Author’s note: When reading my essay I would like you to put yourself in someone else’s shoes.

Power is a privilege. Being able to make choices for yourself and having the power to be whoever you want to be can be exciting, but this power can be taken away when labels are put in place by others. Labels are created to confine people into a box; to limit them and make them feel as though they do not belong. This often happens to immigrants that come to the United States, seeking a better life than what their home country could offer. The United States gives off the impression that all are welcomed but in reality, those who flee to the states feel as though they do not belong because Americans never let immigrants forget the fact that they were not born here. Already feeling misplaced because they have lost their homes, the center of their universe, just to come to a place where they believed they would be safe but really isn’t what’s being advertised. Most Americans tend to focus on themselves and when things interrupt our system we usually push them to the side so we don’t have to worry about them; I think that’s when labels come into play. I don’t feel as though it’s to be seen as being self-absorb or being selfish, it’s just that most Americans prefer to stay in their own world. By giving people a label it limits them and puts them into a box that others can push to the side. A lot of people have the mindset of if it isn’t a problem for me then I don’t want anything to do with it, I know most of the time I personally act that way but I have to catch myself and come to my senses. America has a lot of crappy components within itself, which is why its people focus on that rather than the outside world because we can not help other people’s problems as we’re still dealing with our own. This tends to be the case more if you’re black causing you to be desensitized on another level. I feel like Americans began to see certain stuff as normal because of how often it appears so when it happens to others it’s not as shocking or overwhelming for one to handle. When following most narratives about immigration the concept of labels is heavily represented. From them being seen as being poor, illegal, thieves, being helpless, or that this is the perfect life that they’ve always dreamed of. These labels are distributed by people who choose to forget where they have come from. It amazes me because they are being seen as someone/ something they want to be seen as but now immigrants are only seen “through the eyes of others, of measuring one’s soul by the tape of the world that looks on in amused contempt and pity.” Forgetting that 98.4% of the United States’ population isn’t native to the land meaning that technically we all deserve at least one of the labels that are constantly being given out. The fact that many people believe that immigrants should have the “perfect life” now that they have come to America but are limited. The concept of the American Dream doesn’t really seem to be everyone’s dream. I wanted to focus on a narrative by a young Nigerian girl who didn’t believe in this dream. She found herself trying to fit into the American standard but when she was in Africa she felt free. No longer feeling the pressure to be someone she isn’t. The feeling of not having a home is bad enough because home isn’t just a building. It isn’t just somewhere where you place your head at night. It is the thing that your heart yearns for when you are lost, mentally or physically and when that is taken away a part of you is taken away too. So imagine not having a home and coming to a new place that doesn’t allow you to consider it your home; it would suck.

Works Cited: Nazario, Sonia. Enrique’s Journey. Random House Trade Paperbacks, 2014 Okoro, Enuma. “A Return to Nigeria.” The New York Times, The New York Times, 24 Apr. 2014, https://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2014/04/23/a-return-to-nigeria/?hp&rref=opinion

INTRODUCTION: How do we identify home?

In my essay, I wrote about what home means and the struggles many refugees face when fleeing to other countries in hopes of safety. I used the film Beasts of the Southern Wild to get my message across. As you read, I’d like you to think about how you view home, and how we treat and think about refugees who’ve lost their homes.

ADVANCED ESSAY #2: HOME: AN EXTENSION OF SELF

In a brightly lit room, white walls and shutters take place in the background, along with a light pink toy set. Two young white girls in dresses stand towards the back of the photo. A white woman bends over to talk to a young black girl with fluffy brown hair pulled back out of her face. The young girl wears a pretty little blue dress with a white collar. Her face shows sadness and dissatisfaction. The girls name is Hushpuppy. When she’s home, you can tell she’s a free-spirited girl. She wears her hair out in a fro, a shirt, pants, and boots. She’s a wild little girl, whose spirit is being suppressed at the hands of outsiders. People claiming that they know what’s best for her and her people by inserting themselves in the lives of those they don’t quite understand.

Of the various struggles refugees face during times of war and migrating to places of refuge, one big loss they experience is the feeling of home. They have had their home(s) torn away from them, whether that means their culture, their people, places, and or objects. Broken countries, homelands that no longer serve as a home but as a battlefield. “Sometimes you can break something so bad that it can’t be put back together,”(Beasts of the Southern Wild). Losing home is a fight against one’s identity.

In the film, Beasts of the Southern Wild, the viewer watches as Hushpuppy and her father fight for their home, the Bathtub. The Bathtub is a swampy part of New Orleans that gets the worst hits of storms due to it being below sea level. In the film, they go through some similar struggles that refugees go through. As a large storm was getting ready to sweep over New Orleans, the people of the Bathtub had to choose whether or not they were going to evacuate or stay in the attempt to rebuild after the storm hit. Most of the people leave, but Hushpuppy, her dad, and a few others stayed to fight.

As home is often associated with a house, the truth is, the two are not always interchangeable as some people’s houses are nests of negativity. Places they may be seeking asylum from. When addressing home, it is meant as the attachment to these things. These places, people, objects, and ideas. It is when they give off a feeling of love, nostalgia, and comfortability, can one consider something a home. Home is often also a thing through which ones culture thrives.

It can be extremely hard to keep your culture and cultural practices pristine when you migrate to somewhere with different cultures. You can easily lose your cultural identity if you are trying to escape from a reality, which is the case for many refugees seeking asylum from dangerous conditions. In Beasts of the Southern Wild, Hushpuppy says, “MY daddy says if he gets too sick to drink beer and catch catfish, I should stick him on a boat and set him on fire so they don’t plug him into the wall.” This quote illuminates the will of her father and her people that most others may not be able to relate to. In the film, they fought for their home. Their culture and their people. Hushpuppy’s father tells her what he wants done to him before others who don’t understand what kind of life they lead, to get their hands on him. This was his way of keeping his culture in the midst of devastation.

Similar to Beasts of the Southern Wild, refugees experience rips in their homeland. Whether it be at the hands of their own governments ill governing and enforcement/infliction of their rules and ideals, natural disaster, etc… Refugees must choose in what way they will cope with the present conditions. Will they attempt to flee? Seeking sanctuary in other places, hoping to find a new life, a new home, apart from their poisoned country. Or, will they fight? Putting themselves on the front line, using their voices and their bodies to fight back.

Once in a new place, in most cases of refugees who are undocumented, they are treated as illegal entities. Not human beings, fleeing from death, looking for a life beyond the restrictions of their country. As they move away from their country, they move away from the only home(s) they knew. In their country, they had a life and in their life, they had a home(s). The truth of the matter for most refugees is that they are not always welcomed into countries like America, where you are stripped of your title as human and put into a box labeled with misconceptions and stereotypes. Leading to an ongoing difficult life-path.

As we go through life, we come across countless homes. Extensions of ourselves. A home is a beautiful thing through which life can thrive. We must cherish our home(s) and we must ensure that we allow for others to do the same.

Work Cited:

Zeitlin, Ben, director. Beasts of the Southern Wild. Fox Searchlight Pictures, 2012.

“Beasts of the Southern Wild (Blu-Ray).” DVD Talk, www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/58625/beasts-of-the-southern-wild/.

Author Note: Dear Reader. I’d like you to read my essay and get comfortable with my words. I want you to place yourself in the text and feel my words.

Dear Someone,

This is not easy for me, an immigrant turned American, to write. Consider this a one-sided and inconsequential letter of a young, lost girl’s words. What is the true definition of home? Can another environment ever replace home? You’re probably wondering why I wrote this. Here’s why. My country, Iran is what I call home sweet home, or at least used to. I couldn’t see myself referring to America as my home. Home is home, and everything else is not-home. That’s the way the world is constructed. The pain I experienced at a young age took a huge toll on me and the person that I am today.

Do you know how it feels to feel lost within yourself? You’ll get used to waking up every day to the new scene that you swear could never get old. You’ll meet new kids, people who are completely different from the ones who lived in your old neighborhood. Nobody will judge you nor criticize you and the most they’d do is stare but who cares? you’d already be used to it. You’ll be so stuck in your current fairytale, so deep into the illusion, that you’d believe that this is the best decision your parents have made in all your years of living. Then days would go by, the trees would start to shed leaves, the news would talk about the rise in killings, the streets would be emptier and so is the hole in your heart because you realized that the change your parents made meant you had to leave behind the family that mattered most to you and you believe so much that you were progressing and growing because you no longer had to sleep with the fear of waking up to bad news, that your cousin didn’t make it back or your papa was brutally murdered in his home and now you’re scared. You’re all alone when you realized that the whole entire world is crazy and rather separating yourself from the people who could protect you the most, you needed to be there with them. Do you know how it feels? Home is the only illusion that makes sense, not the country that you thought moving to would diminish the fear in your heart.

In our defense, we were never looking for a new home, rather a new beginning. We never had intentions of America being our new home, at least not me. Iran would always be home to me. Wasn’t that the true definition of home? Not where you’re from, but where you are wanted. Home is the only place where your fears and doubts are cast aside but my home is fragmented, and although we all know it’s true, I’ll still lose the argument. Even if the evolutionary path of knowledge and wisdom is presented in my evidence. So I will hold my silence and create my own will to survive. And the divide will occur and I’ll still be the outsider.

Definition of home? Home could be a townhouse or it could be a small fire and the light it cast on a few familiar faces. Definition of home? Be it ever so humble, it is more than just a place. But whatever home is… its a way of organizing space in our minds. The reality is, home is where you make it and You will inevitably return to your original home at the end of such a journey.

Ethan Friedman English III Mr. Block January 2020

Authors’ Note:

In this essay, I wanted to connect my life and my nostalgia linked to my home with the experiences of people around the world. I wanted to stress how lucky I am to be able to call a place home and be able to experience my 17 years of life there. There are many people in the world who are forced out of their homes, and it’s important for me to highlight the issues in the world when I have the opportunity.

                                 Home Base

As he heard the bells from the departing train, he leaps off of his make-shift cot and scrambled toward the tracks. His limbs clothed in the murky mud from the swamp-like ditch he and his peers had slept in to stay warm. He got to a full sprint as he lept at the perfect time to make it in-between the ultimate and penultimate cars. He ascended the rusty ladder and sat down with his legs crossed facing the newly formed home behind him. That is where the signature picture was taken. He leaves a world of poverty and danger and heads for one with opportunity. I do not live in that same world. My world gives me more opportunities. My world gives me an education. My world provides me with friends of all different kinds. My world even lets me say and do whatever I want. There is a reason that I love my home. Philadelphia reminds me to be strong, to be caring, to be confident, and to bleed green. There will never be another home this meaning fun to me. I do not have to worry about where I am going to sleep, what I am going to eat. I have grown up to understand that there are people on the same planet that I live in who do not have those same privileges.

Some are forced to make a large magnitude of changes in their life to be able to have what I have by default. A Nigerian girl, who’s family moved to New York City to raise her and her sister, did not have the same life. Their names were not pronounced right, they were judged based on their skin, and nobody understood their language. Over time, after her father died, she started to go back to Nigeria and write about her community there. She slowly started to feel like she missed her real home. Just like I feel, you can never replace your true home. She said, “Each time I boarded the plane to return to the states it was with a surprising hint of sadness” (A Return to Nigeria). The problem is, we do not always realize that not everybody has the ability to go back to their home. Sometimes, they are forced out forever. Those are the people that we need to help.

In America, we should be willing to assist refugees. During our schooling and through the news, we learn all about the struggles the migrants and refugees have to endure just to have an opportunity to work and survive. America is most certainly not full. We should be looking for people around the world who need an opportunity. Who cares who is making your clothes? Who cares who builds your cars? Who cares about who where people are from? People are people. As long as they are not causing a problem and are not affecting your life, why does it matter? At the end of the, you never know what could happen to you. In each others’ shoes, you would beg for America to take you in and save your life. We need to understand the damage we are doing by denying immigrants. A significant majority of immigrants want to come to America to work just like everyone else. They want to go to school. They want to be happy. They do not want to hurt anybody.

There are refugees from everywhere on the planet. Not everyone can go home. We think that all of them come to our countries successfully and the struggle is whether or not we want them. The reality is what Enrique said, “Every day, hundreds of families are not as lucky. They are again being torn apart”, in Enqirue’s Journey. There are many groups who become stranded with nowhere to go. We need to look at this issue from other perspectives to understand that home is not guaranteed to everyone. What we take for granted is an incredible privilege.

Works Cited: Nazario, Sonia. Enriques Journey. Random House Trade Paperbacks, 2014.

Okoro, Enuma. “A Return to Nigeria.” The New York Times, The New York Times, 24 Apr. 2014, https://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2014/04/23/a-return-to-nigeria/?hp&rref=opinion.

Introduction:

What I’d like the reader to take away from this essay is the significance of the seemingly insignificant aspects of immigration regarding how immigrants are viewed in society. Without looking at all aspects of immigration, it is impossible to get a solid understanding of what life is like for immigrants.

Essay:

Immigrants and Their Everlasting Attachment

A man stands looking into the path in front of him. His daughter is sitting on his shoulders; she looks to be no more than three. Their clothing is dirty, and trash lay on the ground behind them. Rundown homes are in the distance. They have just arrived in a new country after enduring a difficult journey. They were forced to say goodbye to their homeland, and hello to a foreign country in which they know nothing about. They had to leave all they have ever known for something completely foreign to them. Although this is their new home, they will always hold a special connection to their home country. This lasting attachment that immigrants have to their homeland is an aspect of immigration that is not always talked about and is often overlooked. The everlasting feeling they get when they think about their home country is something that very few can understand, as it is impossible to fully understand something without actually experiencing it. A few works that touch on this subject in order to help others understand the feeling, however, include the book Exit West by Mohsin Hamid, the film Beasts of the Southern Wild by Lucy Alibar, and the article “A Return to Nigeria” by Enuma Okoro.

Each immigrant has their own story, history, and longing for their country which makes understanding their struggles very difficult. There can either be a specified reason for one’s deep attachment to their homeland, or it can simply just be. An example of this is in Exit West, by Mohsin Hamid when Saeed and Nadia are preparing to flee from their home country and seek refuge and they are faced with the fact that Saeed’s father will not be escaping with them. Upon asking his father why his father responds with, “‘Your mother is her.’ Saeed said, ‘Mother is gone.’ His father said, ‘not for me’ (Hamid 95). Although he had the chance to, he refused to leave his wife, who had died, behind. She was buried in that country, therefore he must stay there. The connection Saeed’s father developed for his country was so much deeper than imaginable that he would rather risk his safety, let alone his life, in order to remain in the place his wife was buried. In this case, his wife being buried there strengthens the connection he has to the country, even though he already had a deep connection there before. His reason for staying is unique to him, as is anyone’s reason. It is not necessarily the country itself that he is connected to, it is what the country holds that deeply resonates with him. Although Saeed’s father ultimately stayed and is not an immigrant, he is the perfect example as to how if one were to leave their home country, their attachment and resonance to that country would remain with them throughout their whole life.

Similarly, in the film Beasts of the Southern Wild by Lucy Alibar, after the community is evacuated and brought to the dry land in attempts to “save” them, they all find a way to escape back to their land even though it is seen as unsuitable by those in the dry land. They had a deep connection to their home as there was a great sense of community that was unfulfilled during the time they spent in the dry land. Although they returned to run down, unsustainable shack-like homes, they regained their sense of belonging, which is often a leading reason as to why immigrants have such an attachment to their homeland.

Another example as to how belonging plays a role in the lasting attachment immigrants have to their home country is demonstrated in the article, “A Return to Nigeria” by Enuma Okoro. Enuma had spent only a small portion of her life in Nigeria before her family immigrated to the United States. She had grown up without feeling connected to her home country or feeling like she wanted to return. That was until she had to return to bury her father, as it is custom in Igbo culture to bury oneself in their country of origin. She reminisces, “I couldn’t stop thinking about the fact that there was a land and a people that rightfully claimed me. Choosing to ignore that seemed oddly irresponsible…” (Okoro 2). Okoro had always struggled with her identity, as she felt should could not label herself as Nigerian nor American as she did not fully resonate with either of those cultures. Upon returning to Nigeria, she realized that there is a whole village that knows her name and knows who she is and is accepting of her. That feeling was something she never had in America. After contemplating it for a while, Okoro finally decided to give up her first world lifestyle, buy a one-way ticket, and move to Nigeria, which remains a poor, developing country. Okoro is the perfect example of how strong the sense of belonging and attachment can be for immigrants, even if they do not initially feel that sense of longing for their homeland.

Although discussing the attachment that immigrants have to their country of origin may seem insignificant compared to other aspects of immigration, it is very necessary to look further into it because it allows the public to attempt to understand the effects immigration has on immigrants and their wellbeing. If those who make laws about immigration do not even understand the severity of all aspects of immigration, it is not fair for them to make laws limiting resources and safety precautions for immigrants. There are a lot of components to the immigration crisis and there are many different opposing opinions, however, if one were to look at the seemingly insignificant parts of immigration, as these writers have done, it is clear to see that it goes much deeper than just “wanting to come to America.” It is not an easy decision for immigrants to make to leave their country, and only do so when necessary for their own safety and future, as they know the feeling of attachment will linger for their lifetime.

Works Cited

Alibar, Lucy. Beasts of the Southern Wild. Hamid, Mohsin. Exit West. Penguin Random House, 2017. Okoro, Enuma. “A Return to Nigeria.” The New York Times, 23 Apr. 2014. Oxfam. “7 Ways You Can Help Refugees Right Now.” Oxfam, 13 Jan. 2020, www.oxfamamerica.org/explore/stories/7-ways-you-can-help-refugees-right-now/.

Reader’s Note: The purpose of this project is to help people realize what really makes strong relations between people, how do humans create a community and if it’s fully determines on free will. There are three key examples I used, two of them being from books I read in English class. One of the things that people should keep in mind is that the purpose of this essay is to break down the major factor that contributes to creating communities, acknowledging there are other things that play a role. I hope readers finish reading this paper learning something they didn’t realize before.

Between two rows of temporary tents, about a couple hundred feet apart, are a group of children, they are all spread out, some of them are talking and playing with their friends, others are staring into space. The ground is light gray with gray pebbles and rocks spread throughout it. Every two tents have a satellite next to it. Towards the left side of tents, near the middle tents, stand 3 women monitoring the kids. 5 tents down are men that seem to be fixing a tent. These refugees are living though conditions due to how expensive it would be to move and live in Europe. They had to flee their country and leave most of their belongings. They don’t have a strong, sturdy shelter as a permanent home. There is no certainty of an actual home, and it starts to look like the camp is becoming their new home. They worked together to migrate, supporting each other by creating a system in which other refugees can also cross the water. Securing people with life vests, having people safely arrive onto the land. With these refugees going through a similar struggle, a sense of community and unity starts to emerge due to their common struggles.

This pattern could be found in many different communities, people unite because of a common struggle. One example is the black community, specifically in America. Society creates a stereotype of black people. According to “[An African American is] born with a veil, and gifted with second-sight in this American world —- a world which yields him no true self-consciousness, but only lets him see himself through the revelation of the other world.” - W E B DuBois. DuBois points out that black people have to view everything in two lenses, their point of view and how the rest of the world would view the same thing. Due to these two points of view, they have to watch what they do because the rest of the world already have a negative perception towards them. The only people who understand this struggle are other black people because they also go through the same thing. They find some level of comfort within each other, which creates a unique bond within each other.

In the book “The Namesake”, narrates the life of a 1st generation Bengali-American named Gogol. While he was growing up in America, he started to hate his name more and more because it was an unusual name and it made him stand out and not in a good way. The name was given to him by his dad because when his dad was in Bangladesh he almost died in a train accident. And the book he was reading on the train was written by and author whose name was Gogol. It was a major event that happened in Gogol’s father, Ashoke. It was special to him. When Gogol turned 18 he told his parents that he was changing his name to Nikhil, still preserving his Bengali heritage but a more common name. Further in the book, Ashoke dies in an accident which gathers everyone to their house (Gogol was living on his own in New York). Years later, Ashima moves out of the house and she has a party. Gogol goes in his room and finds the book with the author which he was named after, he starts reading the book that majorly impacted his life and he realizes no one will call him Gogol anymore.“The givers and keepers of Gogol’s name are far from him now. One dead. Another, a widow, on the verge of a different sort of departure, in order to dwell, as his father does in a separate world” pg 289”. At this moment, Gogol is having a moment of realization. Nobody will call him Gogol anymore, since he’s not going to see his mom as much and his father is dead. It wasn’t just a name, it was something that connected him to his parents. The difficulties and struggles that they faced adjusting to a new country, but still found ways to stay in touch with their roots. And the way they passed it on to their children was giving them special names that not only connect to their culture and traditions but to their personal lives too.

Gogol wasn’t close to many Bengali-Americans in the book, I think that’s one of the reasons he had trouble finding himself. He didn’t have people in his life that were balancing both American and Bengali culture. One of the only things he had that connected to his family roots was his name Gogol, which nobody was going to call him anymore.

The point that is being made is that even though we value the role communities in our society and specifically in our daily lives but fail to realize and appreciate two huge factors in forming bonds with others, the same struggles they face and connections to the same roots. Whether it’s having familiar yet unique names that originate from the same place, or extreme cases like going through the same humanitarian crisis. People find comfort with people they could relate to.

              ThEy'Re StEaLiNg OuR JoBs

In today’s political climate, Republicans, in particular, happen to hold a very inaccurate thought regarding immigrants (especially ones of Latin American descent). That thought is that they cross over the border as rapists and murderers. It’s fascinating they believe this because statistics suggest otherwise. There are more whites incarcerated than there are Latinos. So that whole argument is really invalid. The primary reason immigrants enter the US is to create a better life for not only themselves but also their families. They aren’t stealing our jobs, they’re simply working the ones that we don’t want. On June 16, 2015, during a speech, Donald Trump said, “When Mexico sends its people, they’re not sending their best. They’re not sending you. They’re not sending you. They’re sending people that have lots of problems, and they’re bringing those problems with us. They’re bringing drugs. They’re bringing crime. They’re rapists. And some, I assume, are good people.” With the leader of our country saying this, it’s no surprise that his followers agree with him. Trump ran his campaign on anti-immigration before he was elected he would say refer to Latinos as gangsters and Muslims as terrorists. And that’s how he won. He fear-mongered his way into office. And we must remember that fear-mongering is not new. In the nineteenth century, Americans would say that African American Men were sexual beasts, and if you weren’t careful they’d rape your white wife. And to no surprise, this led to various acts of violence against black men. And history has repeated itself in this country, mosques are being vandalized and hardworking people are being locked in cages, separated from their families, and deported. The fact that this still worked centuries later brings to light a much bigger issue in this country. And that problem is bigotry. As Americans, we love to talk about how progressive we are and how far we’ve come as a country. Now even though America can be considered progressive compared to MANY MANY countries, and we have been more and more welcoming of time. We’re still quite far from being a truly progressive and welcoming country. The 2016 presidential election did a great job of bringing this issue to light. The ugly truth is that more than 62 million Americans voted for an open bigot. And the reason why those (at least) 62 million Americans are so easily manipulated is that they’re isolated both physically and mentally. They either aren’t around enough minorities so the only experience they have with them comes from Fox News. Or they’re so stubborn that they’re really a lost cause. The primary reason I feel so adamant about this topic is because of my personal experiences. I grew up around a lot of Bengali Muslims, and interestingly enough it was always my American friends getting me into some kind of trouble. While my Muslim friends were always trying to get me to make better life decisions. The notion that Muslims are violent is factually incorrect. The Quran preaches peace. The only reason the middle east is such a war zone right now is because of US involvement. We took their natural resources and killed so many of their loved ones, they have a valid reason to not like our country. Yet, the only Muslims committing acts of terror are the extremists. The everyday people have nothing to do with it. The truth is that a lot of immigrants who come to this country (documented and undocumented) tend to work harder than the rest of Americans. They’re forced into lower-paying jobs due to their immigration status, level of fluency in English, etc. They survive with these lower-end jobs and still have to pay similar living costs as everyone else. Thus, they work much longer hours and take whatever jobs they can get. If you go out into the countryside and into the farms, you’ll see that the staff of farmhands consists of many immigrants because other Americans just don’t want to do that kind of work. When my mother first came to this country with a two-year-old daughter and not a word of english, she needed a job to provide for my sister. And she ended up working as a maid in a hotel making $4.25 per hour. She wasn’t lazy, she wasn’t stealing anyone’s jobs, she was just doing what she could to support her family just like everyone else. The only jobs she ‘stole’ was when she was picked for promotions due to her punctuality and impeccable work ethic rather than her Americans coworkers who’ve worked there longer but didn’t work as hard. Calling Immigrants violent and lazy is a slap in the face to every single hardworking American Immigrant who came here for a better life.

Citations:https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2017/06/16/theyre-rapists-presidents-trump-campaign-launch-speech-two-years-later-annotated/

Introduction:

I would like the readers to see that I tried to include both my own opinion and the connections from the real world. I think when writing this I just wanted to express all my thoughts and my view on the society we currently live in. I would like you, the readers to recognize and understand the story of Ibanez. The story in some way shows the misconception we have about Immigration and the misconception of what happens once someone migrates to a new country. Writing this essay was hard in the sense of I have a lot of opinions and there are a lot of facts the dilemma is how do I write all of this in a way where it’s not confusing.

Full Essay:

A garage full of immigrants sits wondering. Why was this happening? What had they done besides seek refuge in a country that once screamed freedom? What they would later find out due to it making national news was that they were being detained and sent back to their native country due to fear from the American government. The excuses for why this was happening in the belief of what an immigrant brings with them the word immigrant or illegal alien is associated with drugs, violence, and being unamerican. The government that we are supposed to trust in an attempt to unify the world we inhabit has in many ways failed to deliver their promise. Most take the words of our government as truth and in turn have ruined the opportunity to build a relationship with those trying to live the life that we are privileged to have. We live in a country where we judge without having experienced, we respect and listen to the wealthy, but in reality, we have more in common with immigrants than we do with American billionaires and politicians. We just like immigrants have dreams and aspirations, and we in some cases struggle to get by. Compared to the billionaires of the world we are all at the bottom of the melting pot. The cause of this Immigration issue is due to the fear of change in power within American society.

Immigration according to American politicians is a contributing factor to America’s economic growth. But if that’s the case why has it become such a wedge in American society? We now live in a society where change is inevitable, but as just as many people want to see a change many want things to either stay the same or revert to what they used to be. The policy concerning immigration in the US has changed constantly. In 2016 ICE removed 240,255 immigrants in 2018 that would increase to 256,085. There has been an increase in the removal of immigrants from the US and there have been countless policies set in place to try and limit the illegal migration of immigrants. The most recent and in my opinion the most drastic was the zero-tolerance policy which allowed children to be separated from their parents who were unlawfully entering the United States.

After all that has happened the question began to arise, Are our leader’s actions a representation of the country as a whole? Which formed the bigger question Do American citizens understand and sympathize with immigrants? The answer is simply no, we do not understand nor sympathize with the struggle of an immigrant because we simply have not experienced it. In the CBS News article “You have to live in fear” Is the story of an immigrant named Ibanez who illegally crossed the border after his family at the age of 14. He was born in Mexico and while there he lived a life where a meal wasn’t to be expected every day which he says was one of his hardest memories from living in Mexico. His family snuck into the United States, but while they were on the land of the free they were far from freedom while his siblings are safe from having to immigrate back Ibanez and his mother are not. He is fearful that one day will be the day in which he is separated from his family, but until then he continues to go to school and work to provide for his family.

A common misconception that Americans tend to have about immigrants is that once they cross that border their lives and their families’ life instantly change for the better and that is simply just not true. The life of an immigrant is hard it is full of loss, struggle, and pain you are in every sense of the word on your own whether an immigrant is legal or illegal. Due to the policies that exist today that revolves around immigration the relationship that people from other countries have with one another including our own has made things weird in a sense of probable difference of opinion. I don’t think the word immigrant or any synonym of the word should exist. I think as human beings we inherited the land that was left to us and it’s not the property of one single individual or an established group of people. I think it is one thing to have established a set of rules in a society, but when you begin to prohibit others from pursuing their dreams then something is truly wrong.

We are letting the ideas of our government officials create these ideas of who and what immigrants are. Trump recently said, “We have people coming into the country or trying to come in, we’re stopping a lot of them, but we’re taking people out of the country. You wouldn’t believe how bad these people are, These aren’t people. These are animals.” The basis of what America was formed on does not match the America of today and even early America wasn’t what life for an individual should have been. The idea that we are indoctrinated with unalienable rights for the pursuit of liberty and happiness is not present in the laws of immigration and modern-day America.

Works Cited: Shaban, Bigad. “‘You Have to Live in Fear’: One Undocumented Immigrant’s Story.” CBS News. CBS Interactive, November 22, 2014. https://www.cbsnews.com/news/you-have-to-live-in-fear-one-undocumented-immigrants-story/.

Korte, Gregory, and Alan Gomez. “Trump Ramps up Rhetoric on Undocumented Immigrants: ‘These Aren’t People. These Are Animals.’.” USA Today. Gannett Satellite Information Network, May 17, 2018. https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2018/05/16/trump-immigrants-animals-mexico-democrats-sanctuary-cities/617252002/.