Give us your poor

In response to “Tired of Your Poor” (Oct. 8, p. 19), let’s stop for a minute and be a tad realistic: There is no way that America, or any other nation for that matter, is simply going to open up its borders to help people from any other nation. There is also no chance of there being an open citizenship policy in the U.S. So, for most of the immigrants who struggle to get into this country, the only way to do it is through illegal means.

Of course we also have to stop and think that this is not a new venture in our history. America has continuously made it a desperate point to keep out those that we don’t see as “worthy” when it comes to granting citizenship. When Hitler gained control of Germany and started systematically wiping out the Jewish population, it was in fact America that decided to make it more difficult for Jewish people to gain citizenship.

Our history has been filled with one example after another of segregation, degradation and isolation, and now we suddenly expect this to change? Even after witnessing the horrors of the Holocaust led by Hitler, America sees the same thing happening with the genocide in Darfur and does nothing. This seems to be an American political theme, and it is no different when it comes to Latin American countries. Rather than investing in Latin America and making it a place worth living in, America ignores our neighboring countries and invests in places like New Delhi and then complains when immigrants from Latin American countries want to leave the slums they dwell in for a taste of American prosperity.

The solution here is not to build a multibillion-dollar wall but rather to invest that amount of money in changing living conditions in some of the more affected countries. People who paint a rosy picture of countries south of our border have obviously had the luxury of some tourist attraction city and have not ventured in parts of third world nations – where children sleep in “homes” no bigger than a garage with none of the comforts like running water and air conditioning – that we take for granted.

Before suggesting that others come into “our” country and learn “our” history, maybe we should learn a bit from it ourselves. Unless you are American Indian, then you are no different from those that came here many years ago. Did we learn the history of every American Indian tribe when we came in? Did we “assimilate” into their way of life? Absolutely not! So, who are we to sit and pass judgment now? This has become a raging problem in America. Everyone who has been technically born in this country no longer sees themselves as immigrants, yet we all are. The assimilation we want everyone to conform to is not an “American” culture but rather the Euro-American culture that most of society has deemed ours.

The simple fact is that America is a land of vast cultures and many exciting opportunities that are not available anywhere else on Earth, and it is easy for us to sit back and condemn when we are the ones holding all of the gold. As for “Press ‘1’ for English,” all I can say is if you take advantage of the foreign languages department here at VCU, you can press whatever button you want without concern.

– Kadie Puffenbarger