There's no such thing as an innocent immigrant
I had this thought peice I wrote for a "burning of the bulls" ceremony that is done every "Columbus" Day outside the Catholic Cathedral in downtown Honolulu. But I can't find it anywhere -stupid non-filing system- so I'm recreating from scratch. Prolly this will be full of errors, but I'm using this as a beginning for something longer that I might post on sex_and_race.
As a descendant of immigrants I am here today to tell you all that there is no such thing as an innocent immigrant.
When we come to someone else's country, there's a tendency to claim that "We are different", "We stand outside the troubles you are having", or "This all happened long before I and my family arrived here". We do not want to be bothered with talk of racism or colonialism or overthrows. We simply want to make lives for ourselves, and for our families and to prosper.
To my immigrant brothers and sisters, I say to you, that this way of thinking is dishonest and it is wrong. It is dishonest because it seeks to absolve us of any responsibility to address the social injustices that exist in our new countries of residence. It is dishonest because it prioritizes our own selfish interests over those of others on whose bones our own privileged existence is possible. For those of us who are seen as "model minorities" we are given the right to insert ourselves as buffer races into a system of white supremacy. For those of us who are seen as "credits to our immigrant heritage" we are encouraged to turn our back on those who might be seen as criminal, or pathological or terroristic.
This view of the world is also wrong because it is based on a false assumption: the idea that we have no responsibility to this new situation in which we find ourselves. Every single interaction we have is crafted in response to power relationships that existed before we got here. We are not separate from this situation because we live in it. We work in it. We send our kids to school in it. It is in the air that we breathe and the food we put into our mouths.
Brothers and sisters, we are presented with a choice, every single one of us, when we get off that boat or aeroplane or bus or truck. We are given a choice about whether to accept the status quo, accept the existing set of inequalities in our new homes in exchange for which we get the hope that we will somehow be exempt. We can choose to accept these inequalities, or we can choose to reject them. If we do the first we will be good immigrants, and maybe we'll get jobs at fancy universities or tech companies. If we do the second, we might get labelled trouble-makers or anarchists or terrorist sympathizers. I'm not saying it's an easy choice. But it IS a choice. And everyone of us must make that choice and live with it.
So, I say to you again, none of us are innocent. We have all chosen sides. Whether you agree with me or not, whether you choose to support oppression or to use what leeway you have to do the right thing, there is one single thing that you can be absolutely sure of: at the very least none of you can say to me that you haven't been told.
As a descendant of immigrants I am here today to tell you all that there is no such thing as an innocent immigrant.
When we come to someone else's country, there's a tendency to claim that "We are different", "We stand outside the troubles you are having", or "This all happened long before I and my family arrived here". We do not want to be bothered with talk of racism or colonialism or overthrows. We simply want to make lives for ourselves, and for our families and to prosper.
To my immigrant brothers and sisters, I say to you, that this way of thinking is dishonest and it is wrong. It is dishonest because it seeks to absolve us of any responsibility to address the social injustices that exist in our new countries of residence. It is dishonest because it prioritizes our own selfish interests over those of others on whose bones our own privileged existence is possible. For those of us who are seen as "model minorities" we are given the right to insert ourselves as buffer races into a system of white supremacy. For those of us who are seen as "credits to our immigrant heritage" we are encouraged to turn our back on those who might be seen as criminal, or pathological or terroristic.
This view of the world is also wrong because it is based on a false assumption: the idea that we have no responsibility to this new situation in which we find ourselves. Every single interaction we have is crafted in response to power relationships that existed before we got here. We are not separate from this situation because we live in it. We work in it. We send our kids to school in it. It is in the air that we breathe and the food we put into our mouths.
Brothers and sisters, we are presented with a choice, every single one of us, when we get off that boat or aeroplane or bus or truck. We are given a choice about whether to accept the status quo, accept the existing set of inequalities in our new homes in exchange for which we get the hope that we will somehow be exempt. We can choose to accept these inequalities, or we can choose to reject them. If we do the first we will be good immigrants, and maybe we'll get jobs at fancy universities or tech companies. If we do the second, we might get labelled trouble-makers or anarchists or terrorist sympathizers. I'm not saying it's an easy choice. But it IS a choice. And everyone of us must make that choice and live with it.
So, I say to you again, none of us are innocent. We have all chosen sides. Whether you agree with me or not, whether you choose to support oppression or to use what leeway you have to do the right thing, there is one single thing that you can be absolutely sure of: at the very least none of you can say to me that you haven't been told.