My mom emigrated from her home in Aguascalientes, Mexico decades ago to be with my dad. She is the strongest, most fearless person I’ve had the pleasure of knowing in my short life. She moved to Laredo, Texas (a border town), learned English as a second language, made many friends, and found her place in the United States. She raised three daughters responsibly and provided them everything she could with the limited income from her fast food job. Eventually, she became Assistant Manager. My family is still not well off, but we get by. I owe absolutely everything to her hard work and courage. As cheesy as it may be, I would not be at Kenyon if she hadn’t provided for me and believed in me.
Still, my mom is not what people in this country would consider traditionally “successful.” She will never gain fame or earn a lot of money. But my mom makes a lot of people happy— regular customers will approach her in restaurants, at the supermarket, etc. She treats everyone she meets with so much care and respect that they naturally return that care and respect back to her.
Unfortunately, I’ve also seen first-hand the horrible treatment her status as an immigrant has gotten her. Once, in her place of work, a white man yelled that she couldn’t possibly be a manager because managers in the United States should be able to speak English. My mom, near tears, with her thick accent, said, “I do speak English. I understand you.” But he did not understand her, and he continued to berate her in public. Someone eventually offered him a refund for his original problem, and he stepped back. I think of that day a lot. It was only a year or two ago now, but I saw it in my mind when I found a GED practice exam book under her bed, dusty and unused. I see it every time anti-immigrant rhetoric fills the mouths of men in my government who have never truly interacted with immigration first-hand.
I see it when I see this:
I know, realistically, that this came from a place of good intentions. There are misconceptions in the United States about the role that immigrants take in our country. Words like “lazy” and “terrorist” and “food stamps” and “alien” and “useless” and “dangerous” litter the vocabulary on this subject. This tweet was likely trying to illustrate an alternative view from that narrative. The problem, though, is that immigrant lives matter regardless of whether or not they are successful and deemed “worthy” by the American public.
Immigrants are more than just the labor that they provide for this country. They are people. In the case of many of the immigrants Donald Trump has barred from this country, they too have family and friends and aspirations. Most of those people and their loved ones are probably not going to become millionaires or philanthropists or anything “significant,” but they are important regardless.
None of this is to say that I don’t consider immigrants capable of great things, because I do. I admit that I get enthusiastic and teary-eyed when I think of what immigrants can do to change this country, whether it be from technological advances or social change. Immigrants are hard-working and incredibly perceptive. I personally know many immigrants who are smart and resourceful and tough and compassionate. I know for a fact that they can accomplish incredible things. But I also know that they are also people who are just doing their best to make their situation better. They are not simply “immigrants,” either. They are incredibly complex human beings, beyond any adjectives or descriptors that I could put on this page.
In my Chicana/o Studies class, I have been learning about the constant exploitation that happened to Mexicans throughout American history, as United States businesses picked up immigrants in times of need and immediately returned them to the border once their work was done. To celebrate the life of an immigrant only because they provided something that other, more privileged Americans can benefit from, is incredibly disrespectful and careless. I do not pretend to have very many answers in life, but I know that to do so is wrong.
My mother’s life is valuable, even if all she ever does is become the Assistant Manager at a Whataburger in Laredo, Texas. My life is valuable, even if I never create the next iPhone. The lives of other immigrants within Kenyon, and within this country as a whole, are worthy of your attention, not just because Steve Jobs was the son of an immigrant or because “we were all immigrants once.” Unity is great, but not when it overlooks the struggles of more marginalized groups in this country. Immigrants matter because they are human lives that should be respected, regardless of religious affiliation or nationality or skin color.
The sooner we accept that immigrants are important to our country regardless of how they better the lives of middle/upper-class Americans, the sooner we can move forward as a nation.
Image credits: Paola Liendo, Giphy.com, Twitter, Time