Forget solidarity, we need individualitism

By the time I get to Arizona, cont...

All classes are canceled that:

1. Promote the overthrow of the United States government.
2. Promote resentment toward a race or class of people.
3. Are designed primarily for pupils of a particular ethnic group.
4. Advocate ethnic solidarity instead of the treatment of pupils as individuals.

Let's address these point by point, eh?

Most people wouldn't have a problem with the first point. It makes sense. I'm sure that there are all sorts of Pottery/Bomb-Building classes happening in middle schools throughout the state. They need to be abolished post-haste, before pimply twelve year-olds take down our elected officials with their pencils and flowers.

But the truth of the matter shines when this is connected to the state's other recent laws, designed to move out the Latino population (whether citizens or "illegals"): A bad, short-sighted ploy by Republicans to ensure their supremacy. In the words of The Answer Sheet,

[State Superintendent of Public Education] Horne has wanted to limit [a Mexican-American studies program in Tucson] since he learned several years ago that Hispanic civil right activist Dolores Herta told Tucson high school students that “Republicans hate Latinos.”

This act, of course, dispels such silly rumors...

The second point gets into more clowdy territory, though. Particularly when dealing with modes of ethnic identity, to study the history and culture of one particular ethnic group could leave those not in that group feeling left out or even hurt by accusations. However, bad stuff happened. Winners got the spoils and tend to still receive the spoils as a result. Those same winners get to write the history in such a way where it seems inevitable that they would be the natural winners and that the losers, of course, would lose. Losers, otoh, don't have a history, amirite? At least that's what I was taught...

Resentment is in the eye of the beholder, of course. White supremacists (like those who drafted the "Papers Please" Law and see also this) are always going to feel resentful of other cultures, especially when these other cultures (whether they be Black, Jewish, Arabian, Eastern European, Latino, Latin American, East African) possess pride in their history, food, clothes, holidays, customs, etc. Which is why white supremacists have an abiding NEED to show up to Cinco de Mayo festivities as gangs with their US flag t-shirts.

The third point is fairly explicit, though. As is the fourth point. And the fifth if you count the fact that the state is also grading and forbidding teachers who have "strong accents."

The point is: White Americanism is the de facto ethnic group. To argue that a history class tailors to one particular ethnic group is to miss the point: all study of history comes from a particular cultural viewpoint. All of it is tied into identity. There is no such thing as a purely individualized individual.

Pure make believe.

And there never was outside of romance novels and horrible fan fiction either*. No one person lives in a vacuum. We all have family, expectations, music, perceptions, learning procedures, foods, language, etc., etc. that come from others, that bleed through our pores whether or not we want to acknowledge it.

Kind of like xenophobia.

And if we were xenophobic, we'd have to wave goodbye to humanity, including this. And I'm not willing to settle for that.

*I know what you're thinking. "Aren't those two the same?" Short answer: no! Your treatise on a secret love affair between Princess Leia and a time-traveling Spock remains unpublished while Danielle Steel is, inexplicably, still selling through major distributors. Sucks, but such is reality.

Immigrants cause crime?

Blame Lou Dobbs. Or nativism. Or Dan Stein and his inexplicably mainstreamed hate-policy group, FAIR. Or the 24/7 news culture that somehow leaves us less informed and more afraid than ever before.

But these reports - shooting up everywhere, throwing impossible-to-verify data on the ground in retaliation against migrants - defy any and all logic whatsoever. Not just logic, but experience, and research to boot. I won't spend all day trying to gut the lying numbers, since they do not add up to reality and any quick research will point out that Dobbs and his racist friends* can't admit - they're lying racists who use irrational fear to bring people on the fence to their side. Well, some people on some fences...

It says something fundamentally ugly, however, about American tribal culture that we can so easily believe such unfounded, irrational and perverted lies about our fellow humans simply because THEY (immigrants) are not US (Real Americans).

This is my observation living amongst many cultures: It's not the migrant populations who tend towards violence.** Rather, it's those populations who have tried and failed to assimilate to American cultural norms - those who have looked deep into the heart of domestic imperialism - those who have seen the hard work, toil, sweat, and dropped blood of their parents, aunts and uncles, grandparents and cousins go for naught, but in fact repaid in viciousness, exploitation, burned crosses and ambush parties. These - the second and third and further generational Americans - are those who tend to resort to violence. They've learned from the United States what it means to be ugly.

And sometimes, sadly, they give in to the hopelessness.

Rather than hurting our migrant neighbors by repeating, reposting, accepting, or - often worse - ignoring those who tend to link violent crime with immigrants, we need to offer them and their children a path to hope.***

After all, isn't that what being an American is supposed to be all about?

*To counter the charges of xenophobia, Dobbs' supporters point to the fact that he has a Latina wife. But then I could make an illustration about the different meanings of "love" using goats, but I think I'd rather not...

**Actually, undocumented immigrants tend to become the victims of these crimes rather than perpetrators because their victimizers know that they are in constant fear of deportation and that the police often have their hands tied by laws that, in effect, do not favor much of their population.

***In fact, we should also offer the Dobbses hope too, for as long as they continue to buy into the vicious lies, they continue to not only imprison the new Americans and darker-skinned people, but also themselves. One of us be chained, mofos, we ALL be chained.