Illegal immigration - the politics of blame - look up, not down

[TroubleMan]

I'm paraphrasing here something I wrote in another post, but I would like to discuss this with my fellow DUers, so I made separate post. I was responding to a post, and I got so into it, it turned almost into an essay.

The main point is that illegal immigrants don't cause you to lose jobs or benefits - it's the insatiable greed of those above us that cause this:

The cause of your problems is above you, not below you.

This is a common trick that the rich and powerful have used forever, and it always works. All the problems that people have cited and blamed on illegal immigration are not caused by illegal immigration. It's caused by the greedy, the rich, and the powerful. They have found a scapegoat for you to direct your anger at.

Instead of directing it at the real source of the problem, greed, they have tricked you into believing that illegal immigration caused you to have your benefits cut. This has worked throughout history, and it's one of the best plays out of the elite playbook. Here are some examples:

The poor whites blamed the Indians for their problems on the early frontier days. The problem was actually caused by large plantation owners using slavery instead of hiring people. Also they used power, political favors, and money to buy up all the land and not share it. This pushed the poor whites to the outskirts of the territories and into Indian territory. Of course, the Indians were blamed.

Post reconstruction white sharecroppers and tenement farmers blaming black sharecroppers and tenement farmers for their problems. Once again the problem was greedy land owners practicing unfair practices, but like usual people blame those below them, instead of looking up, and the blacks were blamed.

In the early union days big companies would break picket lines by hiring starving, unemployed blacks to work for them. Instead of blaming the greedy companies, they blamed the blacks, who were just trying to feed their families.


It seems it's almost human nature to blame somebody who's in a worse position than you or who is more defenseless. It's hard to lay the blame where the real problem is, the rich and powerful. They use their money and power to amass more money and power. The dirt poor are already dirt poor, and have nothing else to give. So where does this extra money and power come from? You....It gets squeezed out of you.

It's hard to look at the rich people and say that they're the ones doing wrong, that they're the ones hogging all the resources, but it's true. It's hard for you to admit that, because everybody wants to be rich and powerful. Everybody wants to move up in the world. You look up to these people thinking you could one day be like that with hard work and discipline (if you're good) or that you can scheme your way into that (if you're bad).

Most people want to be rich and powerful, so they think those people must have done something good to deserve it or are really hard workers. That's usually not the case. Nobody wants to be dirt poor, so they think those people have done something bad or are lazy. I know from personal experience, that's almost never true. I refuse to paint such a broad swathe to judge people, because there's good rich people and there's bad poor people. But your problems are caused by the bad rich people and not the bad poor people.

The problems you're mad about are caused by companies like Walmart who practice unfair business practices, anti-unionism, and who kill off a lot of jobs and small businesses. They also pay so low that it lowers the wages in your area. Also, they have horrible benefits, so that more employees are forced to apply for state benefits. When your benefits are cut, do you blame the Walmart worker? Is it the fault of the minimum-wageslave, who has to work at Walmart because the business they work for got put out of business by Walmart, that you lost some benefits? No, it's the greedy executives at Walmart that took it. Your money went to buy their mansion. However by your logic, you would blame the worker.

The problems you're mad about are caused by the rich and powerful voting to give themselves a tax cut, who voted on the bankruptcy law, who mandated the No Child Left Behind Act and refused to fund it.

Your problems are caused by big money going into politics so that the rich can enact the laws they want so that they can legally steal from you.

That's who you need to blame, not the illegal immigrants. They are just fighting to feed their families. They're not trying to take your job or your benefits. They're just trying to survive. Instead of blaming them, you should help them out. If you and others teamed up with them maybe you could do something to change the injustices that are causing problems from you.

You are idolizing the people who are stealing from you and hating the people who share your problems.

Also, all those examples I have cited above led to violence. The poor killed each other like pawns on a corporate chessboard, while the rich cashed in on the situation. Listen to what the "minutemen" on the Mexican border and their supporters are saying now. They believe that they have to "defend themselves" from illegal immigration. They should be storming wall street, but instead their terrorizing the poor.
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I'd like to know if people here agree with me or not. Thanks for listening.