The comic does a pretty good job of summarizing my feelings about the opposing arguments on the “immigration” debate in the U.S.. The observant reader will note that I have place “immigration” inside quotes (a.k.a. “sarcasm tongs”). This is to voice my disapproval at the dishonest conflation of the term to include sneaking over the border and taking up residence. It’s a bit of an insult to those of us who did it the legal way, and it gives us an unwarranted stain on our collective reputation. It’s also inconsistent with the left’s insistence that the occupation of Iraq is illegal. there’s gotta be some consistency here, people.
Now don’t get me wrong, folks: I understand the reasons people come to the U.S. and Canada, becuase I have, to use the cliche, been there, done that and got the t-shirt. There are those who will argue that perhaps it’s better if would-be immigrants stayed in their home countries and made them better, but in most cases, that’s infeasible. We’ve got it good here and they’ve got it bad there because of virtuous and vicious circles. Furthermore, we feed both circles — it is often in our best interests to keep third world governments corrupt and kleptocratic and for other countries’ standards of living to be lower than ours. It keeps our goods cheap and plentiful. It is this plenitude that lets sit high atop Maslow’s hierarchy and pursue interests beyond mere survival: personal self-realization, creative expression, intellectual exploration and social justice. The irony is that the only reason we have the luxury of studying Marxist theory (I view Marxist studies as the educational equivalent of the TV show What Not to Wear) in detail beyond “here’s your AK-47; now go hide in the jungle until we tell you to come out shootin'” is because of capitalism.
This brings me to the “illegal immigrants do the jobs that we’re no willing to do” argument. This is essentially the same thing as saying “Hey, they’re an exploitable underclass who are undocumented and therefore can be paid sub-minimum wage. Hot damn, we got us Coolies again!”
Besides, we already have a built-in source of poorly-educated, unskilled labour:
