SNOBELEN: The great divide on immigration

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It was snowtime. It was showtime. It was no time. To be lost in downtown Toronto.

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Those are the opening lines to James Taylor’s song about a Toronto winter evening (where “the sunshine just doesn’t want to”) and a surprise encounter with a distinctly southern celebration. A mariachi band “swinging for the fences” warmed Taylor and the partiers.

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Taylor’s description of the people he encountered that cold night struck a chord with me. He said they were “Exiled Mexican textile working, punching two clocks, sending two paychecks home. Hard-working, law-‘biding, bus-riding people.”

That description reminded me of the many braceros I have encountered in bunkhouses and “Mexican motels” at ranches across the southern United States. Hard-working men who gladly endure the dangers of the border and living in tough conditions so they could send money home and make a better life for their families.

I have always found honour in that endeavour and courage in those men. For four decades, I have wondered why Americans couldn’t find a way to legally welcome people they need to power those ranches. In others walks of life, I have similarly wondered about the entangled mess of regulations blocking professional immigration.

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A friend of mine is an alien. She is a doctor who completed her studies in the U.S., works in a U.S. hospital, is married to another doctor who is a U.S. citizen, and is the proud mother of American-born children. But, despite the need for doctors and her obvious ties to the U.S., she remains an alien in a two-year (or more) green card queue with no certainty of her future.

America’s immigration system has been broken for decades and the country and the people have suffered. But the political system can’t seem to find a solution, vacillating between temporary amnesty programs and hardline deportation.

So why can’t politicians fix an obviously broken system? Do they lack imagination or wisdom? Nope. They just have a profound understanding of politics.

Humans are tribal, and for centuries political and religious charlatans have driven wedges between tribes to gain power. The strangeness of the other tribe is always portrayed as dangerous and evil.

Immigrants are the perfect target for politicians. In America, those migrant workers are described as rapists and murderers who are a clear and present danger to the tribe. They must be eradicated.

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And so, America is engaged in a civil war between American tribes with immigrants uncomfortably wedged in the middle. It is not a great time to be brown and poor in America. Heck, even American Indians are rounded up to be deported.

The secondary weapons of this war are new. Podcasts, social media, cellphone video, teargas, pepper spray, and, tragically, government bullets. But the political weapons are ancient: Lies and half-truths.

The civil war in America is moving on from the streets of Minneapolis, but make no mistake: The smell of tear gas will linger and the red on blue war will move to another city. As long as Americans are happy being herded into tribes, they will delight in fighting.

Canadians can learn from our southern neighbours. We can reject the notion of tribes and the people who seek to profit from dividing us. We can remember that there always have been pretenders who profit from splitting us into warring factions.

West vs East, French vs English, established vs new. It is an old, tired story.

And we are better than that.

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