Bunny trail on borders

Events occurring and how they relate/affect Anabaptist faith and culture.
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Bootstrap
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Re: Bunny trail on borders

Post by Bootstrap »

Haithabu, you seem to be implying that there was a huge increase in illegal immigrants under the Obama Administration.

Let's take a look at the overall number of illegal immigrants in the United States since 1990 - a period that includes George H.W. Bush, Bill Clinton, George W Bush, and Barack Obama.

I just don't see a spike in illegal immigration under Obama. I don't think that the political rhetoric matches actual facts here. And I don't think we are facing runaway illegal immigration in the States right now.

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Bootstrap
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Re: Bunny trail on borders

Post by Bootstrap »

haithabu wrote:I don't have a particular issue with immigration per se, or with demographic replacement. I do have an issue with cultural replacement, since I believe that our host (Anglo) culture is the one which best safeguards the social qualities which make our countries the best places in the world to live.
Which aspects of the culture are you most concerned about? Is it our democratic tradition and economy? Or our faith heritage? Or is it something related to being Anglo, as opposed to, say, German or Chinese or Arab?
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RZehr
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Re: Bunny trail on borders

Post by RZehr »

Bootstrap wrote:
Which aspects of the culture are you most concerned about? Is it our democratic tradition and economy? Or our faith heritage? Or is it something related to being Anglo, as opposed to, say, German or Chinese or Arab?
It might be connected to the humans deep seated desire for belonging. In another thread we discussed how people not born as Mennonites can feel like they are not completely accepted.

I suppose all humans can feel this way when they are surrounded by people different than themselves. This is not necessarily connected to a sense of superiority by the majority. People just like to fit in and people in minority sometimes have a tendency to focus to much on there minority.
There is a sense of belonging and safety and stability in being part of a majority - whether in culture, religion, ethnicity, locality or nationality. I don't think this belonging is wrong until it begins to exclude or push away others in order to selfishly keep the good to myself. I think it is different when the newcomer isn't coming constructively, but really wants to be destructive.
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haithabu
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Re: Bunny trail on borders

Post by haithabu »

Refugees are a separate though related issue to immigration. Specifically: how much should a nation's immigration consist of refugees who are qualified on the basis of need alone rather than on objective qualities that make them a asset to the nation?

I have ambivalent feelings about that. I've worked with refugees extensively. For the better part of two decades I was our church's go to guy for liaison with refugee families. I've experienced the pleasure of welcoming these families and seeing them gratefully take hold and work hard to make a place for themselves and their children. I've also had the sour feeling of watching others not so gratefully lay back and live on the dole while working for cash on the side.

Refugees are human and obviously some will be more deserving than others. But as a group I would say that they are not more deserving than people who come in on Canada's Foreign Worker program and in many cases less so. Yes, there are many refugee families who are motivated and industrious but the degree of sacrifice which they are required to make is far less than what is asked of each foreign worker I have met.

As an example: two years ago I attended an organizing meeting for a community sponsorship initiative for a prospective Syrian family. The budget proposed at the meeting was one which assumed full support for the family for a year together with ancillary service and supports which totaled $100,000 in cash and in kind.

Contrast that with the foreign worker who hits the ground running with first one and then two or more jobs beginning the first week he or she is in country. She receives no ESL training other than what she herself pays for. She expects to learn our language and the rules of our society on the job. She is not allowed bring family over until she is granted permanent residency, which takes a minimum of four years. That's four years of working 60 or more hours a week, separated from her children, living in a rented bedroom while sending up to half of her money home.

Which of these two is likely to value their Canadian citizenship more? Whose children are more likely to take hold and thrive?

Humanitarian need is the rationale behind the refugee program and the ultimate trump card to favour the refugee over the economically motivated foreign worker or immigrant. Yet even here the issue is not so clear cut. The Syrian family which was eventually sponsored was not pulled out of a war zone. They came from a camp in Lebanon where they had been established for the better part of a decade. They, too, came to Canada in search for opportunities great than what they enjoyed at home. The same applies to all of the Cambodian immigrants I worked with in the 80's and 90's. They had fled their country's killing fields, but our sponsorships didn't save them from death in Cambodia; we saved them from life in a Thai camp and eventual repatriation to Cambodia after the Khmer Rouge were removed from power. I didn't and don't begrudge them that, but the point is that the plight of the refugee is not always that much different from the plight of the economic migrant.

The bottom line is that I do support our refugee program, but the emphasis in immigration policy should be on those who are best motivated and equipped to contribute to Canadian society. And those who follow more strenuous paths to citizenship should be respected and supported more than they are. In fact, I almost think it would be healthier model of helping refugees to shrink the fully sponsored refugee program while expanding the FW program and giving preference to refugees for FW positions.
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Bootstrap
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Re: Bunny trail on borders

Post by Bootstrap »

haithabu wrote:Refugees are a separate though related issue to immigration. Specifically: how much should a nation's immigration consist of refugees who are qualified on the basis of need alone rather than on objective qualities that make them a asset to the nation?
To me, refugees are the people that we let in precisely because of their need, legal immigration is the mechanism we use to admit immigrants that we would choose as an asset to the nation. When a country erupts in a civil war, many of the people who flee are not the ones we would have chosen if the civil war had not occurred. The ideal situation would be a world without war and violence where refugees do not need to flee.

The United States has generally negotiated with the rest of the world so that many nations are carrying some of this burden, and our share has usually been proportional to the rest of the world until quite recently.

Generally, the United States absorbs somewhere between 0.6 and 1 percent of the world's refugees.

Lately, the share that the United States carries has been dropping significantly.

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haithabu
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Re: Bunny trail on borders

Post by haithabu »

Bootstrap wrote:Haithabu, you seem to be implying that there was a huge increase in illegal immigrants under the Obama Administration.

Let's take a look at the overall number of illegal immigrants in the United States since 1990 - a period that includes George H.W. Bush, Bill Clinton, George W Bush, and Barack Obama.

I just don't see a spike in illegal immigration under Obama. I don't think that the political rhetoric matches actual facts here. And I don't think we are facing runaway illegal immigration in the States right now.
There has been a huge increase in illegal immigrants since 1990. I don't lay it all on Obama. As far as Obama's role - I don't give him credit for the drop in and stabilization of the number of illegal immigrants either which seems to coincide with the onset of the recession in 2007. The lack of job opportunities had more of an effect than anything the government did. However, the question remains: why has that number stabilized? If there were effective immigration enforcement - and I don't just mean at the the borders - would you not expect that number to have continued to angle downward toward 1990's levels? If the economy improves as it appears likely to, what would prevent that number from spiking again?

The question also is what are people to make of Democrats' seemingly reflexive opposition to Trump's proposed wall/immigration enforcement policies and support of the sanctuary movement? It seems very much as if the party wants to normalize illegal immigration as a semi-permanent plank of American immigration policy.
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PeterG
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Re: Bunny trail on borders

Post by PeterG »

Josh wrote:
Bootstrap wrote:
Josh wrote:Who said anything anything about expelling people? The question is if large demographic changes should be allowed or promitted.
Name me a time in the history of the United States or Canada when there weren't large demographic changes. It seems to have worked reasonably well for both countries over the past few centuries.
I would say it worked very poorly for Native Americans and for First Nations peoples.
That was a matter of conquest much more than a matter of immigration.

As Bootstrap has alluded to, the anti-immigration arguments of today are virtually identical to the arguments made in the 18th–20th centuries against German, Irish, Italian, Slavic, Jewish, and Chinese immigration. Were those arguments valid then?
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Bootstrap
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Re: Bunny trail on borders

Post by Bootstrap »

haithabu wrote:I have ambivalent feelings about that. I've worked with refugees extensively. For the better part of two decades I was our church's go to guy for liaison with refugee families. I've experienced the pleasure of welcoming these families and seeing them gratefully take hold and work hard to make a place for themselves and their children. I've also had the sour feeling of watching others not so gratefully lay back and live on the dole while working for cash on the side.
I appreciate the work you have done. I have been the organizer for our church's refugee efforts with two Syrian families, but I have not been doing that as long as you have. And FWIW, both families are working hard to establish themselves here.
haithabu wrote:As an example: two years ago I attended an organizing meeting for a community sponsorship initiative for a prospective Syrian family. The budget proposed at the meeting was one which assumed full support for the family for a year together with ancillary service and supports which totaled $100,000 in cash and in kind.

Contrast that with the foreign worker who hits the ground running with first one and then two or more jobs beginning the first week he or she is in country. She receives no ESL training other than what she herself pays for. She expects to learn our language and the rules of our society on the job. She is not allowed bring family over until she is granted permanent residency, which takes a minimum of four years. That's four years of working 60 or more hours a week, separated from her children, living in a rented bedroom while sending up to half of her money home.
I don't actually know the budget numbers, but I do know that resettlement support lasts only 6 months here in the States, it can be extended another 6 months for extenuating circumstances. The families I know work, and work hard. And I know that at least the one family I work with has to pay off their flight costs to the United States, the flight was paid for as a loan. I do think that they have a lot of medical costs paid for - they had not seen much medical care or dental care in their lifetimes, and they had some significant medical issues.

How did that work for your prospective Syrian family? Were they not expected to work and pay for their living costs? What did that $100,000 pay for?
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haithabu
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Re: Bunny trail on borders

Post by haithabu »

Bootstrap wrote:
haithabu wrote:I don't have a particular issue with immigration per se, or with demographic replacement. I do have an issue with cultural replacement, since I believe that our host (Anglo) culture is the one which best safeguards the social qualities which make our countries the best places in the world to live.
Which aspects of the culture are you most concerned about? Is it our democratic tradition and economy? Or our faith heritage? Or is it something related to being Anglo, as opposed to, say, German or Chinese or Arab?
Our culture has already largely moved away from its faith heritage so that's not primarily it. It's a matter of having a common language, common manners and a common identity which includes the existing political, legal and economic traditions and which in the minds of immigrants and their children supercedes that of their culture of origin.

I mean that America should remain Anglo in the sense that someone named Petrochuk is Anglo and reserves "Ukrainian" as a descriptor for their grandmother.
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Josh
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Re: Bunny trail on borders

Post by Josh »

Bootstrap wrote:
haithabu wrote:I don't have a particular issue with immigration per se, or with demographic replacement. I do have an issue with cultural replacement, since I believe that our host (Anglo) culture is the one which best safeguards the social qualities which make our countries the best places in the world to live.
Which aspects of the culture are you most concerned about? Is it our democratic tradition and economy? Or our faith heritage? Or is it something related to being Anglo, as opposed to, say, German or Chinese or Arab?
I don’t think turning America into the Balkans would be a good thing.
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