“Because the truth is, today’s immigrants as they have for a generation after generation, work the longest hours at the hardest jobs for the lowest pay, jobs that are just above impossible to fill” (“Luis Gutierrez Quote. ” Brainy Quote). This quote, spoken by U. S. Representative Luis Gutierrez, speaks volumes to his stance on immigration reform, and his compassion for the immigrants themselves. Some, for his stances, even consider Gutierrez to be the Martin Luther King of the Spanish immigrant which is further evidenced by the peaceful protests he participated in, and his belief in what is right.
He is what Americans should strive to be. We are one nation who is suppose to stand united for one another. That being said, who are we to deny citizenship to hard working immigrants. Although we may have been born here, our ancestor’s may have not which means our families were immigrants. What gives us the rights to be hypocrites? Most Americans feel threatened with immigrants being here, whereas most of the 21st century no longer cares. It seems as though we’re still living in the segregation day. In Oklahoma we have segregated the hispanic to a poor area with insufficient benefits.
The saddest thing about this is most of the immigrants are trying their hardest to conform to American ways. We have so many immigrants here in America. “Immigrants accounted for 13 percent of the total 316 million U. S. residents; adding the U. S. -born children (of all ages) of immigrants means that approximately 80 million people, or one-quarter of the overall U. S. population, is either of the first or second generation. “(Zong, Jie, and Jeanne Batalova. ) Theses immigrants are contributing to our environment by making it beautiful with their landscaping work or by making beautiful building or safe roads.
We are cold-blooded enough to tell these people who are actually contributing to society they are not good enough to be one of us. American are against immigrants moving to America. Their reasoning behind this is because they are stealing American jobs. “Roughly 71 percent of GOP voters and 51 percent of unaffiliated voters said workers without work permits were taking jobs from American citizens, while 31 percent of Democrats said the same. “(Silva, Cristina. ) The is a fact of opinions, in reality most immigrants don’t have work permit therefore, the jobs they are “stealing” is hard labor.
These jobs are jobs no American with some kind of sense would be willing to do. Immigrants do these jobs because they have no other options and this will be the only job available for them. The jobs are usually manual jobs. My fellow Americans who are complaining about their jobs being taking are not taking into consideration that the immigrants might just be doing them a favor by taking these jobs. Most people do not realize how hard these manual jobs are on a person. “Nearly all construction workers will experience one or more work-related injuries or illnesses over their lifetime, as well as a greater risk of premature death.
The risk is even higher for workers employed in some occupations, and those who are of Hispanic origin. “(Dong, Xiuwen Sue, DrPH. ) Our immigration laws and citizenship policies are unjust and bring a disgrace to us as a country. My mother is full blooded native american. My father is hispanic. He was born in Mexico. He is a permanent resident. I am half native american and half hispanic. My parents raised us to not be racist and to be understanding of people’s upbringing. I am the person that if I do not like something, I am going to have something to say about that.
The thing that upsets me the most is when I am in public “minding my own” and I hear the whitest guy saying remarks about “sending wetbacks back to where they came from” as he is walking into a mexican restaurant. I am not sure what race of me quite reacts to his remark. I think you have to give someone that ignorant a wake up call. When you consider the foundation of America, who were the first people to even be able to say they were actually from here? The native americans are the first known people to be here. That man’s ancestors were immigrants more than likely from Europe
When the Europeans came here they treated the Indians inhumanely. They were practically shoving them in areas that nobody could survive on. They took all their resources, valuables, and tortured the women and kids. Now imagine if we had treated the Europeans the way Americans treat hispanics nowadays then there would not be any whites, blacks, hispanics, or any other race here in America. The immigration laws and citizenship policies are what make us look ignorant because it’s showing how a person with a generations of immigrants is going to tell one immigrant they can not be here because they were not born here.
The attitude we Americans seem to all have is we all feel like we are entitled to be here. Once you think about what our ancestors did in order for us to be able to say we are “American citizens” you should be disgusted. We are denying the rights to people who are working their hardest to be able to barely get by in America but we basically committed genocide just to call ourselves Americans. The solution to these uncompassionate laws is to grant a temporary residence to the people and families who want to enter this country.
Give them a six month trial. If the do as most immigrants and begin to conform to the rules then continue to monitor them. They should have a job and can maintain it without any complaints then that should be a good thing. They must pay all their bills on time but if they are late then their should be a good reason (i. e. insufficient income). The adults must have job. The children must be enrolled in school; must have no marks in school and must have good grades. If they are of age of having a job then they should have one to help their parents.
If the people who are wanting to become citizen may be granted temporary citizenship once they have withstood the 6 months trial. If they are wanting to have permanent citizenship then they must forgo a year meeting the same requirements. The need to understand that if they are wanting to stay here in America they must continue to maintain these rules. If America made all it’s citizens and residence follow those requirements America would have a better reputation. Taxes are something every American citizen has to pay.
The potential citizens would of course have to pay taxes because they would have a green card and a social security number presented to them during their acceptance as residents. Being residents they can not buy property but they can rent it. If they are financially unstable housing and other necessities would be provided for them. We want them to have every right an American has. Once they become citizens they can begin to buy property. They can of course buy an other items. Houses are not yet allowed because the security of them staying needs to be granted and buying a house would be expensive to pay in full.
Payments would more likely be persuaded for them to do. When immigrants come into this country they have nothing and have to bust their tails to barely not even get by. Last thing we want them to do is be struggling or going without necessities America and Americans do not realize how hard people work just to call themselves Americans. We take for granted the privilege of being a citizen or the “perks” of having citizenship. Some of us were born into it, others put in effort to become one. Our laws should be changed because we have hard working people who will never be granted citizenship, not even residency.
There are Americans who are living off the government and call themselves proud Americans. They are doing America wrong and giving it a bad reputation. Nobody realizes how much immigrants go through just to come here illegally. They are helping America instead of leeching off of it. “The truth is immigrants tend to be more American than the people born here. “(Chuck Palahniuk) We are quick to judge and say who can stay and who can’t. Yet we always seem to forget we are all immigrants or at least our generation of ancestors are.
Native Americans were not given the opportunity to judge their immigrants because they were naive and believed there was good in them. Why can’t we do the same and just believe there is good in all of our immigrants. They are human beings as well as an immigrants. They are seeking freedom, as our previous loved ones did. We were taught in grade school that the native americans welcomed the pilgrims with a thanksgiving feast. Imagine if we did this to the people who want to enter this country to help and seek salvation. We would be so much better of a country.
