[Peace-discuss] Letter to the editor

[David Green]

'Dreamers' being treated like slaves
      Wed, 02/28/2018    
I have read with interest News-Gazette coverage of support for immigrant "Dreamers," especially concerning the self-described Jewish progressive organization Bend the Arc: their conversation with Rodney Davis, trip to Washington, local march, etc.

Certainly, Dreamers deserve a clear and efficient path to citizenship. Nevertheless, their plight is politically and morally exploited by both supporters and detractors. At a fundamental level, this narrowly construed issue ignores the "bipartisan" corporate/neoliberal policy context of globalization, the need for cheap immigrant labor, and the concurrent outsourcing of American industry, leading to bigoted liberal/elitist denigration of so-called "deplorables."

Specifically, Democratic Party support for North America Free Trade Agreement in the early 1990s (Bill Clinton/Gore) devastated both American factory workers and Mexican small industry and farmers, contributing to the origins of Dreamers' now-sympathetic plight.

Analogously, there are those liberals and so-called progressives who claim to support refugees while not opposing ongoing American wars at the root of their victimization. And there are those self-described Jewish progressives who support the Dreamers but are silent regarding Palestinian refugees and African refugees in Israel, the latter being persecuted by Israeli authorities in ways that are not sufficiently photogenic for a News-Gazette article.

Moreover, the Dreamers have become a "model" immigrant minority, providing a contrast that is historically familiar whether in terms of immigration status, race, or ethnicity. Anis Shivani writes on Counterpunch: "What exactly is a Dreamer? A Dreamer is the postmodern version of a slave, embodying the pliant immigrant we seem most comfortable with, expected to be grateful for grudging symbols of identity."


David Green

DAVID GREEN

Champaign

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