What is the rationale behind hating immigrants? I think I might be missing something. After following the Brisenia Flores story and watching a documentary called the Order of the Myth I thought a lot about the history of this country and where we are now relative to how we feel about people, those like us and those not like us. I have been reading a book for school titled Invitation to Law & Society by Kitty Calavita and she says something very interesting:
"If law shapes how we live, it also shapes how we talk, and so how we think. At the most basic level, law creates conceptual categories and determines their contents and boundaries. As I write this, there is a heated debate in the United States about whether immigrants take jobs away from citizens. Beyond the specifics of this debate, consider how law shapes the thought process that underlies it. Without immigration law, there is no category of 'immigrant' (AS THERE WASN'T WHEN EUROPEAN EXPLORERS 'IMMIGRATED' TO THE SHORES OF WHAT WAS TO BECOME THE AMERICAS). The point may seem trivial until we recognize how much a part of natural reality this legal category and others like it seem, and how critical to our very thought process."
So is Calavita saying that the issue of immigration is only an issue because it was defined as a legal issue? Why is it a legal issue? Why do we not want people from other countries in America? Did we sell the idea of the American dream and our form of economy and government too well?
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