From the Pacific News Service:
Ethnic media are at the forefront of reporting a controversial student demonstration in north Texas called “Capture An Illegal Immigrant Day.”
In January, the student group Young Conservatives of Texas (YCT) organized a protest at the University of North Texas in Denton at which some students pretended to be undocumented immigrants, “while others received a prize each time they ‘captured’ one of the supposedly undocumented ones,” writes Vanesa Salinas in the Dallas-Fort Worth Spanish-language daily Al Dia. The protest, she writes, aimed to “raise consciousness of the problem of undocumented immigration and demand more energetic laws to stop it.”
A columnist in Southern California online magazine HispanicVista skewered the event, its organizers and school officials as racist. “The event staged by the Young Conservatives of Texas was prima facie use of racial slurs against students of Mexican ancestry,” writes Felipe de Ortego y Gasca in the piece….
That columnist seems to assume that everyone of Mexican ancestry in the U.S. is an illegal alien. Otherwise, why would favoring “more energetic laws stop [illegal immigration]” be regarded as a racial slur against everyone here of Mexican descent?
Maybe for the same reason that opposing all discrimination based on race is regarded as racist by those who favor some discrimination based on race.
“That columnist seems to assume that everyone of Mexican ancestry in the U.S. is an illegal alien.”
Doesn’t it also work if most illegals are mexican?
Doesn’t it also work if most illegals are mexican?
I don’t see how. In fact, I don’t see any racial slurs (much less a “prima facie” use of them, whatever that may mean) in saying our immigration laws ought to be enforced more energetically.
“I don’t see how. ”
Because then an attack on illegals would be akin to an attack on mexicans.
” in saying our immigration laws ought to be enforced more energetically.”
I suppose it depends on how the students pretending to be illegal immigrants were dressed. Sombreros?
But I would agree that not all illegals are mexican. My cousin is here without documents and she’s not mexican.
Because then an attack on illegals would be akin to an attack on mexicans.
No, it wouldn’t. It would be, and is, a criticism (not an “attack”) of illegals.
I think we should hunt down and kill the terrorists who attacked us. The terrorists who attacked us were all Muslims. You’re saying I believe we should hunt down and kill all muslims. Ridiculous.
“You’re saying I believe we should hunt down and kill all muslims.”
No just some. But If you had a ‘hunt down the terrorists’ day, and people were dressed like muslims, i’d say htere was something funny going on.
But If you had a ‘hunt down the terrorists’ day, and people were dressed like muslims, i’d say htere was something funny going on.
Well, I guess that makes us even, because I’d say there’s something funny about your comment.
actus,
I don’t see anything in the article to show that the pretended “undocumented immigrants” were disguised as Mexicans or made to look Mexican. And I find it difficult to believe that the stunt (which does strike me as pretty puerile) was directed at “students of Mexican ancestry,” unless UNT doesn’t verify legal status when it admits students, as most universities do.
Actually, the students were dressed in a t-shirt with the words “ILLEGAL IMMIGRANT” written on it.
No sombreros or other stereotypical ethnic dress — just a t-shirt and jeans, which I suppose is stereotypical college student dress..
“That columnist seems to assume that everyone of Mexican ancestry in the U.S. is an illegal alien.”
Doesn’t it also work if most illegals are mexican?
No. Most people in the NHL are white. That doesn’t make criticism of the NHL the equivalent of criticizing whites. (I was going to use NBA & black, but the hockey example makes it even more obvious how silly the claim is.)
Criticizing illegal aliens is not criticizing Mexicans. Of course, a racist can use the former as a proxy for the latter, just as many anti-Semites use “Zionists” as a proxy for Jews. But the fact that racists might do X does not mean that doing X is inherently racist, any more than the fact that anti-Semites criticize Israel means that criticism of Israel is inherently anti-Semitic.