Get rid of the birdfeeder: how to really solve the problem of illegal immigrants

I got an email called "Quite an Analogy" forwarded on by somebody I respect and it made me so mad.  It said we should stop providing housing assistance, emergency medical care and free schools.  Because if we did that all the immigrants would go away and life would be better for us.  No crowding, no mess.  (It was comparing it to the fact that if you put on bird feeders, the birds come and make a mess and pester you for food.  Take down the bird feeders, the birds go away and the mess is solved.)

Let me see, if I stopped feeding my kids, they’d probably go away sooner or later and the house would sure be cleaner and quieter.  Or to make the analogy more accurate, that if the neighbor kids started coming over for food, I should stop feeding the neighbor kids and my kids, so that the neighbor kids (never mind what would happen to mine) would go away.  What kind of reasoning is that??  And it obviously resonates with people – someone forwarded it to me. 

If you want the problem to go away, you need to look at why you have the problem.  It’s not because you put out the bird feeder.  If the emergency rooms are crowded, it’s not because you offer emergency care to everyone, it’s because some people had no where else to go.  Figure out why they don’t have family doctors and help them get them.  It has to be easier and cheaper for them and the emergency rooms to provide care for them some other way.  Personally, I like that the courts have constantly up held our right to emergency care regardless of proof of insurance.

I think people that want to get rid of the bird feeder are just plain lazy.  They aren’t willing to really figure out why we have this problem.  This isn’t the immigrants’ problem.  It’s our problem.  We have to fix it.  Getting rid of the bird feeder will just change the problem, not solve it.   

I take that back.  Getting rid of the bird feeder, if it meant lowering our standard of living to that of Mexico, might solve the problem.  If life was as bad here as there, maybe they wouldn’t come.  If I stop feeding my kids, the neighbor kids will stop coming over for dinner. 

One Reply to “Get rid of the birdfeeder: how to really solve the problem of illegal immigrants”

  1. Thank you for your wonderful comment. I am so tired of this rutheless attitude americans have towards illegal immigrants. They DO contribute GREATLY to our society, whether people choose to face that or not. The fact that there are some negatives to their being here doesn’t automatically erase all the good, yes I said GOOD things they do here. My hometown of Gulfport, Mississippi was a direct hit by hurricane Katrina. Thank god for these illegal immigrants who are here now doing the work nobody else wants to do in 100 plus degree weather -rebuilding our homes and businesses, including putting the roof on my home in record time with outstanding craftsmanship. They are also the reason we americans enjoy our fruits and vegetables at REASONABLE prices..because the day farmers start paying living wages to the pickers, thats the day we pay more at the supermarket. Of course they deserve a living wage, but I was just making a point of how we are benefiting from their labor. Thank you for having a kind heart to this issue. It is most refreshing to see in a country where it seems almost everybody wants to blame all of our society’s ills on these hardworking people who are just seeking a better life for their families, just as our ancestors did when they came to this country. And for those who would say the difference is that our ancestors came here legally, I say if our ancestors had been made to wait the years and jump through so many legal hoops to come here, they would have done it illegally too.

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