Liberty
I’m been having a hard time figuring out my position on the “Immigrant Crisis” happening at the Mexican border. Most of my family are very conservative, while I’m more liberal/centrist in most of my views, but on immigration, we have always agreed. I understand, being gay, that I am supposed to be liberal and open in all of my views, but I have a hard time feeling sorry for people who come into this country illegally and then get upset when they get caught and deported. Isn’t there a legal way into the country?
So I decided to try a little exercise by putting myself into the tattered shoes of one of those immigrants.
Okay, step 1: Pick a country to migrate to.
This is a tough one. I’m very American so there is no way in hell I’m learning a new language, so that limits my choices to English speaking countries. I pulled up a list on the internet and, sadly, many of them are just too hot. I’m Scots-Irish and so pale I get burned by a lamp with a 60 watt bulb. Seriously…light passes THROUGH me. Australia seems nice, but, again, too hot, and having my seasons flip-flopped would just bug the shit out of me, so I’m drawing a line through anything in the southern hemisphere as well. That pretty much leaves Canada (at least part of it), Ireland, and the United Kingdom. I’m a little surprised that Scotland didn’t show up on the list, but it just would have been another option, and fewer options are better.
I think I’ll pick Ireland!
Great, step 2: Getting there.
While watching the news of the immigrants it’s pretty easy to figure out how they arrived there. You don’t see any busses, cars, limos, taxis, or ubers, just masses of people, old and young, walking around. Great. I have to walk to Ireland. That’s not gonna happen, so, Canada, you’re up! I can make the walk, I’m in pretty good shape for a middle aged queer and it will be good to get my steps in everyday. I can map it out and just go from Red Roof Inn to Red Roof Inn until I make it to the border. What’s that? Oh, I have to sleep outside? The migrants didn’t bring any money and they have to rough it? Hmmmm…I don’t like getting dirty, and while peeing outside isn’t a problem (3 cheers for the penis!), pooping by a tree just seems awful. This is looking less and less like a vacation and more and more like work.
Step 3: What to bring with me.
Since I’m walking, I can only bring what I can carry. One of the great things about living in this country is our ability to obtain massive piles of shit. Fun shit like books, movies, cd’s, clothes, pictures, glassware, furniture, and sex toys. Everything very important to my happiness and well being. Also, medication. I have lots of it. Did I mention before I was in good shape? I may have been lying. Also, my dogs and cats. How do I leave them behind? This will be tough to narrow down to whatever fits in a small, carry on piece of luggage. With wheels. You didn’t expect me to actually CARRY it the entire way, did you? Luckily my fashion sense can best be described as “unemployed lesbian” so I’m cool with packing fewer clothes and more…things.
But what about my pets?
Step 4: Pick a reason for leaving the U.S.
I got nothing. I have never understood why anyone would get behind a man whose slogan was “Make America Great Again”. Again? Exactly when did it stop being great? Was it a slow decline, or were we great one day, and then a shit-hole the next? Did the 60’s kill it with all it’s unrest? Disco? 80’s hair? 9/11? A black president? Gay marriage? Whenever I see someone with a bumper sticker with that printed on it, or one of those cheap looking red hats with “MAGA” sewn on by Chinese hands, I can’t help but wonder why anyone would walk around announcing, “I think this country sucks!” I think of the millions of men and women in our military wasting their time fighting for a country that isn’t great. On their behalf, fuck that! This country IS great. It has always been great, and always will be. Why would anyone be dumb enough to leave it?
Most of the people who are trying to get into this country left their homes because of violence. I don’t mean the kind of violence we have here, the kind where you say to your friends, “I just don’t like what’s become of our neighborhood, so we’re gonna pack up and move a few miles west, where it’s safer!”. The countries they are leaving completely infested with drug gangs. No matter where they move to, the violence will find them. Imagine that. No matter where you live, your children will not be safe. You will not be safe. “I don’t do drugs.” It doesn’t matter, people are killed EVERYDAY just by being in the crossfire of a gang war. Children don’t play outside. Parents hurry home, keeping their heads down, not making eye contact with anyone lest they get on the bad side of a thug with a gun and an eager trigger finger. The police don’t help, they are on the payroll. One day, you look at your family and think to yourself, “Nothing is ever going to change here. My family is going to be killed and there isn’t anything I can do about it.” So you make the decision to leave everything behind, your home, possessions, most of your family, any friends you have, your history, your legacy, and your past all so you can hope for a future.
I think I’m starting to understand what it all means. I’m imagining the fear of taking your family to a strange world where everyone talks different and stares at you as if you were one of the criminals you’re trying to escape from. No job, no money, just a little bit of hope. A little bit of hope is a powerful thing. A little bit of hope has the power to take you away from everything you have, and everything you have worked for, for a chance at a better life. All you can say is, “Please help us.” A little bit of hope propelled you from the fear your entire life was encased in. “Please help us.” A little bit of hope puts your children’s needs ahead of your own. “Please help us.” A little bit of hope will sustain you as you are separated from your children. “Please help us.” A little bit of hope may help you get a little sleep at night. “Please help us.”
I am never leaving this country. There simply isn’t a better one.
I have an idea. Instead of spending millions on a magic parade for our “Pretender-in-Chief”, instead of building a wall to keep out all the “rapists and thieves”, instead of creating a science fiction “space force”, instead of blaming everything that goes wrong on people who don’t look like “us”, lets build a second Statue of Liberty. Right on the U.S./Mexico border. We can even print her famous poem in both English AND Spanish…maybe even throw in a few extra languages just for fun. Perhaps looking at it everyday will remind law enforcement what this country stands for. It might not change anything, or any minds, in this country, but imagine you are a migrant from a far off land. You come to the border with your little bit of hope and say, “Please help us.”, and we confine you and take your children. Then, right when you think all is lost, you look out of your small window and see Lady Liberty, standing tall and proud in the dry, hot night.
And maybe you feel that little bit of hope again. All is not lost. You came to the greatest country in the world for a reason. We shall not disappoint you…once Trump is gone.
Inscription on the Statue of Liberty
Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses, yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore,
Send these, the homeless, tempest tost to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door.
Author: Emma Lazarus