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In the United States and the West more broadly, we need to begin thinking about immigration with a more rigorous and serious perspective. The US is built on imm

In the United States and the West more broadly, we need to begin thinking about immigration with a more rigorous and serious perspective. The US is built on immigration and I want us to have a robust immigration system, but it's important to recognize that immigration must be managed and take into account social, cultural and economic realities. In recent decades it seems we have disregarded these considerations, allowing both illegal and legal immigration to rise year after year without any reflection on the broader negative impacts this massive influx of people may have. I want to stress that the large majority of people coming into the US are probably good people, but that doesn't mean we are free to ignore the possible systemic effects of mass immigration. Good intentions can often lead to negative outcomes when we don't look beyond the immediate future and our idealized conception of things. It doesn't help that any discussion around reducing immigration is immediately slandered as racist. How deluded have we become when even attempts at reducing illegal immigration are ridiculed and rejected?

rjsw 7y ago
I'm not sure you have a choice in this. Climate change is going to cause a huge increase in the number of migrants.
pjc50 7y ago
Rather like the drug war, the war on immigration requires exponentially increasing violence to maintain. How many dead south Americans is US social cohesion worth?
- creaghpatr 7y ago
  >the war on immigration requires exponentially increasing violence to maintain This claim is flat out wrong.
- corporate_shi11 7y ago
  Deporting people and building a wall doesn't have to cost any lives.
  - jlokier 7y ago
    Depends if you think "ruining someone's life", "separating children from their parents", "breaking up married couples", "destroying someone's legitimate business", "forcing someone to live in an alien place with a language and culture they have never known" or "abruptly terminating someone's life-critical healthcare" counts as costing lives. I guess they usually don't die...
    - corporate_shi11 7y ago
      Laws must be upheld and people who break them must be held accountable for their actions. The nations most migrants are running from are lawless nations. Because they are lawless, they are not particularly good places to live. That's why people leave and come to America, which is an amazing place to live in large part because we are a nation of laws. I want it to stay that way.
      - jlokier 7y ago
        Most migrants are not running from lawless nations. Fact. A large number of deported migrants are not running from any nation at all - many of them were raised from a young age in the country that will deport them once they become adults. They have known nowhere else; it is cruel and arguably immoral to send those somewhere else. Some of them will be surprised, as they won't know they were from somewhere else. Another large number are people from different countries who simply fell in love and want to be together in spite of law preventing them from doing so legally. It is cruel and arguably immoral to prevent them from being together. A third large class are not breaking any law at all, it is the authorities breaking the law by not applying their own rules correctly or consistently. See also "deport first, appeal later" legal systems, where of course you can't really appeal once deported as it is impractical to do so. A fourth class are people for whom the law is simply arcane and insane. For example people deported because one of their bank accounts dipped briefly below some threshold for a moment and there is an arcane rule saying it is not allowed. Or for not having long held a class of insurance that nobody knew about until one day people were being told to leave for not having it, and nobody can say how to obtain it anyway. Or for correcting a minor error caused by their accountant in their tax return, as encouraged by the authorities, and then being labelled a terrorist and threat to nations all over the world due to abusive misapplication of "bad character" law that wasn't created to be used that way. And then there is the fact that nations of laws change their laws from time to time. Causing people who were once legally entitled to permanent residency to become unwelcome overnight.

rjsw 7y ago

I'm not sure you have a choice in this. Climate change is going to cause a huge increase in the number of migrants.

pjc50 7y ago

Rather like the drug war, the war on immigration requires exponentially increasing violence to maintain. How many dead south Americans is US social cohesion worth?

creaghpatr 7y ago
>the war on immigration requires exponentially increasing violence to maintain This claim is flat out wrong.
corporate_shi11 7y ago
Deporting people and building a wall doesn't have to cost any lives.
- jlokier 7y ago
  Depends if you think "ruining someone's life", "separating children from their parents", "breaking up married couples", "destroying someone's legitimate business", "forcing someone to live in an alien place with a language and culture they have never known" or "abruptly terminating someone's life-critical healthcare" counts as costing lives. I guess they usually don't die...
  - corporate_shi11 7y ago
    Laws must be upheld and people who break them must be held accountable for their actions. The nations most migrants are running from are lawless nations. Because they are lawless, they are not particularly good places to live. That's why people leave and come to America, which is an amazing place to live in large part because we are a nation of laws. I want it to stay that way.
    - jlokier 7y ago
      Most migrants are not running from lawless nations. Fact. A large number of deported migrants are not running from any nation at all - many of them were raised from a young age in the country that will deport them once they become adults. They have known nowhere else; it is cruel and arguably immoral to send those somewhere else. Some of them will be surprised, as they won't know they were from somewhere else. Another large number are people from different countries who simply fell in love and want to be together in spite of law preventing them from doing so legally. It is cruel and arguably immoral to prevent them from being together. A third large class are not breaking any law at all, it is the authorities breaking the law by not applying their own rules correctly or consistently. See also "deport first, appeal later" legal systems, where of course you can't really appeal once deported as it is impractical to do so. A fourth class are people for whom the law is simply arcane and insane. For example people deported because one of their bank accounts dipped briefly below some threshold for a moment and there is an arcane rule saying it is not allowed. Or for not having long held a class of insurance that nobody knew about until one day people were being told to leave for not having it, and nobody can say how to obtain it anyway. Or for correcting a minor error caused by their accountant in their tax return, as encouraged by the authorities, and then being labelled a terrorist and threat to nations all over the world due to abusive misapplication of "bad character" law that wasn't created to be used that way. And then there is the fact that nations of laws change their laws from time to time. Causing people who were once legally entitled to permanent residency to become unwelcome overnight.