For a nation that was basically developed from immigrants due to exploration and promised opportunities, you would think that birthright citizenship should always be followed. It is quite obvious that in today's society, "citizenship" can easily be stripped even when there is clear and evident proof of legislation that a child has been born within the United States; even if one of the parents is a legal US citizen and the other is not or vice versa there is a higher chance that families will be separated. How is it fair to justify or strip someone's citizenship away from them by comparing the generational lineage of a family's previous history of residency? In my mind, I find that this practice is much more difficult to deal with then just helping undocumented become documented, but that's just me.
According to 14th Amendment, all people who have been born within the United States are automatically considered to have citizenship. So, you mean to tell me that the 14th Amendment can be overthrown and allows for someone's birthright citizenship to be denied when it clearly states that anyone born within this nation is a citizen by default? You also mean to tell me that families are subject to be broken up because of the lack of appropriate documentation to justify the parents American citizenship which negates their child's eligibility? I do not think that the people who are following out with these ridiculous orders regarding border patrol or immigration realize how detrimental these practices can be. They are depriving people of family and opportunities that they did not have before coming over; at the end of the day, these are human beings. They deserve the right to be entitled to seek opportunities and allowed to become productive citizens of society as. Yet again, United States continues to fall short of their promises.
Tuesday, October 27, 2015
Birthright Citizenship as we see it
****sorry about the lateness, I wasn't in class Thursday and didn't have the prompt for the blog****
As the bulk of what we talked about in class, birthright citizenship is the idea that, a legal right to citizenship for all children born in a country's territory, regardless of parentage.With that being said, areas of the world have all grown to form misconceptions about what that means and therefore it is not a thing any many countries, something I find to be absurd. By creating this ideal into our systematic thinking we have also built up several other concepts through our thinking towards birthright citizenship. For instance, this has now built up the idea of "statelessness" which we touched on in class. This misunderstood notion of a homeland and no where to turn to, making the "alien" term even more evident. With that being said, as Maury had mentioned in our class discussion the people who are coming to the U.S. are already "stateless" yes, we are making them feel this way, but it is likely that they left their country because they have already had this feeling. Our immigration systems and patrols work to send them away...when they truly don't have anything to go back to.
I found an article online that talks about the term and what it means today especially with all Donald Trump has to blab on about it. It talks about the notion that one can be born into the U.S. citizenship by being born in the states, as described the "right of the soil," and you can also be born in by being born in by U.S. citizens or by "right of blood." These truths create the term birthright citienship and really express how far we've moved away from this and more on white is right and aliens of this country will always be that way.
http://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2015/09/birthright-citizenship-donald-trump-england/403159/
Anchor babies
The United States is a country that grants birthright citizenship to those who are born in this country whether their mother is here documented or undocumented. The big issue with the upcoming presidential race is immigration. It has been a very hot topic specifically being spouted out of Donald Trumps mouth continuously. Here's the thing.... What does Trump actually want to do? He claims he wants to deport every undocumented person in the country and bring back the "good ones". His reasoning is to get the rapist and criminals that are undocumented out of the country. He has been scrutinized for using the term "anchor baby" because it is seen as offensive to some. The monetary effects of deporting everyone to start with would negatively effect the United States economy. Along with going against the 14th amendment that grants people born in this country citizenship automatically. An interesting fact that it is not many countries have birth right citizenship. It is not a common thing. You could examine what goes on in the Dominican where people are being scrutinized for their skin color and other outlandish factors in order to determine if they get citizenship or not. Some people in this world are statelesness and it is a very tragic matter. There needs to be profession on the matter of citizenship in the United Statss because we claim to be a melting pot, but if certain candidates are elected we will be contradicting what we stand for
noun: birthright citizenship
a legal right to citizenship for all children born in a country's territory, regardless of parentage.
In an interview that Donald Trump gave back in mid-August he talked about one of his favorite issues to knock: birthright citizenship. If you have been following Trump’s presidency campaign you will very well know that Donald Trump very much despises immigrants. Trump wants to deport all these immigrants but then also letting the “good ones” have an easier return process. In class we watched a movie about those living in the Dominican Republic who if they were even slightly of Haitian descent then they were deported back to Haiti. In the movie they interviewed those who had to go to Haiti and they said how horrible it would be and they don’t even know their family there or anything about there. They also talked about how much that would uproot them from their lives here: leaving friends, leaving school, leaving their house, leaving their jobs, etc. This very much would show what it would be like to deport those in the U.S. and even if Trump let back in the “good ones” then it would be hard for them to pick up their lives once they already got torn up out of it.
Trump also believes that the concept of birthright citizenship is the biggest magnet for illegal immigration. He truly believes that these immigrants are viscously having children here just so they can take advantage of this birthright citizenship. He believes building up walls will be what keeps these “criminal aliens” out. Although Trump probably believes that this idea of his is the best since sliced bread, many are quick to knock his far right idea on this issue. Fellow republican, Chris Christie, basically calls it unoriginal and then says he has never seen a wall be put up that humans can’t get around. On the other hand, our very own Senator Jeff Sessions applauded Trump and thought his idea was magnificent.
Also wanted to note that this was a Fox News report and it read like a SNL skit bashing Trump so I think that should go for something as well.
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2015/08/17/trump-calls-for-deportation-illegal-immigrants-end-to-birthright-citizenship
Trump Doesn't Understand the 14th Amendment, Obvs.
Birthright citizenship is the idea that
those born in a country are granted automatic citizenship to that country and
have the right to access all opportunities and resources afforded them by that
state. It is one of the most important pieces of legislation against the dire
status of “statelessness” which humanitarians consider to be a dangerous and
perpetual state of limbo for some 4,000-6,000 people currently in the U.S. Many
people arrive already stateless or have it stripped of them once they enter the
country. If they are refugees, such as the Ethiopians of Eritrean descent and those
who fled the Soviet Union, they are fleeing their home countries because of war
and persecution. Once they arrive, if they do so illegally, they are “stateless”.
This is dangerous because it creates a silenced community without any rights-
they cannot access healthcare, they have no political voice, and education is a
far-fetched dream. If caught by
immigration, they are detained for inconsistent stretches of time, ordered to
leave the country, and then remain here because they literally have no where
they can go.
Good ole Donald Trump has made
blatantly racist and bigoted statements about immigrants (particularly those of
Latino descent) in the hopes that he will ramp up his bigoted voters. He has
claimed that he would like to rescind birthright citizenship if elected. This
is what humanitarians call a “crisis”, leaving possibly hundreds of thousands
in a state of limbo in the U.S. “Statelessness” isn’t good for anyone and it
most often seems to target people of color and those most vulnerable globally-
those seeking asylum in the U.S. We can see from our readings that “retroactively
denying citizenship” has had drastic and costly effects on both Haiti and the
DR, leaving some 200,000 people in “statelessness”.
Birthright citizenship is in the 14th
amendment. What Trump, and many of his GOP candidates are calling for is
blatantly against one of the most highly regarded and consistently upheld
documents in the U.S. Trump has declared that “anchor babies” are not in fact
citizens, claiming that he knows “many good lawyers” he would agree with him on
that. What Trump is truly doing is using inaccurate interpretations of the law
and inflammatory language to gain headway in the polls. Trump is tapping into
the far-right conservatives and nativists of this country, appealing to them
through his hateful rhetoric.
Deportation is a real worry for
many immigrants, even those here “legally”. Birthright citizenship is not just about
the local business men Trump doesn’t want to see in his neighborhood. It is
about human beings. It is about the livelihood of families and communities. It
is about asylum seekers from all over the globe who literally have nowhere else
to go. Deportation threats are any easy way to control a minority group,
primarily of color and lower SES, by creating a community of fear and
discouraging assimilation through that fear.
http://www.businessinsider.com/bill-oreilly-donald-trump-immigration-deport-birthright-2015-8
Monday, October 26, 2015
Jus Soli
Before this class I had always assumed that every country offered birth right citizenship, at least to some degree; however, not only does the US fail to fully live up to Constitutionally mandated jus soli, only around thirty other nations offer jus soli, including Canada, Argentina, Chile, and Mexico, which means undocumented immigrants and their children are at even greater risk of having absolutely no records and documents.
Offering Birth Right Citizenship is by no means the only way to assist immigrants, particularly those without documents, and as seen with recent happenings in Texas, it is not always effective. Texas has created a catch-22 for undocumented parents who children were born in the US because in order for those parents to secure their child's birth certificate they must have US visas in addition to any foreign passports or other photo id. Thus, a id from a foreign consulate, which is the most accessible for undocumented immigrants is not taken by the Texan Vital Statistics office. And in order for undocumented parents to get the appropriate documentation, many times requires them to return to their home country, which then would make it extremely difficult for them to reenter the United States and would separate them from their family and job in the United States. Texas is attempting to portray this as an attempt to protect the privacy and identity of these children and/or punishing the undocumented parent, except instead they are rendering these children stateless, as they are not in many cases eligible for citizenship in their parents' country, and they cannot access the records that allow them to show their US citizenship and attend school, receive public benefits, or even medical care. Thus, Texas is imperiling not only the political lives and futures of these children, but is also harming their health and general well-being by preventing them from having access to their birthright citizenship.
Though as has been exemplified in the above example and in the abuses of the Dominican Republic against Dominicans of Haitian descent before and after the repeal of jus soli, jus soli is not an impenetrable force that protects people from statelessness or ensures citizenship, but the blatant disregard in the United States of the fourteenth amendment, the Nationality Act of 1940, and the Supreme Court Case of United States v Wong Kim Ark illustrates how the conceptions of illegality and criminality, the desire to limit citizenship to certain peoples (that is whites) are all vestiges of and continuation of the racism and brutality of inequality in this country, particularly towards Latino immigrants.
Offering Birth Right Citizenship is by no means the only way to assist immigrants, particularly those without documents, and as seen with recent happenings in Texas, it is not always effective. Texas has created a catch-22 for undocumented parents who children were born in the US because in order for those parents to secure their child's birth certificate they must have US visas in addition to any foreign passports or other photo id. Thus, a id from a foreign consulate, which is the most accessible for undocumented immigrants is not taken by the Texan Vital Statistics office. And in order for undocumented parents to get the appropriate documentation, many times requires them to return to their home country, which then would make it extremely difficult for them to reenter the United States and would separate them from their family and job in the United States. Texas is attempting to portray this as an attempt to protect the privacy and identity of these children and/or punishing the undocumented parent, except instead they are rendering these children stateless, as they are not in many cases eligible for citizenship in their parents' country, and they cannot access the records that allow them to show their US citizenship and attend school, receive public benefits, or even medical care. Thus, Texas is imperiling not only the political lives and futures of these children, but is also harming their health and general well-being by preventing them from having access to their birthright citizenship.
Though as has been exemplified in the above example and in the abuses of the Dominican Republic against Dominicans of Haitian descent before and after the repeal of jus soli, jus soli is not an impenetrable force that protects people from statelessness or ensures citizenship, but the blatant disregard in the United States of the fourteenth amendment, the Nationality Act of 1940, and the Supreme Court Case of United States v Wong Kim Ark illustrates how the conceptions of illegality and criminality, the desire to limit citizenship to certain peoples (that is whites) are all vestiges of and continuation of the racism and brutality of inequality in this country, particularly towards Latino immigrants.
Sunday, October 25, 2015
Birthright Citizenship & Deportation mechanisms
Birthright citizenship in the United States gives the legal right for citizens who are born in this country the right to be a citizen, despite of their parents status.
Though, some people feel that having a child in the United states will help their citizenship, they have a rude awakening, depending on the country. For example in Haiti, due to the "ethnic cleansing" of the Dominican Republic, Haitians who are citizens can automatically have their rights as citizens taken away from them. The United States are more lenient with their birthright laws. An undocumented immigrants can live in the U.S. for years, have a baby, and that baby can obtain all of the natural rights which are given to those who are citizens.
With the issues we're currently dealing with, with undocumented immigration into this country, the use of deportation is considered a solution to some. It is also a way to control, by the regulation of what comes out and what goes in. I feel as though deportation is also a method of "ethnic cleansing" as I previously stated. For the simple fact we can tell an ethnic group that they don't have rights to our country and we feel that by deporting them back that we are ridding ourselves of that extra burden of people that are not documented citizens. It's also a form of racism too. For example in extreme cases, Hitler felt that getting rid of Jewish people would free the nation of Germany from their many internal problems. Yet, in America deportation acts in a similar sense of ridding our nation of this alien who invaded. Also by sending them back, we are also preventing them from reproducing in this country so their kids can have legal citizenship. Even though the Hitler example is quite extreme, they birthright citizenship along with deportation act as a modern day riddance of an entire people.
Though, some people feel that having a child in the United states will help their citizenship, they have a rude awakening, depending on the country. For example in Haiti, due to the "ethnic cleansing" of the Dominican Republic, Haitians who are citizens can automatically have their rights as citizens taken away from them. The United States are more lenient with their birthright laws. An undocumented immigrants can live in the U.S. for years, have a baby, and that baby can obtain all of the natural rights which are given to those who are citizens.
With the issues we're currently dealing with, with undocumented immigration into this country, the use of deportation is considered a solution to some. It is also a way to control, by the regulation of what comes out and what goes in. I feel as though deportation is also a method of "ethnic cleansing" as I previously stated. For the simple fact we can tell an ethnic group that they don't have rights to our country and we feel that by deporting them back that we are ridding ourselves of that extra burden of people that are not documented citizens. It's also a form of racism too. For example in extreme cases, Hitler felt that getting rid of Jewish people would free the nation of Germany from their many internal problems. Yet, in America deportation acts in a similar sense of ridding our nation of this alien who invaded. Also by sending them back, we are also preventing them from reproducing in this country so their kids can have legal citizenship. Even though the Hitler example is quite extreme, they birthright citizenship along with deportation act as a modern day riddance of an entire people.
Wednesday, October 21, 2015
Undocumented Women
The article Undocumented Women Forced To Give Birth While Shackled and In Police Custody was very disturbing and shocking to me. The fact that a woman who is in labor could be shackled to her hospital bed during this intense time is horrific. The question I raise with this is what do you do in this situation? What does the United Stats do as a whole when situations like these are brought to the table? The idea of an open-door policy would be one of the things I think that would be a solution. Letting people in without question seems like a solution, but there still has to be some form of organization at the border in order to keep the U.S. in line.
If you are presented with a situation like someone needing critical care and you do find out they are undocumented, what do you do? It is not a criminal offense to be undocumented in this country, yet women are getting shackled to hospital beds during labor like they are some type of animal. I have done research to view different standpoints on the immigration issue. The conservative way of looking at this would be to support legal immigration only and opposing amnesty for those who break the law by entering the U.S.. The liberal viewpoint is that people get amnesty once they step foot into the country. This immigration law we have provides people with working Visas for this country along with opportunities to get citizenship. The question is, if we are providing these types of service for migrants to this country why is there still a problem for the people to attain these types of services. The average wait time to become a U.S. citizen is currently five years. How easy are we making it for people to get citizenship is a question I raise. It is just interesting to me that we have all these types of ways to be in this country, yet there are still undocumented people and this is seen as a "problem" for some.
If you are presented with a situation like someone needing critical care and you do find out they are undocumented, what do you do? It is not a criminal offense to be undocumented in this country, yet women are getting shackled to hospital beds during labor like they are some type of animal. I have done research to view different standpoints on the immigration issue. The conservative way of looking at this would be to support legal immigration only and opposing amnesty for those who break the law by entering the U.S.. The liberal viewpoint is that people get amnesty once they step foot into the country. This immigration law we have provides people with working Visas for this country along with opportunities to get citizenship. The question is, if we are providing these types of service for migrants to this country why is there still a problem for the people to attain these types of services. The average wait time to become a U.S. citizen is currently five years. How easy are we making it for people to get citizenship is a question I raise. It is just interesting to me that we have all these types of ways to be in this country, yet there are still undocumented people and this is seen as a "problem" for some.
Tuesday, October 20, 2015
Let Them Have Their Babies in Peace
While reading the article Undocumented Women Forced To Give Birth While Shackled and In Police Custody, I found this quite disturbing reading that a portion of the Latina community are considered to be "criminal offenders" are still being apprehended and chained down while being pregnant due to re-entry after being deported. Why is it that law enforcement find it completely ok to physically obstruct women that are in labor? This practice has been considered illegal in 14 states & is prohibited by ICE, but yet immigrant women who have violated immigration policies can "legally" be detained and denied the right to not be allowed to have the father present during a live birth.
The inhumanity of this ordeal perplexes me so; is illegal immigration even that serious to dehumanize expecting mothers? I don't think so. Basically what authorities are saying is that since there is no proof of documentation so they are automatically suspicious and a threat to human kind... This is something I am really having a hard time understanding; is the fear of the "illegal" that real? Is the fear that real to the point that the shackled mother isn't even allowed to nurse her own child until after her release? It's also sad that these women are also denied specialized care during incarceration while being in these conditions.
Along with the abuse of power, pregnant women were also mistreated physically, but verbally; for example Maria from the Breakthrough documentary described her ordeal with border patrol during a traffic stop and how she experienced with overly aggressive enforcement when being arrested. Maria claimed to be pushed hard enough to cause her water to break; using excessive force on a person who has violated a "civil" offense is one thing, but using this type of force on a pregnant woman is unacceptable and completely malice. Reading the condescending remarks that were being said at them were appalling; a border patrol agent had the audacity to tell Maria that she was faking her contractions and had threatened her by telling her that she will be deported to Mexico immediately after the birth of her son.
Seeing what is happening with the US?Mexico border us just a mess within itself. The Americanized views of immigration and/or "illegal" immigration makes it even easier to fully understand what the big problems are. Our social structures or ideologies causes gender biased stigmas of the Latino which deters us from the real issues that these women are facing internally (within their race). Criminalizing innocent people by using a corrupt power system does not make it easy for us to address all of the silences placed among the Mexican community.
Along with the abuse of power, pregnant women were also mistreated physically, but verbally; for example Maria from the Breakthrough documentary described her ordeal with border patrol during a traffic stop and how she experienced with overly aggressive enforcement when being arrested. Maria claimed to be pushed hard enough to cause her water to break; using excessive force on a person who has violated a "civil" offense is one thing, but using this type of force on a pregnant woman is unacceptable and completely malice. Reading the condescending remarks that were being said at them were appalling; a border patrol agent had the audacity to tell Maria that she was faking her contractions and had threatened her by telling her that she will be deported to Mexico immediately after the birth of her son.
Seeing what is happening with the US?Mexico border us just a mess within itself. The Americanized views of immigration and/or "illegal" immigration makes it even easier to fully understand what the big problems are. Our social structures or ideologies causes gender biased stigmas of the Latino which deters us from the real issues that these women are facing internally (within their race). Criminalizing innocent people by using a corrupt power system does not make it easy for us to address all of the silences placed among the Mexican community.
ICE, Eugenics, Nazism, Biopower, Biopolitics, and Foucault...Oh My!
Inda's article "Biopower, Reproduction, and the Migrant Woman's Body" as well as Costantini's article "Undocumented Women Forced to Give Birth While Shackled And In Police Custody" both weave a tale of biopower and political extremism that borders on eugenic-level Nazism. We have discussed at length in this course the sociopolitical airs surrounding the constructed discourses pertaining to the "immigrant," the "alien," the "illegal," the "border," and the underlying yet overarching concept of "othering" that permeates all of the above.
Using Foucault's writings on "biopower" and its effects on biopolitics and the social body, one can certainly see the connections between Inda's article, Costantini's article, and his (Foucault's) underlying message that biopower, this innate ability to regulate the social and biological reproduction of a population, in order to maintain a "healthy and vigorous population" parlays into a biopolitics regime that centers itself on "the necessity of establishing a threshold in life that distinguishes what is inside from what is outside, separating those bodily interests that can be represented in the polity fro those which cannot, from those adverse to the social order it embodies" (Inde 99,102).
Costantini's harrowing tale of women being shackled to a hospital bed during what can be, and usually is, one of the most painstaking endeavors of their lives, childbirth, brings forth mental images of eugenics laboratories, science experiments of a Frankensteinian nature, and ultimately draconian politics, that all have a basis in this underlying ideology, which, again, we have discussed at length throughout this course, particularly in Kaplan's and Chavez's work, regarding the American-generated discourse that these "illegal immigrants" are incapable of "mixing" within the homogenous and "elitist" society that is apparently so sacred to protect, that one must risk the numerous lives of the "Other" for the sake of protecting it, thus fully embodying Foucault's treatise on the merging of sovereign power and biopower. Unfortunately, the consequence of this merging is the disruption, exploitation, and utter inhumane abuse of human lives. Lives that are merely being lived in the pursuit of something better, of something more than what they know.
Foucault's reference to the Nazi state (102-103 Inda) really made a lot of sense from a eugenics/American exceptionalism standpoint, in that, through this "othering" on a reproductive level, there is a deeper and further "othering" at play that not only plays at the "illegal" status of the mother, but at the transgressive nature of the child being born, for that child has merged the citizen, the illegal, the state, and the border, into one disturbing experience, mirroring a Nazi eugenics laborator of yore, often regulated at the hands of the United States Border Patrol, with their ultimate aim of "protecting the social body" (Chavez 72; Inda 102-3).
In a sentiment mirrored by a classmate, if these are the lengths to which we, as a collective polity, are willing to traverse, in the name of "purifying" our "social body" then, please, by all means, let's colorify America. A rainbow of individuals, from a rainbow of perspectives, with a rainbow of experiences, with the potential to share those experiences, resulting in lessons to be learned by all.
Using Foucault's writings on "biopower" and its effects on biopolitics and the social body, one can certainly see the connections between Inda's article, Costantini's article, and his (Foucault's) underlying message that biopower, this innate ability to regulate the social and biological reproduction of a population, in order to maintain a "healthy and vigorous population" parlays into a biopolitics regime that centers itself on "the necessity of establishing a threshold in life that distinguishes what is inside from what is outside, separating those bodily interests that can be represented in the polity fro those which cannot, from those adverse to the social order it embodies" (Inde 99,102).
Costantini's harrowing tale of women being shackled to a hospital bed during what can be, and usually is, one of the most painstaking endeavors of their lives, childbirth, brings forth mental images of eugenics laboratories, science experiments of a Frankensteinian nature, and ultimately draconian politics, that all have a basis in this underlying ideology, which, again, we have discussed at length throughout this course, particularly in Kaplan's and Chavez's work, regarding the American-generated discourse that these "illegal immigrants" are incapable of "mixing" within the homogenous and "elitist" society that is apparently so sacred to protect, that one must risk the numerous lives of the "Other" for the sake of protecting it, thus fully embodying Foucault's treatise on the merging of sovereign power and biopower. Unfortunately, the consequence of this merging is the disruption, exploitation, and utter inhumane abuse of human lives. Lives that are merely being lived in the pursuit of something better, of something more than what they know.
Foucault's reference to the Nazi state (102-103 Inda) really made a lot of sense from a eugenics/American exceptionalism standpoint, in that, through this "othering" on a reproductive level, there is a deeper and further "othering" at play that not only plays at the "illegal" status of the mother, but at the transgressive nature of the child being born, for that child has merged the citizen, the illegal, the state, and the border, into one disturbing experience, mirroring a Nazi eugenics laborator of yore, often regulated at the hands of the United States Border Patrol, with their ultimate aim of "protecting the social body" (Chavez 72; Inda 102-3).
In a sentiment mirrored by a classmate, if these are the lengths to which we, as a collective polity, are willing to traverse, in the name of "purifying" our "social body" then, please, by all means, let's colorify America. A rainbow of individuals, from a rainbow of perspectives, with a rainbow of experiences, with the potential to share those experiences, resulting in lessons to be learned by all.
Unjust Perceptions of Women in Reproduction
We live in a world full of false accusations and understandings about the "aliens" that inhabit the U.S. The term alien has become so apart of our society thanks so media's depiction of who these people are. The terms "illegal" and "alien" take over stereotypes of entire nations and we rarely find the proper terms to address them by as, "undocumented." Both readings spend time discussing how negative portrayal on there stereotypes and groups have affected everything in this desired life of theirs, specifically, child birth. In more ways than one, reproduction is the single most important way of increasing the growth of population only for the better of humanity, but of course for outsiders of this nation that is not seen in any of the same positive light as say the "white-privileged."
In the first reading, Undocumented Woman Forced to Give Birth While Shackle and In Police Custody, we are given insight into the deep inhumane workings of police brutalities to alien women who happen to be pregnant. It shows the absurd actions of law enforcement during child birth of undocumented women who are being forced out. Only a mere 14 states have bans on this cruel shackling process that can be done to women who are in labor. On top of being physically restrained by handcuffs the women are denied the rights to having family members in the room during delivery. In one specific case, Alma Chacon who was detained for a non-violent criminal case was shackled to her bed and supposedly not able to hold her baby for up to 70 days later after she was released from immigration custody. I can't even fathom the idea of being unable to nurse or hold your own child for that long, its unjust and unbelievable. The women themselves have been stripped of all their human rights and really are taking on the role of "alien" seriously because that's truly what they've become when they can't even hold their own child after carrying them for 9 months. In another narrative about a girl Maria she expresses, "Oh they don't respect human rights, talking about cops in other parts of the world, but where are we now? if something as important and sacred as someone giving birth can no longer be treated as humans, where are we?"(Constantini). This in itself is scary to think that our police as a whole finds peace at letting unbelievable acts like shackling happen to these real humans, not just aliens of this country.
In Biopower, Reproduction, and the Migrant Woman's Body, the reading takes on the role of explaining why there was just in these actions such as shackling of undocumented immigrants. It focuses on the country's need to move these people out, saying there are too many and they don't stop coming. In a summary of their reasons for allowed brutality, "It is thus the space between life and death that it is possible to locate the present-day rejection of the migrant" (Inda 108). This implies that since no one is actually being killed and the newborns are birthed by their mother there is little harm. They have worked to manipulate the idea that there is reasonable understanding of the "space" between birthing and death. As long as no one is dying and the child is born and healthy who cares what means it took to get them there right? A very mixed-up, unfair view for justification of brutality by immigration if you ask me.
In conclusion, both articles highlight the police and immigration officers unreal perception of what they're doing to these real, undocumented PEOPLE. Not aliens, they're more than aliens to everyone back in their foreign lands. And they are for sure more than an alien to that baby that was just forced out of them and taken away from them. There is no reason for this to be allowed in up to 36 states in our nation despite Inda's arguments.
Monday, October 19, 2015
Eugenics and Bio-Power
Inda details the Foucaultian concepts of bio-power, and how political and economic powers seek to control bodies in order to create the most efficient, productive society at least in terms of monetary gains for certain individuals. These same basic principles come into play with both Costantini's article and Chavez's text, where the Latina body becomes the battleground for the insurance of a predominantly white, middle and upper class society. The portrayal of hyper-fertility and the treatment of pregnant undocumented women demonstrates the same fundamental underpinnings that drove the eugenics movements in the United States in the 1900s.
Women's reproduction represents the first way to control and adjust the population to reflect the desires of the most privileged, and in an American context this means, male, white, well-off, able-bodied, etc. The eugenics movement in America solidified the idea that social, physical, and mental desirability were inherently genetic traits that were passed down from generation to generation. With some of the earliest eugenicists in the 1910s came studies tracking "problem families" such as the Jukes, which sought to show the pernicious passing down of inadequacies, thus these women needed to be prevented from giving birth or ever becoming pregnant (since it was almost always framed as an issue of women's sexuality). Then emerged widespread forced institutionalizing of primarily women who were viewed as "feebleminded," a catch all term that was extremely raced, classed, and gendered, into forced labor colonies, where many of them were non-consensually sterilized. Eugenic movements created the same fears around reproduction as Chavez notes in The Latino Threat, that these people will be economic drains on the welfare systems, etc. The exact same arguments were used by the eugenicists, that by preventing reproduction of epileptics, idiots, the sexually promiscuous, the disabled, etc. the social services would not be overburdened and the white, middle and upper class citizenry would not have to bank role these "less desirable" people.
This desire to control reproduction has shifted, criminals are still at risk as seen by the mass sterilizations in California's prisons, as are the poor, but the newer group is the fear of Latina reproduction, which mirrors the previous tropes of the "Welfare Queen" and even earlier "feebleminded" hypersexaul individual, to create the modern day body that must be controlled. In this case immigration has entered the fray as the easiest way to physically restrain these bodies, without having to sterilize. We limit legal immigration, so only so many Latinos may enter, and those that are undocumented face insurmountable obstacles, which reduces their ability to remain. Thus immigration functions as the preventing force to reproduction on American soil. Undocumented women are deported when giving birth or seeking gynecological care, medical repatriation is disturbingly common, pre-natal care the number one determiner of fetal well-being is denied or inaccessible to undocumented women (and these are all true for many poorer women as well). Ensuring that the financial, cultural, medical, societal, and sometimes physical (as in restraints while giving birth) and biological (sterilizations) the frontiers of reproductive control have shifted their energies to the Latina women, and ensuring that they cannot enter, remain, or give birth in America, or if they do their experience and life of their children will be marred by the attempts of the privileged American society to remain hegemonic.
Women's reproduction represents the first way to control and adjust the population to reflect the desires of the most privileged, and in an American context this means, male, white, well-off, able-bodied, etc. The eugenics movement in America solidified the idea that social, physical, and mental desirability were inherently genetic traits that were passed down from generation to generation. With some of the earliest eugenicists in the 1910s came studies tracking "problem families" such as the Jukes, which sought to show the pernicious passing down of inadequacies, thus these women needed to be prevented from giving birth or ever becoming pregnant (since it was almost always framed as an issue of women's sexuality). Then emerged widespread forced institutionalizing of primarily women who were viewed as "feebleminded," a catch all term that was extremely raced, classed, and gendered, into forced labor colonies, where many of them were non-consensually sterilized. Eugenic movements created the same fears around reproduction as Chavez notes in The Latino Threat, that these people will be economic drains on the welfare systems, etc. The exact same arguments were used by the eugenicists, that by preventing reproduction of epileptics, idiots, the sexually promiscuous, the disabled, etc. the social services would not be overburdened and the white, middle and upper class citizenry would not have to bank role these "less desirable" people.
This desire to control reproduction has shifted, criminals are still at risk as seen by the mass sterilizations in California's prisons, as are the poor, but the newer group is the fear of Latina reproduction, which mirrors the previous tropes of the "Welfare Queen" and even earlier "feebleminded" hypersexaul individual, to create the modern day body that must be controlled. In this case immigration has entered the fray as the easiest way to physically restrain these bodies, without having to sterilize. We limit legal immigration, so only so many Latinos may enter, and those that are undocumented face insurmountable obstacles, which reduces their ability to remain. Thus immigration functions as the preventing force to reproduction on American soil. Undocumented women are deported when giving birth or seeking gynecological care, medical repatriation is disturbingly common, pre-natal care the number one determiner of fetal well-being is denied or inaccessible to undocumented women (and these are all true for many poorer women as well). Ensuring that the financial, cultural, medical, societal, and sometimes physical (as in restraints while giving birth) and biological (sterilizations) the frontiers of reproductive control have shifted their energies to the Latina women, and ensuring that they cannot enter, remain, or give birth in America, or if they do their experience and life of their children will be marred by the attempts of the privileged American society to remain hegemonic.
Maury Reads Article, Soapbox Ensues
Women’s
bodies have always been the battleground for political debate and rhetoric.
Whether it be because of our temptress ways or simply our (presumed) ability to
incubate a fetus, women are policed because of what our bodies can do. This
policing helps shape political, social, and economic trends. Jonathan Inda’s
article Biopower, Reproduction, and the
Migrant Woman’s Body introduces the concept of biopower/politics where the
government has now taken on the task of “managing life” (100) through “regulatory
pow er whose highest function is to thoroughly invest in life in order to
produce a healthy and vigorous population.” (99) Government has decided that it
is their duty to “protect” the nation by maintaining a healthy population, but
who do they see as belonging? Chavez, in Latino
Threat, goes to great lengths to dissect the idea of biopower revolving
around Latina women’s reproductive practices and rights.
Chavez
writes, “We still see that the biological reproduction of Latinas combines with
their social reproduction in the popular imagination to produce fears about
Latino population growth as a threat to the nation…” (75) Why would Latinas be
a threat to the nation, particularly their reproduction? Chavez makes clear
that the nation, as portrayed and reinforced by popular media, is a White
nation. Latina reproduction is a threat to White America- the only America that
matters to politicians. Chavez also notes that Latina reproduction is a threat
because, “Latino babies transgress the border between immigrants and citizens.”
(75) If Latinas reproduce here they would “create families, and soon
communities of Latinos who would remain linguistically and socially separate
would be clamoring for a reconquest of the United States.” (87)
The Latina
reproduction threat is based off of stereotypes about Latina sexuality,
submissiveness, and rates of reproduction. It is a threat to the nation that
Inda makes clear believes is their right to direct. Who is positioned as
director are White, mostly male, politicians and their supporters. Let me take
a moment of personal interest and point to the fact that most of the hateful, racist
rhetoric surrounding this issue is most likely supported by those who align
themselves with inflammatory pro-life campaigns (not all pro-lifers are
haters*) and probably watch 19 kids and counting and think it’s totally okay.
Personal moment over.
There
is no greater, or more disturbing, example of what biopower can and has done to
Latina women in this country, than in Undocumented
Women Forced to Give Birth While Shackled and in Police Custody. The
article describes the- what I assume to be a more common then we know about- practice
of handcuffing Latina women to their hospital beds as they give birth, all while
a police officer stands guard and they are deprived of their partner’s and
family’s presence. The fact that a woman, accused of a non-criminal or
dangerous breaking of the law is shackled, justifiably according to many
officers apparently, is ludicrous. Here we have the embodiment of what Chavez
notes as the fight against “browning America”. Time magazine is quoted by Chavez- “The ‘browning of America’ will
alter everything in society, from politics and education to industry, values
culture …. The deeper significance of America becoming a majority nonwhite
society is what it means to the national psyche, to individuals’ sense of
themselves and the nation…” (87)
If these are the values and the state of our national
psyche, then I want no part in it. Perhaps a browner America would be a better
America.
Sunday, October 18, 2015
“Undocumented Women Forced To Give Birth While Shackled And In Police Custody” vs. “Biopower, Reproduction, and The Migrant Woman’s Body”
The two articles “Undocumented Women Forced To Give Birth While Shackled And In Police Custody” and “Biopower, Reproduction, and The Migrant Woman’s Body” both shed light on an issue that we do not hear about very often most likely because the American government knows that they are doing something inhumane and they don’t want Americans to know about it. Both articles are very educational on a subject matter that should be talked about more in today's society.
“Undocumented Women Forced To Give Birth While Shackled And In Police Custody” told stories of immigrant woman who were forced to deal with the brutalities of police officers while they were giving birth. In 36 states it is legal to shackle an immigrant woman while she is giving birth. Although most people would think this is an inhumane process, it is still legal in more than half of our country. In Miriam Mendiola-Martinez’s case she got chained to a hospital bed and was not allowed to have any family members by her side during the delivery process. As a woman myself, I think of how much I would rely on my friends and family during that delivery process. Something that I found to be just as inhumane as being chained to a bed during the delivery process is that she got her new born baby taken from her within 48 hours of being delivered. This also strikes me hard because I could not imagine having my new born baby taken away from me like that. Alma Chacon shared a similar experience as Miriam: “Chacon was allegedly not allowed to nurse or hold her baby until she was released from immigration custody almost 70 days later”(Constantini). On another hand, one woman was set into labor by how brutally she was treated by a local enforcement agent. Then, they accused her of faking her contractions while she was in labor. Reading these stories of these women were cringeworthy and upsetting to realize that these things were happening in our very own country.
In “Biopower, Reproduction, and The Migrant Woman’s Body” it allows readers to understand as to why the government thought it was okay to do what they do to these women. Jonathan Xavier Inda writes “power would no longer be dealing simply with legal subjects over whom the ultimate dominion was death, but with living beings, and the mastery it would be able to exercise over them would be applied at the level of life itself, it was the taking charge of life, more than the threat of death, that gave power its access even to the body...political power has assigned itself the duty of managing life.”(Inda). Inda explains to us that this is just another way that America can take control and have power over immigrants. However, by doing this it has leaked that American officials put values on different people’s lives and this shows that they completely do not value immigrants lives at all. Some people believe that the way immigrants are being treated is right because they believe “providing such assistance is unwise, for it acts as a magnet for illicit immigration”(Inda). On the other hand some people would argue that is is “an attempt to govern the reproduction of an undesirable population”(Inda). Former Governor Pete Wilson proposed Proposition 187 where one of the main aims of this proposition was to eliminate non-emergency medical care for women in the country illegally. But the backfire on this proposition is that it would cause: “unwaranted suffering, avoidable birth complications, sicker, smaller babies and needless disability”(Inda).
In both these articles we have our eyes opened to the inhumane realities of the U.S. government towards immigrants. We see how brutal the American government is through their roughness with women during their delivery process in “Undocumented Women Forced To Give Birth While Shackled And In Police Custody” and also that the United States government does not value immigrants lives as much as they value non immigrant lives.
“Undocumented Women Forced To Give Birth While Shackled And In Police Custody” told stories of immigrant woman who were forced to deal with the brutalities of police officers while they were giving birth. In 36 states it is legal to shackle an immigrant woman while she is giving birth. Although most people would think this is an inhumane process, it is still legal in more than half of our country. In Miriam Mendiola-Martinez’s case she got chained to a hospital bed and was not allowed to have any family members by her side during the delivery process. As a woman myself, I think of how much I would rely on my friends and family during that delivery process. Something that I found to be just as inhumane as being chained to a bed during the delivery process is that she got her new born baby taken from her within 48 hours of being delivered. This also strikes me hard because I could not imagine having my new born baby taken away from me like that. Alma Chacon shared a similar experience as Miriam: “Chacon was allegedly not allowed to nurse or hold her baby until she was released from immigration custody almost 70 days later”(Constantini). On another hand, one woman was set into labor by how brutally she was treated by a local enforcement agent. Then, they accused her of faking her contractions while she was in labor. Reading these stories of these women were cringeworthy and upsetting to realize that these things were happening in our very own country.
In “Biopower, Reproduction, and The Migrant Woman’s Body” it allows readers to understand as to why the government thought it was okay to do what they do to these women. Jonathan Xavier Inda writes “power would no longer be dealing simply with legal subjects over whom the ultimate dominion was death, but with living beings, and the mastery it would be able to exercise over them would be applied at the level of life itself, it was the taking charge of life, more than the threat of death, that gave power its access even to the body...political power has assigned itself the duty of managing life.”(Inda). Inda explains to us that this is just another way that America can take control and have power over immigrants. However, by doing this it has leaked that American officials put values on different people’s lives and this shows that they completely do not value immigrants lives at all. Some people believe that the way immigrants are being treated is right because they believe “providing such assistance is unwise, for it acts as a magnet for illicit immigration”(Inda). On the other hand some people would argue that is is “an attempt to govern the reproduction of an undesirable population”(Inda). Former Governor Pete Wilson proposed Proposition 187 where one of the main aims of this proposition was to eliminate non-emergency medical care for women in the country illegally. But the backfire on this proposition is that it would cause: “unwaranted suffering, avoidable birth complications, sicker, smaller babies and needless disability”(Inda).
In both these articles we have our eyes opened to the inhumane realities of the U.S. government towards immigrants. We see how brutal the American government is through their roughness with women during their delivery process in “Undocumented Women Forced To Give Birth While Shackled And In Police Custody” and also that the United States government does not value immigrants lives as much as they value non immigrant lives.
Latina reproduction and the Latino Threat
In the article: Undocumented Women Forced To Give Birth White Shackled And In Police Custody it discusses the inhuman circumstances undocumented mother have to deal with while giving birth. It also discusses the large debate of the treatment these women endure while in the custody of authorities.
In chapter four of the Latino Threat, the issue becomes more in depth of the mistreatment and the negligence of undocumented women as mothers. Chavez stated that "'Latina reproduction' as an object of discourse produces a limited range of meanings, often focusing on ther supposedly excessive reproduction, seemingly abundant or limitless fertility and hypersexuality, all of which are seen as 'out of control' in relation to the supposed social norm," (Chavez in the Latino Threat pg. 72).
Chavez pretty much elaborates on this topic on how America believes for something out of the norm to be out of control. The same perceptions about black women are still used to this day when discussing the cycle of poverty in America, and that black women would often reproduce in excessive number in comparison to their white counterparts.
The two readings both describe the complexity and the unfairness of the treatment of undocumented immigrants. Whether and person is documented or not, the issue deals with human rights and the fact something as intimate as giving birth is now becoming acceptable to be abused by authorities is just sad. But it also goes in the bigger issue as well of the Latino Threat on America, whereas the belief that if their numbers rise; more jobs will be taken, the idea of whiteness dies out because of more people of color in this nation being born, and the fight for land. This nation does a good job at trying to divide and conquer and labeling something bad because it is not "White or "American" to be a threat to society, and for that belief it doe not give the right to make someone endure inhumane conditions for something as serious as the birth of a baby.
In chapter four of the Latino Threat, the issue becomes more in depth of the mistreatment and the negligence of undocumented women as mothers. Chavez stated that "'Latina reproduction' as an object of discourse produces a limited range of meanings, often focusing on ther supposedly excessive reproduction, seemingly abundant or limitless fertility and hypersexuality, all of which are seen as 'out of control' in relation to the supposed social norm," (Chavez in the Latino Threat pg. 72).
Chavez pretty much elaborates on this topic on how America believes for something out of the norm to be out of control. The same perceptions about black women are still used to this day when discussing the cycle of poverty in America, and that black women would often reproduce in excessive number in comparison to their white counterparts.
The two readings both describe the complexity and the unfairness of the treatment of undocumented immigrants. Whether and person is documented or not, the issue deals with human rights and the fact something as intimate as giving birth is now becoming acceptable to be abused by authorities is just sad. But it also goes in the bigger issue as well of the Latino Threat on America, whereas the belief that if their numbers rise; more jobs will be taken, the idea of whiteness dies out because of more people of color in this nation being born, and the fight for land. This nation does a good job at trying to divide and conquer and labeling something bad because it is not "White or "American" to be a threat to society, and for that belief it doe not give the right to make someone endure inhumane conditions for something as serious as the birth of a baby.
Thursday, October 15, 2015
The Bracero Program/Los Braceros - Or rather, Slavery by Another Name - The Neverending Saga
As we learned through our readings of Migra!, The Latino Threat, and Lugo's Theorizing Border Inspections, the intersection of migrations and the U.S. border is one of social construction origins. We learned that the concept of a "border," an "immigrant," and the labels of "undocumented" (in lieu of "illegal" as well as the concept of "alien," are all results of socially and spatially created discourses involved in the rhetoric surrounding immigration and migrations as a whole. When looking at The Bracero Program, as emphasized in Migra! and attempting to connect its historical presence and impact to contemporary discussions of immigration, migration, and citizenship, one must first look at the realities of The Bracero Program itself.
"The Labor Importation Program of 1942-1964 [better known as The Bracero Program - "Bracero" in Spanish meant "strong-armed one," which is oddly appropriate given that these individuals had to have the strongest of resolutions and dispositions in order to withstand the massive exploitation and abusive environmental circumstances that permeated their existence as widespread temporary agribusiness labor] was a carefully negotiated, bilateral agreement between the Mexican and U.S. governments" (Los Braceros, American University). Initially meant to be a "well-intended" endeavor to ensure the basic needs of these temporary agricultural workers as dictated by the Mexican law of the time, we have since learned that this program was more about sustaining U.S. imperialist land-grabs in Mexico and the U.S. as a means of furthering the development of super agribusiness monopolies in the name of U.S. capitalism.
However, at the time of its creation in 1942, the United States had many more people directly dependent on agriculture than it does today. According to U.S. Department of Labor statistics for that year, "the U.S. farm population accounted for roughly 22% of the total population" (Los Braceros, American Univ.). Today's statistic is closer to 3%. This is not a means of excusing any of the innumerable human rights infractions nor the blatant exploitation of migrant labor in the name of American imperialist greed, but rather, I use this statistic comparison to set the stage for the initial enactment of this program within the discourse of American "history." A massive influencing factor for the establishment of the LIP was precedent. In 1917, just months after Congress had passed legislation to restrict the flow of Mexican nationals across the border, as we have learned, temporary agricultural workers were exempted from the restriction as a concession to farmers. This initial period laid the ground work for the LIP and its massive influence on American super-agribusiness economics in both the United States and Mexico.
Discussing the United States and its agricultural sector in this light, oddly enough, reminds me of a lecture given in my Sociological Theory course this week on C. Wright Mills' theory of power stratification in America. Ironically, Mills was writing during the period of The Bracero Program, the 1950s, to be precise. As it is dense sociological theory, I won't go into the depths of his writings here, but the bottom line of his treatise on power is that a "power elite" comprised of leaders from the economic, government, and military sectors, whom ascended to power and in turn, reigned over the middle classes, special interest groups, and the masses (everyone else). In simpler terms, these individuals came from a socially privileged and elitist social class, ultimately having gained massive amounts of financial power through their respective endeavors in economics/commerce and, in turn, had gained governmental and military prominence through their positions as economically prominent individuals. This principle of a social hierarchy based on the concept of power remaining with an elite few with the capacity to affect the lives of everyone beneath them is reminiscent of the political landscape during The Bracero Program. The U.S. government leaders had reached agreements with the economic leaders of the time, i.e. the super agribusiness heads and farming moguls and, in turn, the military leaders, i.e. the early members of the Border Patrol and immigration regulation agencies alike in order to collectively utilize their resources to coerce temporary migrant workers into a life of exploitation and abuse, bordering on a modernized form of slavery, in the name of the almighty U.S. dollar.
"In 1951, the FSA (Farm Security Administration) guaranteed minimum standards of housing (including laundry, bathing, toilets and waste disposal), a minimum wage of $0.30 per hour (READ THAT AGAIN), at least 30 days of work upon arrival, free transportation and other essential living and labor criteria (Los Braceros). These somewhat "humane" standards, well, at least humane through the eyes of those enacting them, were short-lived, as the American Farm Bureau Federation stripped them down through an unquestioned legislative move, leaving on a skeleton of the original agreement made between the United States and Mexico regarding treatment of temporary workers. The U.S. only had one concern when it came to treatment of workers: adequate labor. During this period, oddly enough, illegal recruitment and smuggling became commonplace practices, often without consequence or punishment. The human rights organizations of contemporary America would be having a field day with this. In 1954, Operation Wetback (a term which originated during this period as well - not my favorite descriptor but a point of historical accuracy nonetheless), succeeded in deporting over one million "illegal" southwestern residents in a militant and brutal fashion. This was the ONLY major action to curb "illegal" settlement throughout the Bracero Program. Again, the monster of American imperialist and capitalist greed rears its head. We just had to have more and more temporary agricultural workers for those ever-growing super agribusiness fields popping up everywhere across the American southwest and Mexico during this period.
I found the table included in this case study from American University entitled "Los Braceros" to be of particular interest when discussing a history of this program as it gives a numerical breakdown of Braceros, Legal Immigrants, and "Illegals" Apprehended. The table is as follows:
Table 1
Source: U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service Annual Reports 1949-1954 and 1964-1974.
The Bracero Program adhered to the ever-present economic principle of supply and demand. However, in the case of The Bracero Program and in the case of contemporary immigration politics, once the need runs out, there's no need for the supply. And thus, we arrive at the need for a regulatory policing unit to remove the "unwanted" and now "unnecessary" migrant worker population who had served the purpose of fueling the American imperialist agricultural machine for decades, thus aiding in ultimately creating the global economic power that would eventually become the United States superpower that we, as a collective, are aware of today.
I also wanted to share this graphic regarding industry output, particularly U.S. agriculture's contribution to the national income of selected years during the Bracero Program:
Table 2
Source: U.S. Department of Agriculture. Agricultural Statistics 1942-1964.
Note: figures are shown in billions.
Ultimately, I've dragged this out long enough. The bottom line is that the Bracero Program set a precedent for abuse and exploitation of migrant labor that is still prevalent in U.S. global economics, both with regards to Mexican labor forces, as well as those from the Middle East and other areas of the globe. The descendants of the Bracero legacy include the various temporary workers visa statuses including H-1B, H2-A, H2-B, J-1, L-1, L-2, and Q-1, each of which is tied to the employer's whims and holds NO DIRECT PATH OR GUARANTEE TO PERMANENT STATUS. In other words, if the worker loses favor with the employer, hello, Border Patrol, greetings Detention Center and deportation papers.
The United States has a blatant history of systemic and blanket discrimination, exploitation, othering, and abuse in the name of imperialist, capitalist, and militaristic greed that has come at the expense of millions of individuals over the course of its existence. It can be seen in The Bracero Program, the temporary work visa programs, the rampant Islamophobia, homophobia, and numerous other instances in which anyone deemed a "threat" to the hegemonic balance of American "culture" as the dominant force of Western civilization, anyone deemed incapable of diluting themselves and mixing into the assimilationist "culture" that has become synonymous with American exceptionalism and nationalist idealism is ultimately deemed expendable.
I am attaching a few articles that I browsed while brainstorming the rather lengthy response I've laid out here, as well as a YouTube video I found on The Bracero Program, as well as images of Bracero documents that I found while browsing the Internet, learning the never-ending legacy of The Bracero Program, which, in its own way, was and continues to be "slavery by another name."
We Should Remember the Bracero Program...and Shudder
Los Braceros - Case Study
May 2014: Immigrant Deportations Today and the Legacy of "Operation Wetback"
Forgotten Voices: The Story of the Bracero Program
"The Labor Importation Program of 1942-1964 [better known as The Bracero Program - "Bracero" in Spanish meant "strong-armed one," which is oddly appropriate given that these individuals had to have the strongest of resolutions and dispositions in order to withstand the massive exploitation and abusive environmental circumstances that permeated their existence as widespread temporary agribusiness labor] was a carefully negotiated, bilateral agreement between the Mexican and U.S. governments" (Los Braceros, American University). Initially meant to be a "well-intended" endeavor to ensure the basic needs of these temporary agricultural workers as dictated by the Mexican law of the time, we have since learned that this program was more about sustaining U.S. imperialist land-grabs in Mexico and the U.S. as a means of furthering the development of super agribusiness monopolies in the name of U.S. capitalism.
However, at the time of its creation in 1942, the United States had many more people directly dependent on agriculture than it does today. According to U.S. Department of Labor statistics for that year, "the U.S. farm population accounted for roughly 22% of the total population" (Los Braceros, American Univ.). Today's statistic is closer to 3%. This is not a means of excusing any of the innumerable human rights infractions nor the blatant exploitation of migrant labor in the name of American imperialist greed, but rather, I use this statistic comparison to set the stage for the initial enactment of this program within the discourse of American "history." A massive influencing factor for the establishment of the LIP was precedent. In 1917, just months after Congress had passed legislation to restrict the flow of Mexican nationals across the border, as we have learned, temporary agricultural workers were exempted from the restriction as a concession to farmers. This initial period laid the ground work for the LIP and its massive influence on American super-agribusiness economics in both the United States and Mexico.
Discussing the United States and its agricultural sector in this light, oddly enough, reminds me of a lecture given in my Sociological Theory course this week on C. Wright Mills' theory of power stratification in America. Ironically, Mills was writing during the period of The Bracero Program, the 1950s, to be precise. As it is dense sociological theory, I won't go into the depths of his writings here, but the bottom line of his treatise on power is that a "power elite" comprised of leaders from the economic, government, and military sectors, whom ascended to power and in turn, reigned over the middle classes, special interest groups, and the masses (everyone else). In simpler terms, these individuals came from a socially privileged and elitist social class, ultimately having gained massive amounts of financial power through their respective endeavors in economics/commerce and, in turn, had gained governmental and military prominence through their positions as economically prominent individuals. This principle of a social hierarchy based on the concept of power remaining with an elite few with the capacity to affect the lives of everyone beneath them is reminiscent of the political landscape during The Bracero Program. The U.S. government leaders had reached agreements with the economic leaders of the time, i.e. the super agribusiness heads and farming moguls and, in turn, the military leaders, i.e. the early members of the Border Patrol and immigration regulation agencies alike in order to collectively utilize their resources to coerce temporary migrant workers into a life of exploitation and abuse, bordering on a modernized form of slavery, in the name of the almighty U.S. dollar.
"In 1951, the FSA (Farm Security Administration) guaranteed minimum standards of housing (including laundry, bathing, toilets and waste disposal), a minimum wage of $0.30 per hour (READ THAT AGAIN), at least 30 days of work upon arrival, free transportation and other essential living and labor criteria (Los Braceros). These somewhat "humane" standards, well, at least humane through the eyes of those enacting them, were short-lived, as the American Farm Bureau Federation stripped them down through an unquestioned legislative move, leaving on a skeleton of the original agreement made between the United States and Mexico regarding treatment of temporary workers. The U.S. only had one concern when it came to treatment of workers: adequate labor. During this period, oddly enough, illegal recruitment and smuggling became commonplace practices, often without consequence or punishment. The human rights organizations of contemporary America would be having a field day with this. In 1954, Operation Wetback (a term which originated during this period as well - not my favorite descriptor but a point of historical accuracy nonetheless), succeeded in deporting over one million "illegal" southwestern residents in a militant and brutal fashion. This was the ONLY major action to curb "illegal" settlement throughout the Bracero Program. Again, the monster of American imperialist and capitalist greed rears its head. We just had to have more and more temporary agricultural workers for those ever-growing super agribusiness fields popping up everywhere across the American southwest and Mexico during this period.
I found the table included in this case study from American University entitled "Los Braceros" to be of particular interest when discussing a history of this program as it gives a numerical breakdown of Braceros, Legal Immigrants, and "Illegals" Apprehended. The table is as follows:
Table 1
| 1949 | 1953 | 1964 | 1965 | 1970 | 1974 | |
| Braceros | 107,000 | 201,380 | 177,736 | 20,284 | 0 | 0 |
| Legal Immigrants | 7,977 | 18,459 | 34,448 | 40,686 | 44,821 | 71,863 |
| Illegals Apprehended | 233,485 | 676,602 | 43,844 | 55,349 | 277,377 | 709,959 |
The Bracero Program adhered to the ever-present economic principle of supply and demand. However, in the case of The Bracero Program and in the case of contemporary immigration politics, once the need runs out, there's no need for the supply. And thus, we arrive at the need for a regulatory policing unit to remove the "unwanted" and now "unnecessary" migrant worker population who had served the purpose of fueling the American imperialist agricultural machine for decades, thus aiding in ultimately creating the global economic power that would eventually become the United States superpower that we, as a collective, are aware of today.
I also wanted to share this graphic regarding industry output, particularly U.S. agriculture's contribution to the national income of selected years during the Bracero Program:
Table 2
| 1942 | 1945 | 1948 | 1951 | 1953 | 1956 | 1958 | 1960 | 1964 |
| $123.168 | $164.067 | $207.478 | $279.3 | $305.6 | $350.8 | $367.4 | $414.5 | $510.1 |
Note: figures are shown in billions.
Ultimately, I've dragged this out long enough. The bottom line is that the Bracero Program set a precedent for abuse and exploitation of migrant labor that is still prevalent in U.S. global economics, both with regards to Mexican labor forces, as well as those from the Middle East and other areas of the globe. The descendants of the Bracero legacy include the various temporary workers visa statuses including H-1B, H2-A, H2-B, J-1, L-1, L-2, and Q-1, each of which is tied to the employer's whims and holds NO DIRECT PATH OR GUARANTEE TO PERMANENT STATUS. In other words, if the worker loses favor with the employer, hello, Border Patrol, greetings Detention Center and deportation papers.
The United States has a blatant history of systemic and blanket discrimination, exploitation, othering, and abuse in the name of imperialist, capitalist, and militaristic greed that has come at the expense of millions of individuals over the course of its existence. It can be seen in The Bracero Program, the temporary work visa programs, the rampant Islamophobia, homophobia, and numerous other instances in which anyone deemed a "threat" to the hegemonic balance of American "culture" as the dominant force of Western civilization, anyone deemed incapable of diluting themselves and mixing into the assimilationist "culture" that has become synonymous with American exceptionalism and nationalist idealism is ultimately deemed expendable.
I am attaching a few articles that I browsed while brainstorming the rather lengthy response I've laid out here, as well as a YouTube video I found on The Bracero Program, as well as images of Bracero documents that I found while browsing the Internet, learning the never-ending legacy of The Bracero Program, which, in its own way, was and continues to be "slavery by another name."
We Should Remember the Bracero Program...and Shudder
Los Braceros - Case Study
May 2014: Immigrant Deportations Today and the Legacy of "Operation Wetback"
Forgotten Voices: The Story of the Bracero Program
Tuesday, October 13, 2015
Poor Whites: Then and Now
The function of current Latino labor policies directly
mimics the function of Jim Crow laws in terms of dividing labor parite with
similar interests in order to help reinforce status quo capitalist systems.
When individuals cross the border without documentation,
they are branded with the label “Illegal”; this is deeply ironic because these
undocumented workers are systematically given this branding so that they can
serve the interest of the nations whose law they are in “violation” of. As was
discussed in Migra!, Diaz attempted
to modernize Mexico by accepting an excess of foreign investment and
expansionist projects; these projects had the consequences of destroying local
agricultural business and spiraling Mexico into an ultra-rigid class system,
where the 10 richest families in Mexico control more wealth than the median 95%
combined. Widespread poverty and lack of employment, particularly in rural and
marginalized regions such as Chiapas, led to the perceived need to immigrate to
the United States in order to take on available work. This, and a wartime job
shortage, led to the creation of the Bracero program which was unique in how
far (geographically speaking) it took Mexican migrant workers and for the
widespread abuses that were perpetuated against Mexican workers. During this
time, the larger narrative of Mexican workers was that they were “docile”,
“hardworking” and “unlikely to organize”; this hearkens back to the time of
slavery and during the civil war, when white plantation owners used the exact same
language to describe black slaves and why they were integral to the
construction of southern society. In exactly the same way, society became used
to a pliable workforce that required minimal pay, no respect and who had no
real protections from their employers/owners.
However, when both groups (Slaves and Migrant Workers) began
to pose a threat, this dynamic changed. In the reconstruction south, newly free
slaves represented a threat to the very core of southern society, at least in
the eyes of the planter class, since their ability to produce crops at very
little cost was now endangered by the potential legal rights that these black
workers now had. This led to the production of white-supremacist propaganda,
like The Birth of Nation, which in
turn spurred Jim Crow legislation and the rise of groups like the KKK, which
hugely restricted the rights of black Americans and made it impossible for them
to live their lives. In addition to a new social schema which reinforced white
supremacy, and the created inability of black Americans to effect the political
process directly, many minor offenses were criminalized during Jim Crow so that
police could sentence black workers to indentured servitude on farms (thereby
recreating the slave labor needed to fuel southern plantations).
This process parallels the current construction of the
Latino Threat. After the “docile” workers of the Bracero program became less
attractive (workers came back from war and so the demand for labor went down),
the nation began to change its narrative about Latino workers. Instead of
viewing these people as doing a job no one wished to do, facing significant
oppression and abuse while doing so, we constructed the idea that a huge influx
of Latino Americans would change and undermine our distinctly American culture,
that they were criminal and dangerous, and that they were freeloading off the
“plenty” we had given them. This was amplified particularly after 9/11, when as
Chavez discussed in The Latino Threat,
when the state was able to tie the huge national focus on national security to
the problem of border security. An open or unregulated border, which would let
undocumented workers in, represented a threat that would allow “terrorists” or
other vague criminals and enemies in – and so we associated those crossed the
border without documentation, or those who look like they may have crossed the
border, with criminality and wrongness. Just as Jim Crow criminalized blackness
to create a workforce to fuel modern slave labor, modern immigration policy and
culture has so stigmatized undocumented workers as “illegal” that they can only
find under the table work, with no rights or protections against abuse, and
should they cause any problems, they can be reported to INS and deported –
always placing them in the existential crisis of needing to maintain their
current way of living. The brand of “illegal” is the only way that American
corporate interests are able to maintain their ability to produce at low cost
and so even though there is a huge emphasis on closing the borders, we are
secretly encouraging and depend on that open border to provide us with a cheap
workforce.
By creating social and legal norms that criminalized
blackness, the white powers that be created a world that made it impossible for
white and blacks to associate, which in addition to the obvious and numerous
harms to blacks, actually worked to the detriment of poor southern whites. Poor
southern whites viewed black workers as threats to their livelihood and as
encroaching on the social position which caused them to be among the most cruel
and fervent in their enforcement of Jim Crow laws and social norms. Today, poor
whites are among the most ardent crusaders to close the borders and deport “illegals”,
as they view the competition of Latino workers as infringing on their place in
society and preventing them from being on the bottom rung of society. This
stance, then and today, is ultimately harmful to this class as a unified
workforce would be able to come together to make demands on the state and
employers in a way that divided workforces simply cannot due to the harm of
strikebreaking and discord between races. This process, reconstituted with each
racial other, is one that upon which the whole of society depends – absent a
workforce able to produce at practically no cost, civil society and its neoliberal
foundations would crumble under the weight of the promises and ideals that they
had only been giving to the most fortunate in society.
The Similarities between African American Civil Rights and Latino Civil Rights
In class whether we are talking about slavery in the United States or
the United States-Mexican border patrol, two themes are always
prevalent. These two themes are: “aliens” and “brutality”. Both African
Americans and Mexicans experienced being “aliens” or the “foreign” and
also they experienced “brutality” during their time of oppression in the
United States. Another main concept that these two groups shared when
being oppressed by the United States was that they both were used for
work in the United States but when they were no longer needed they got
dumped with no support or anything from those that they were working
for.
We are always taught about the brutality of the slave holders to their slaves and we learn in Migra! and also a movie in class of how bad the brutality is and the horrible conditions that the Mexicans had to stay in when they were crossing over the border into the United States. The embarrassment that came with this brutality is not to go unmentioned either as we learned that men would have to strip completely naked in front of each other as they got tested on every part of their body before being able to go to the United States to do back breaking work for basically no money at all. Another place where we see a huge problem with United States- Mexican brutality is in the Bracero Program where we saw Mexicans being absolutely exploited beyond their means for work during World War II. During this time they also had to go through lots of embarrassing checks before they were sent into the United States to do ridiculous work for next to nothing.
Even though the African American Civil rights movement is well known through out the United States one movement that we do not hear about as much is the Chicano Movement. This movement took place during the 1960’s and was much like the African American Civil Rights movement because how how African Americans tried to gain their equality and civil rights, Mexicans at this time were doing the same thing.
Even to this day both parties are trying to gain their full equality and rights in the United States. We see this in one example with African Americans in the “Black Lives Matter” movement. And Mexicans to this day are also trying to gain not just full equality but full acceptance as well. In Latino Threat we read that it takes three full generations of being in the United States before being able to fully be apart of the United States community: “Latino first- and second- generation interviewees engaged the least in this form of transnational activity.”(65). Along with this acceptance and full rights to education as well their is an HBO movie named “Walkout” that was filmed in 2006 about a group of Chicanos who were not getting full rights to education in their Denver school so they started protesting and they preformed a “walkout” where all the Chicanos walked out of the school at the same time to preform their protest. In this day we see many protests being the way for people to get their views of what they want whether it is a Chicano movement of a walk out or an African American movement and they are holding a “Black Lives Matter” protest.
We are always taught about the brutality of the slave holders to their slaves and we learn in Migra! and also a movie in class of how bad the brutality is and the horrible conditions that the Mexicans had to stay in when they were crossing over the border into the United States. The embarrassment that came with this brutality is not to go unmentioned either as we learned that men would have to strip completely naked in front of each other as they got tested on every part of their body before being able to go to the United States to do back breaking work for basically no money at all. Another place where we see a huge problem with United States- Mexican brutality is in the Bracero Program where we saw Mexicans being absolutely exploited beyond their means for work during World War II. During this time they also had to go through lots of embarrassing checks before they were sent into the United States to do ridiculous work for next to nothing.
Even though the African American Civil rights movement is well known through out the United States one movement that we do not hear about as much is the Chicano Movement. This movement took place during the 1960’s and was much like the African American Civil Rights movement because how how African Americans tried to gain their equality and civil rights, Mexicans at this time were doing the same thing.
Even to this day both parties are trying to gain their full equality and rights in the United States. We see this in one example with African Americans in the “Black Lives Matter” movement. And Mexicans to this day are also trying to gain not just full equality but full acceptance as well. In Latino Threat we read that it takes three full generations of being in the United States before being able to fully be apart of the United States community: “Latino first- and second- generation interviewees engaged the least in this form of transnational activity.”(65). Along with this acceptance and full rights to education as well their is an HBO movie named “Walkout” that was filmed in 2006 about a group of Chicanos who were not getting full rights to education in their Denver school so they started protesting and they preformed a “walkout” where all the Chicanos walked out of the school at the same time to preform their protest. In this day we see many protests being the way for people to get their views of what they want whether it is a Chicano movement of a walk out or an African American movement and they are holding a “Black Lives Matter” protest.
Borders With No Boundaries
The US/Mexico border has been the hot topic as of recent especially with certain presidential candidates that expressed their concerns on "illegal" immigrants. There is always this notion from conservative individuals that think that strengthening the borders would actually be a solution to stop Mexican immigrants from coming in and "taking" American jobs (so they say); Unfortunately, majority of these "immigrant shamers" tend to not understand what is going on behind the scenes. The drug cartels in Mexico has been an issue the United States has been keeping a close eye on for quite sometime. Knowing and seeing how profitable the drug trade was and the United States wanted to put themselves in the position to make some revenue by affiliating themselves with border patrol.
Even though the US is not active in the drug distribution process they do control who is allowed to enter and who is not. These practices that the United States partake in make it quite impossible for people to understand how much control that America has on the mobility of the Mexican community. In Latino Threat, it discusses how the the Immigration Act of 1990 explicitly disclosed the amount of actual "legal" immigrants are allowed to migrate freely into the US. Along with the Immigration Act, Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act made the legalizing process more tedious and difficult to meet the proper requirements. Ironically, the US is able to extend their boundaries outside of their jurisdictions along the border to meet their benefit, but constrict Mexico to stay within their own (Contradictory much? I think so.).
Sicario, was a great example of how border control isn't what the average person think it is. It is so much more than just controlling people from coming and going; the film based the story on the Drug War in Mexico and how the United States can implicitly bend the rules in order to gain control. The playing by the book" ideology goes out of the window when it comes to getting US's end of the deal; all regulations become null and void. This just goes to show you that America is on the constant pursuit of control and getting in where they fit in. So to sum everything in a nutshell, borders aren't so bounded after all, now are they?
Sicario, was a great example of how border control isn't what the average person think it is. It is so much more than just controlling people from coming and going; the film based the story on the Drug War in Mexico and how the United States can implicitly bend the rules in order to gain control. The playing by the book" ideology goes out of the window when it comes to getting US's end of the deal; all regulations become null and void. This just goes to show you that America is on the constant pursuit of control and getting in where they fit in. So to sum everything in a nutshell, borders aren't so bounded after all, now are they?
Migration; then and now
The Bracero program brought millions of Mexicans across the border in 1942 for labor. Some of these were sent to due emergency labor needed on railroads and agriculture during World War II. The labor was only short term. These hispanics were desperate for labor so they were taking difficult jobs at very low wages. With this little information given, I can already make connections to this program and the current state of labor in the United States. We have green cards that allow people to come across our border for a certain amount of time and work. Just like we talked about in class I think there is still some migration across the border that is allowed and that is illegal. GOP candidate Dr. Ben Carson visited the border and he stated that his photographer that was with him was able to walk through a human size hole in the border fence and take pictures of the United States from technically Mexico. Just like these workers that crossed a long time ago, these Mexican workers that come over today are taking jobs that essentially no other Americans want to take. Whether its cleaning dishes at a restaurant or taking jobs in factories. My dad is VP of a denim manufacturing company and a large percentage of his workers are straight from Mexico. The interesting thing about all of the migration that still takes place is that Americans like to blame these Mexicans for taking "their" jobs , but the fact is these exact americans don't want these jobs. Another fact is that some sort of migration even illegal is essential to the U.S. economy. The Wall Street Journal conducted a poll in 2006 from economists that said 96% of them believed that illegal immigration was beneficial to the U.S. economy.
The Bracero Program-What it Has Left Us With
After having viewed the movie Sicario last week, I started seeing several connections between now with the contemporary issues of drug wars and border indecencies as well as the problems over time dating back to the Bracero program in 1942. During this intense movie experience as well as parts of our readings of the Latino Threat and Migra!, there are so many obscene ways that this idea of the true border is truly recognized. In so many ways there are too many understandings and beliefs for what it stands for in dividing these areas. That being said, from all stand points of people involved in early border patrol and programs as the Bracero every side had deliberate involvement in creating this catastrophe of today. For instance, drawing from what happened in the early stages of bordering shown in Migra! how they indulged in these special Mexican deportation parties. This skewed ideal of what it means to bring someone into this country started with problems just as these. It became in our country this cruel belief that no matter the "use" for these "aliens" in our country they would never truly have a home. An alien is to only inhabitant of our world for so long and that's the part America did their best to hide by trying to show their respects and interests in dedicating time to programs as the Bracero. But in reality. it didn't matter how the program and relations seemed on the outside, the border patrol and administrations within it always played however they wanted in the inner workings for example on 118 in Migra! there is a lot of discussion about how the officers in the border patrol were pushed to move or quit constantly this strategy was dominant for many years and were consistently asked to move and relocate. While I am not defending the border patrol as a whole I am simply making the connections of how the entire system and this "line" is messed up from all sides that we can see it all taking place in our early history of border patrol that has brought us the problems we face today. No side faced fair executions whether it was deportation per-designed parties of the pushing out of work from the opposite side, both were so wrongly based on a false sense of foundation.
Now with that being said, that has led us to today and movies with displays such as current day drug wars that have flourished due to the examples I mentioned. In Sicario, we can see how all the misunderstandings of this border are pushed as the FBI inhabitants this area of Mexico to conquer what they believe to be fighting for good however by doing this in the early scenes they have all-out brawl with some of the members of the cartel and murder them point blank. This is what we have been led to forced by historic problems in first helping aliens of this country. We have not only scared them away and fearful of leading a true and purposeful life here but we have now come into a war among drugs with them. While we are destroying a lot of their people and creating these deadly areas, we (only some) are benefiting from this inter-workings of the drugs which again goes back to this double-standard for those involved. As we've seen all through this class, we want them for their money and intel through Mexico but they are never to be true citizens here they are still treated as aliens of this country. This is the contemporary problems with what we are left with over time due to the missed functions and promises of programs like the Bracero that was simply not carried out well. The U.S. as an entirety needs to find a way to fix this to avoid harsh realities like the living ones displayed in the movie Sicario.
Now with that being said, that has led us to today and movies with displays such as current day drug wars that have flourished due to the examples I mentioned. In Sicario, we can see how all the misunderstandings of this border are pushed as the FBI inhabitants this area of Mexico to conquer what they believe to be fighting for good however by doing this in the early scenes they have all-out brawl with some of the members of the cartel and murder them point blank. This is what we have been led to forced by historic problems in first helping aliens of this country. We have not only scared them away and fearful of leading a true and purposeful life here but we have now come into a war among drugs with them. While we are destroying a lot of their people and creating these deadly areas, we (only some) are benefiting from this inter-workings of the drugs which again goes back to this double-standard for those involved. As we've seen all through this class, we want them for their money and intel through Mexico but they are never to be true citizens here they are still treated as aliens of this country. This is the contemporary problems with what we are left with over time due to the missed functions and promises of programs like the Bracero that was simply not carried out well. The U.S. as an entirety needs to find a way to fix this to avoid harsh realities like the living ones displayed in the movie Sicario.
Monday, October 12, 2015
Modern Day Bracero: H-2 Visas
In my attempts to discover a way to connect the Bracero Program from our Migra! readings, I stumbled upon a Buzzfeed investigative article about H-2 visas. These visas fall under the Labor Department and are described as legal options for "seasonal workers", similar to the Bracero Program, looking to obtain a temporary visa to work in the U.S. However, these visas are in the power of the employers at all times who can deport their workers at a whim. Many are committing atrocities against their employees from rapes and beatings to withholding wages and creating debt hearkening back to the days of indentured servitude.
There are currently 1,000 labor department officials charged with maintaining and investigating grievances against the program that currently has 135 million immigrant participants. (read that again) The Labor Department even released a statement about the H-2 program claiming it is "part of a wider immigration system that is widely acknowledged to be broken, contributing to an uneven playing field where employers who exploit vulnerable workers undermine those who do the right thing.”
The thing is, in other countries H-2 visas aren't being used for exploitation. The UK uses H-2 visas to invite soccer coaches to temporarily coach youth soccer programs. In the U.S. we use it for cheap labor in what has been called by many "modern day slavery". The Bracero Program in Migra! has been compared by some scholars as "a system of ‘colonial labor exploitation’.” (110) But this is still happening today.
The investigation was extensive. Personal accounts of harassment and atrocious living conditions are well documented in the countless court cases being brought against employers and the Labor Department. It's not so hard to find a connection to the history of the Bracero Program. It never ended.
There are currently 1,000 labor department officials charged with maintaining and investigating grievances against the program that currently has 135 million immigrant participants. (read that again) The Labor Department even released a statement about the H-2 program claiming it is "part of a wider immigration system that is widely acknowledged to be broken, contributing to an uneven playing field where employers who exploit vulnerable workers undermine those who do the right thing.”
The thing is, in other countries H-2 visas aren't being used for exploitation. The UK uses H-2 visas to invite soccer coaches to temporarily coach youth soccer programs. In the U.S. we use it for cheap labor in what has been called by many "modern day slavery". The Bracero Program in Migra! has been compared by some scholars as "a system of ‘colonial labor exploitation’.” (110) But this is still happening today.
The investigation was extensive. Personal accounts of harassment and atrocious living conditions are well documented in the countless court cases being brought against employers and the Labor Department. It's not so hard to find a connection to the history of the Bracero Program. It never ended.
http://www.buzzfeed.com/jessicagarrison/the-new-american-slavery-invited-to-the-us-foreign-workers-f#.md5a2dqZv
US Corporate Interests
For many of the texts we have looked at,
the role of United States capitalistic and business interests emerge as
determiners in domestic and foreign policy. With Warmth of Other Suns, Wilkerson showcases the recruitment of black workers from the south as they could be exploited since many unions were not integrated, and how Ida Mae was used as a strike breaker. In Kelly Lytle Hernandez’s Migra!, she traces the emergence of the
border patrol and particularly how the emerging Southwest’s agribusinesses determined
much of the policies and policing of Mexican immigrants, since they were a
valuable and expendable workforce. Immigration policies have been shaped
by business interests, as demonstrated byt the Bracero program and more recent guest-worker programs. However, I
am interested in mapping overseas U.S. ventures and how those intertwine with
imperialism, and create the conditions that push people to immigrate, in many
cases to the United States, thus further benefiting US corporations.
Land dispossession emerges as one of the strongest
tools of corporations to profit in countries such as Colombia, Mexico, and
Puerto Rico, and to create a workforce that no longer has their traditional
means of subsistence farming and is either forced to work in there home country
for these corporations or migrate to another country, such as the United States,
to seek employment for many of those same corporations.
I’d like to focus on Mexico and Puerto Rico as US corporations played powerful roles in shaping policies and
removing locals from their lands and small farms.
The early 1900s in Mexico were defined by shifting periods of foreign investment into infrastructure, and a civil conflict. For the United States and its growing southwestern agricultural industry rail lines to and from Mexico and the US created the means for a mobile, migrant workforce to tend US agriculture for cheaper than US workers since they lacked the class, social, language, and union powers to defend fairer wages and working conditions. In addition, this time period brought greater privatization and the buying up of land from small time and subsistence farmers. This created an economic imperative to migrate, many times to the US, increasing the size of the dispensable migrant workforce. In addition, to the historical land dispossession by US corporations of poorer Mexicans, is the effects of Mexico joining NAFTA on smaller Mexican farmers. As discussed in Harvest of Loneliness: The Bracero Program, NAFTA meant that US goods priced incredibly cheaply flooded US markets pushing out homegrown products, thus these Mexican agricultural laborers now needed to migrate to the US or work for a larger agricultural business such as Chiquita, which is headquartered in North Carolina.
Puerto Rico has a similar journey where prior to US colonization in 1898, most Puerto Ricans ustilized subsistence famring to survive. As Iris Lopez charts in Matters of Choice: Puerto Rican Women's Struggle for Reproductive Freedom, that "with the arrival of North American corporations [...] These corporations took land from peasants and replaced subsistence crops with profitable sugar commodity agricultrue. This changed Puerto Rican agriculture from subsistence famring to a one-crop economy" that largely benefited US corporate holdings in the country and left much of the population forced to migrate to cities to find industrial jobs in US owned facotries (Lopez 6). The initial US invasion of corporate power left a impact on Puerto Rico that has not ceased. More Puerto Ricans live in the US than on the island due in a large part to the economic ravaging by US companies to the original subsistence ways of life on the island.
As Chavez notes in The Latino Threat, these mass Latinx migrations are not random, they are not as the "Latino Threat" dialogue presents an invasion, but merely the response of individuals to unlivable conditions that were in many ways created and exacerbated by US policy, which is driven by corporate interests. The past as we see mirrors the present where the "War on Drugs" was initiated in part to secure US and foreign investments in Colombia, Mexico, and other South American and Latin American countries.
The legacy of early border patrol stems from a large array of ideas, situations an powers of authority that want to be set in place vis control. For instance, where the border is located on "American" soil, was formally colonies of Mexico. In MIGRA and the Latino Threat, they give us a broader idea as to why border patrol is set in place and the regulations of who exactly comes in and who leaves. I feel the regulations of such are biased towards Americans. For example in Sicario, U.S. milita were able to freely enter into Mexico and regulate the smugglers and illegal immigrants; but, we wouldn't dare give Mexican authorities to do the same. This just shows how privledge plays a big role in the U.S. border patrol and over the years our biggest problem has been the drugs cartels.
Since the war on drugs in the U.S. and Mexico has become so prevalent, that seems to be the new issue as to who comes in the nation and who stays out. The drug war in Mexico however should not affect who the U.S. brings in and brings out because a lot of people that come here undocumented are escaping their narco-run states for a better life, just to be sent back into that violence that surrounds them. Which goes back to the legacy of early border patrol, in which was created to regulate who was able and who we felt were fit to enter this nation. This same motive is used today except we have the war on drugs as a justification of who can come into and who we think can leave our country.
Since the war on drugs in the U.S. and Mexico has become so prevalent, that seems to be the new issue as to who comes in the nation and who stays out. The drug war in Mexico however should not affect who the U.S. brings in and brings out because a lot of people that come here undocumented are escaping their narco-run states for a better life, just to be sent back into that violence that surrounds them. Which goes back to the legacy of early border patrol, in which was created to regulate who was able and who we felt were fit to enter this nation. This same motive is used today except we have the war on drugs as a justification of who can come into and who we think can leave our country.
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