There is an ocean that blinds us from seeing the truth. A few miles away is the island of Puerto Rico, an American territory, and on it are natural born American citizens suffering. Trapped in the ill-timed political upheaval in the validity of Puerto Rico, is the children’s hospital in San Juan (the resourceful capital) that is on the verge of running out of much-needed electricity. The people of Puerto Rico have recently suffered detrimental effects of Hurricane Maria; however, the rehabilitation of the island has been slowed.
Courtesy: CNBC
The New York Times conducted a poll of American citizens, inquiring on whether or not they knew that Puerto Ricans are natural born American citizens and half of them responded no. The United States has been late to provide aid to Puerto Rico because the government and many citizens fail to recognize the validity of Puerto Rico as United States Territory. Puerto Rico is in grave danger; the people have little food and water and are fighting for their lives. The governor of Puerto Rico, Governor Rosselló, has practically begged the U.S. for aid and brought up the idea for American citizens of Puerto Rico to move to the homeland of the U.S. until reconstruction efforts are through.
Courtesy: CNN International on Twitter
The president recently lifted The Jones Act, an act that had made it difficult to ship necessary supplies to the island. Efforts to gather and ship supplies to the island have been underway in a multitude of locations throughout the U.S., even in Tallahassee. A group of independent pilots called Operation Airdrop worked with our own Dr. Raquel Albarrán, a postdoctoral scholar in Modern Languages, to organize a plane to take supplies to Puerto Rico, which happened toward the end of last week.
By a stroke of luck, Tallahassee was not hit by the detrimental effects of Hurricane Irma as previously predicted by weather stations and university officials, but Puerto Rico was hit by Hurricane Maria and can benefit from the leftover supplies you may have had from Irma. Puerto Ricans are Americans, just as American as Floridians are, but besides being American they are also human and in need of humanity. The ocean that separates the island from the homeland of North America, is made of water, not concrete. There is no wall between us and them, there is no us and them. There is only one, the collective American, united to help other Americans–regardless of what language the other speaks or customs that they hold.