The other day I was walking down a sidewalk, dressed in my work uniform, when I observed ahead of me two white women (they could have just as easily have been white men) talking to each other in a parking lot as they were preparing to enter a car. When they saw me approaching, they suddenly stopped what they were doing and stared at me; one of them made an exaggerated glance at a building they had just on the lot, as if to tell me that if I tried to “do something,” there was someone nearby to “dissuade” me from my evil designs. Their eyes kept following me as I walked past them; when I turned around ten yards further, they were still staring at me, as if willing me to disappear so that wouldn’t have to “worry” about me. Angered by their prejudicial assumptions, I called out “Adolf.” One of the women retorted “If you don’t like it, go back to where you came from,” which frankly is not very original. Where I “came from” is Cleveland (and I have no plans of going there--it is too cold in the winter), but obviously these two had some other assumption. One interesting aspect about the darker side of human nature is that people who hold prejudices and stereotypes about certain groups is that they like to dish out the abuse, but when confronted with their ignorance or the falsity of their beliefs, they become even more enraged and entrenched. Their hatred is so strong that they recoil upon any evidence that their beliefs are based on myths and propaganda, and rather accept that not everyone conforms to their beliefs, fall back on even more extreme and unreasonable beliefs. It would be like me regarding all white people as Nazis, which I know, of course, is not true.
Most Americans believe in the myths and stereotypes perpetrated by politicians and the media. In a rare bit of reporting, a recent USA Today story debunked the myth that the U.S. side of the Rio Grande is more violent than the rest of the country, which 83 percent of Americans believe. The reality is, largely because of local and federal law enforcement presence, it actually has less crime than most other areas of the country. Yet the anti-immigrant activists, the Sheriff Joe Arpaio-types and those who use anti-immigrant propaganda for political gain cry foul; instead of accepting statistical evidence, they make-up their own “facts,” claiming that “underground” crime is not being counted, as if it is elsewhere in the country (as an aside, even the “popular” media can’t avoid “benign” stereotypes; I don’t know what political slant George Lucas is, but I wonder if he told Cheech Marin that the character he was voicing over in one of the Star Wars “prequels” would have flies swirling around him; I’m sure if he had been told that this character would include this ugly caricature, he would have insisted on their removal).
As far as “liberal” media is concerned, if people are under the impression that the Seattle Times falls under that category, they may be misjudging it. For a newspaper with only a few pages of print, the Times certainly uses-up quite a bit of space on inflammatory stories on the immigration question. Here are a few recent headlines:
“State says new driver's licensing rules foiling outsiders”
“13 counties to join crackdown on illegal immigrants accused of crimes”
“Climate of fear grips Forks illegal immigrants”
“'Twilight' town death sparks Border Patrol debate”
“Mistrial in trial of armed man wounded by Seattle police”—this case concerned a Latino shot by yet another police officer who thought he was “in danger”; the man did have a weapon on his person, but it was found to be unloaded--thus to say he was "armed" was a slight reach. The hypocrisy here is that it is the Latino who is being tried on a “deadly” weapons charge.
“Illegal-immigrant numbers in state jump 35% in 3 years”—actually zero percent, which I’ll discuss in a little while.
“Lawmakers want more security on northern border”
“WA wants to send illegal immigrant inmates to feds”
“Immigrant issue raised in Olympia as lawmakers struggle to make cuts”
“Bills would prevent illegal immigrants from getting state licenses”
“State lawmakers join debate on citizenship”—another attempt to change the Constitution regarding citizenship for those born in this country.
None of those stories provides any background, context or information that might bring fresh insight or proper perspective to the immigration issue. In order to provide some, let's look at some of the numbers. According to the Pew Foundation, which unlike right-wing nativist “information” outlets actually attempts to compile accurate information with a minimum of partisan posturing, 78 percent of illegal immigrants are from Latin America, 13 percent are from Asia, and 9 percent are from Europe and Africa. Any figure applied to the total number of illegal immigrants in this country is little more than guesswork, but let’s assume the number is the commonly bandied about 12 million. Applying these numbers to the 2010 Census breakdown of population by race and ethnicity, this means that 18 percent of Latinos, 11 percent of Asians and .5 percent of whites and blacks are illegal immigrants. The percentage of Latinos who are presumably illegal probably doesn’t surprise many people (some hardcore xenophobes think they are all illegal), but I’m certain the percentage of Asians who are illegal probably does surprise some people, and is even inconvenient to know. Probably even more surprising is that they are not targeted by the ICE, probably because it costs too much to deport them.
Now, the Seattle Times quotes the number 230,000 illegal immigrants in the state, and gives the impression that all are Latino. Washington actually has a large Asian population, about 2/3 that of the Latino population. If we use the national percentage, there would be 135,000 Latinos who are illegal in this state, 55,000 who are of Asian extraction and 25,000 who are black or white; just to make people “happy,” I’ll tack on an extra 15,000 on the Latino total. But even if we assume that the 230,000 describes the number of Latinos who are illegal, the total number of illegal aliens is still being deliberately downgraded by as much as 80,000 for what can only be reasons of scapegoating and racism against Latinos.
The Times’ deliberate campaign of anti-Latino misinformation doesn’t stop there. It ran a story claiming that 5 percent of the state’s population were illegal Latinos, an increase of 35 percent over the past 3 years. This would mean that there are 335,000 illegal aliens in the state, although the story still quoted the 230,000 number. It turned out that Lornett Turnbull—who wrote the story and is the principle perpetrator in the Times’ campaign—mistook the number given for Washington DC for those of the state (Turnbull is actually considered a “spokesperson” for illegal immigrants by some readers, apparently because she doesn’t go far enough to satisfy their race hatred lust). The actual percentage supplied by the Pew Foundation was 3.4 percent, which is about 230,000—which suggests no percentage increase at all. But again, the question is whether those numbers apply only to the number of Latinos who are illegal or the total of all who are illegal. Another story claims that illegal immigrants cost the state $272 million in public services a year; again this is deliberate misinformation given without context intended to inflame prejudicial passions and obfuscate the real problems this state has. No one, illegal or not, is immune from Washington’s regressive tax system, and some even benefit from it; the wealthiest pay less than 3 percent of their income in state taxes, while the those who make $20,000 or less pay 17 percent of their income in state taxes. Sales and property taxes do not discriminate between legal and illegal. The stupidity of lawmakers in this state is manifest by the fact that they will willingly forego what tax revenue they can get in order to score points with bigoted voters—while those wealthy fortunates who pay so little are untouchable. The Times, of course, was the hysterical opponent of the income tax initiative on the wealthiest state residents in the 2010 election.
Although the Times did report that despite their large presence in Yakima, Latinos are completely voiceless in that bastion of right-wing extremism—due mainly to city council elections held not by district, but city-wide; as long as whites are in the majority, it is almost impossible for a Latino to be elected. For one to be elected, according to Yakima whites, they must be “conservative”—meaning towing the anti-Latino line, or being silent on their concerns. Despite the obvious discrimination inherent in this, the Times subsequently printed the effusive story about “Secure Communities” which I recently wrote about. It was the paranoid all-white Yakima city council that approved this first compact with the devil (as opposed to San Francisco, whose mayor in June ordered the police to release immigrants stopped on misdemeanor and traffic offenses but held in jail to determine immigration status, after the ICE refused to stop their abusive “Secure Communities” activities in the city). Complaints of gang activity, while predictably ignoring the role of poverty and discrimination, assumes that immigrants come here to be gang members. They don’t. They come here to work and survive. As I mentioned before, studies have shown that gang problems tend to be a second and third-generation phenomenon: it is native-born residents who learn the hard lesson that they are hated, and act accordingly.
The hate has become so widespread that the nativists and xenophobes to do not make distinctions, and regard Latinos regardless of legal status as the “enemy.” Pat Buchanan, as I noted before, claims that Latinos “are out to destroy America.” Every story the Times prints that contains the words “illegal,” “immigrant” or “Mexican” is sure to draw out the dregs of society to empty out their racist minds on online comment pages. Someone who claims to be “a good man” with the handle “can’t keep down” posted a dozen remarks on one story—except that a Times moderator deleted them all. Frankly, I would have liked to see what kind of hatred the Times was inspiring just by continuously “illuminating”—or rather, failing to illuminate, the immigration issue. Most comments are deemed “acceptable,” although it really depends on the amount common sense one has to regard them as so. Here is a sample of the more "moderate" variety:
“Latino's have not kept pace because most are here uninvited, living outside of the law and use an X to sign their name.”
“Why does our government take pitifully small steps to ‘protect’ communities by waiting untill after they ‘have’ committed more crimes before taking any corrective action? Expell ALL illegal invaders "before" they have a chance to commit further illegal acts. SEAL THE BORDER.”
“I have never been able to understand how someone who steals another family's income is making a contribution to society.”
“Our Government, has allowed the invasion of 30 million criminals in direct violation of Article IV, Section IV of our Constitution. they force American tax payers to pay Billions to provide Welfare, Prison cells, Educate the invaders children, free medical care, massive document fraud, & are destroying our schools, hospitals, communities, culture while Robbing, Raping, Killing & Assaulting American Citizens WAKE UP PEOPLE!” (This person provided a link to a website called “immigrationcounters.com,” which claims to keep in real time “accurate” numbers in regard to illegal immigrants. The current “count”—it goes up by the minute--claims that there are 23, 531,529 illegal aliens in the country, double the generally accepted figure, of which all but 606,175 are “Mexican.” This is obviously disinformation at its baldest; but the “worse” the number, the more “satisfied” the racist is. It claimed that 12,255,892 “skilled” jobs were “stolen” by illegal immigrants, again an outrageous and deliberate bit of misinformation. The website admits that its “methodology” is prone to “minor” mistakes, but it plainly deals in deliberate inflation when it bases its numbers on 11-12 million illegal workers, when every such estimate includes dependents and non-workers. Note also that there are slightly more “skilled” jobs than actual workers).
One funny farm candidate made a “comparison” between “Joe Legal” and “Jose Illegal.” I won’t go into each of the completely imaginary and invented variables that eventually lead to “Joe Legal” having to work two jobs to keep food on the table while “Jose Illegal” gets to enjoy his family on the weekends with no fiscal worries at all. Suffice is to say that ignorance is bliss to the hardcore xenophobe.
One commentator tried to offer some reality on the driver’s license and voting fraud issues, but to no avail:
“I have known hundreds, if not thousands, of illegal immigrants in my lifetime. I have never heard of a single one having voted, or wanting to vote. The idea that an illegal immigrant would risk deportation just to vote is laughable. These people go out of their way not to be noticed. Take as little risk as possible. They have spent thousands to get here. There's absolutely no benefit and great risk. Illegal immigrants voting, sorry, it just doesn't happen. If you want to make an argument against illegal immigration, come up with something that is at least somewhat believable. A driver's license is good for driving, open bank accounts and convenient piece of ID. That's all that's being used for.”
But what does the truth matter? During times of labor shortages, especially in the agricultural and sweatshop industries, the “natives” tolerated undocumented workers. But when times become tough, they hypocritically turn on them and blame them for everything, and then some. And who are these “criminals?” Many, and perhaps most, of these immigrants from the south are indigenous peoples, just like Native Americans. Both have suffered removal from their lands and general discrimination. The difference is that in the U.S. the indigenous peoples were given a certain amount of autonomy, and basically “paid” to stay on their designated plots—essentially becoming wards of the state. In Latin American, the indigenous people were left to fend for themselves, kept in line by brutal U.S.-supported right-wing dictatorships in places like Guatemala and El Salvador. In Mexico, indigenous peoples in the Chiapas region have risen-up in the form of the Zapatista movement, which is just a more public manifestation of socioeconomic inequalities in the country; the movement blames, among other things, their impoverishment on free trade with the U.S., whose produce receives unfair price protections (one of the few exceptions to the “free trade” rule), and has had a detrimental effect on the poorest farmers in Mexico. Since their livelihood has in sense gone to El Norte, and the myth of job flight going south of the border (rather than to Asia) is just that, it shouldn’t be a shock that that they are heading this way. They have no secret “agenda” other than simple survival. These people know they will face discrimination in the U.S., and will be used and abused at the same time, yet they are willing to risk it for the sake of living by their own labor, not by crime as is the popular stereotype. Unless, of course, honest labor is considered a “crime” if you are the wrong “ethnicity.”
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