of how they get coached for the interview. What keywords to blurt out which trigger a greater consideration.

adjkant 8y ago

The basic problem with that line of thinking is that most don't think immigration is such a large problem that we must have a zero-tolerance policy that does such harm. Immigration is a highly politicized issue that in reality has limited effects. Yes, it's more nuanced than "this is evil", but it's pretty inhumane and overly nationalistic / American-centered if you ask me.

sheepmullet 8y ago
> is that most don't think immigration is such a large problem that we must have a zero-tolerance policy that does such harm. According to who? I don't think that's true at all. I think immigration is the most important policy to get right.
- adjkant 8y ago
  What are the day to day effects you face every day due to current vs ideal immigration policy? What about most people? Do you really think that harm is more than the huge amounts of suffering this policy is causing? Where is your judgment for importance coming from? What's your reasoning for making it such a huge priority? In a country with over 300M people, how is this relatively small amount of people having this vast of an effect? What is it affecting? In terms of public opinion, consider this: https://news.gallup.com/poll/1675/most-important-problem.aspx https://news.gallup.com/poll/1675/most-important-problem.asp... I wish there was a ranked system to see more than the single importance, but the point being that very few see it as a high priority issue. I don't have specific data for this claim, but I think it's also safe to say the issue is a polarizing one: the group who sees it as the #1 issue thinks its a huge problem while many others see it as almost nothing. The disconnect there is exactly why I led with those questions above.
  - sheepmullet 8y ago
    > What are the day to day effects you face every day due to current vs ideal immigration policy? It's the key reason one of the richest states has some of the worst public schooling in the country. It impacts hundreds of thousands of school kids and ensures they end up with a worse education. I wish the techies who didn't care about the negative impacts had to send their kids to these schools.
    - adjkant 8y ago
      Do you have the stuff to show it's actually hundreds of thousands? How much of a difference is the education quality? Public schools are mostly funded by local taxes, yes? How exactly does this come into play? All of this is still to say that you think your kid going to a slightly worse school is worth messing up all these lives so horrifically? I'm not saying let's take every single person that goes to the US or that we shouldn't enforce immigration laws. I'm just saying let's not make a Holocaust in its name, and these policies are literally starting to mirror those types of events. I don't see how any equation of such direct pain to such a large number of people can possibly be justified by small effects on masses. That's a central utilitarian flaw in thinking this was a good idea. That and not caring about the lives of those being harmed. There's a difference between allowing one to immigrate and treating them as human.

int_19h 8y ago

From my experience talking to different people in US, most of them on both sides of the immigration debate have zero clue what their immigration laws are even like. One theme that's particularly common is hearing "they should just get into the line and wait for their turn". They genuinely don't understand that there is no line for the majority of those people - they don't have any legal avenues for immigration at all, except for winning the diversity visa lottery (the chances for which for any individual person are so slim, no-one in a sane mind would plan around that as a strategy).

briandear 8y ago
But that isn’t true. Asylum applications can be submitted to a US consulate. There is a process. Syrian refugees didn’t just show up in Laredo. Asylum can also be requested at a legal port of entry. These unlawful entry arrests are from aliens entering the country while avoiding ports of entry.
- dagw 8y ago
  Quoiting from the first sentence on the main page about asylum on usembassy.gov, which is the first hit I got on Google: "The United States does not grant asylum in its diplomatic premises abroad. Under U.S. law, the United States considers asylum only for aliens who are physically present in the United States." So I guess it's understandable that some people might believe they have to be physically present in the United States to be apply for asylum
- cr1895 8y ago
  >Asylum applications can be submitted to a US consulate. False. "To obtain asylum through the affirmative asylum process you must be physically present in the United States. You may apply for asylum status regardless of how you arrived in the United States or your current immigration status." "A defensive application for asylum occurs when you request asylum as a defense against removal from the U.S. For asylum processing to be defensive, you must be in removal proceedings in immigration court with the Executive Office for Immigration Review (EOIR)." https://www.uscis.gov/humanitarian/refugees-asylum/asylum/obtaining-asylum-united-states https://www.uscis.gov/humanitarian/refugees-asylum/asylum/ob...

refoundglory 8y ago

> enforced, even when a child is in tow. I think that the best answer is detention as a family during the process of prosecution and deportation, but I understand that there are some legal hurdles to that. No, there are no legal hurdles to that and families were being held together in detention until the Trump administration decided they didn't want to do that any more. This could stop today if anyone in the Trump administration wanted it to - but they want to keep doing it, and they also want to fool people into thinking that it isn't their personal decision to do so.

criddell 8y ago

> Zero tolerance for illegal crossings, on the other hand, is probably actually good. That's what I used to strongly believe then this weekend I listened to a Malcolm Gladwell podcast (yeah, I know, I know) and he made me think about it a bit differently. Back when the border was super porous, immigration was more circular and cyclical. People would come into the US, work for a season, then go home. When the border became difficult and expensive to cross, people would cross the border and then stay. There's an argument that can be made that a zero tolerance policy has created the current situation.