On Thu, 24 Apr 2008 19:06:47 -0400, Warp wrote:

> Jim Henderson <nos### [at] nospamcom> wrote:
>> >   You claim that a person's history consists of his ancestors'
>> >   history
>> > besides his own life. I disagree. Why should it have any effect on
>> > your actions what your ancestors did or didn't do? Why should your
>> > own ancestors' actions have more effect on yours than the actions of
>> > someone else's ancestors?
> 
>> Because the mistakes made by those who came before me (whether related
>> by blood or not) are mistakes I personally would care not to repeat.
> 
>   Which is precisely what I said: It doesn't matter who *your* ancestors
> were. "Your ancestors also did this or that" is completely irrelevant.
> 
>   If I'm to learn from past mistakes of humanity, why should I make any
> distinction between whether those people were my ancestors or not?
> That's absolutely and completely irrelevant.

I guess the hang-up here is that I'm not necessarily talking direct-line-
of descent, but "generations that come before us".  I honestly don't know 
if my ancestors were involved in the slave trade.  But that the slave 
trade took place is something that is historically undeniable, and that 
it happened is something that plays into decisions lots of people make in 
how to deal with minorities (for example).

>   The original point in this thread was that you shouldn't treat
>   immigrants
> with disrespect *because your ancestors were immigrants too*.

Well, sure, you shouldn't treat immigrants with disrespect because it's 
just plain wrong to do so.  The historical context is what helps 
demonstrate that it's wrong.

>   No, that's not the reason why you shouldn't treat immigrants (or
>   anyone
> else) with disrespect. That's just an irrelevant argument which doesn't
> make any sense.

Right, I think we agree on that.

>> I can't just come in and say "right, everything we did before is null
>> and void, I don't care who promised you what, we're starting over from
>> scratch".  If we did that on a national/global scale every generation,
>> we'd never get anywhere, and we CERTAINLY wouldn't make any progress.
> 
>   I didn't even understand that.

My point was that if every generation did not incorporate historical 
context into their decisions, as a civilization, we wouldn't make any 
progress.

>> No, that's simply not true.  That the families that came into the US
>> (for me about 4 or 5 generations ago) were permitted to enter this
>> country, even though they didn't speak English (well, some of them did
>> - they came from England) and were welcomed (generally) without people
>> saying "Hey, <derrogatory term>, why don't you learn some goddamned
>> English?  YOU'RE IN AMERICA NOW, SPEAK ENGLISH YOU FRIGGIN IDIOT!" does
>> inform my opinions on matters like this.  As well it should.  Doesn't
>> mean I'll always agree with them, but that past informs my decisions
>> and opinions in the current world situation.
> 
>   Sorry, I still don't understand. Informs?

Sorry, forgot - non-native speaker. :-)  In this context, "inform" (the 
verb) is used as meaning "To give form to the mind, to discipline, 
instruct, teach (a person), to furnish with knowledge."  Or put another 
way, the historical context provides a foundation for the opinion.

My point here is that, at least in the US, some of us forget that our 
ancestors (ie, those who came before us, not necessarily any specific 
individual's specific lineage) generally came from somewhere outside this 
country, and it is disrespectful to our collective history to ignore that 
fact as we take a more adversarial stand (and for some, a much more 
adversarial stand including the suggested and actual use of violence) 
against keeping people out of the US.

I've suggested to several friends who have differing opinions on 
immigration in the US to me that they watch a particular episode of 
Morgan Spurlock's "30 Days" that dealt with the issue of illegal 
immigration.  The idea behind the programme is that someone who is 
against something (be it immigration, Christianity, Islam, whatever - in 
the final episode, Spurlock spent 30 days in jail to show life 'on the 
other side of the tracks' - very interesting) in the situation they 
don't.  When they looked at immigration, they took someone who was a 
legal immigrant (from Cuba, IIRC) who had joined up with the Minutemen 
(an organization - some would say of vigilantes - who 'protect' the 
border from illegal Mexican immigrants) and moved him in with a family of 
illegal immigrants in California.  It was very interesting to see the 
discussions/debates he had - and then he went to Mexico and *saw* where 
they had lived; the family hadn't been back since they crossed the 
border, and they had missed the funeral of one of the grandparents as a 
result.  When he came back to the US, his opinion had changed; even 
coming from Cuba, he had no idea conditions were that bad in the rural 
parts of Mexico and he completely understood the motivation people had to 
cross the border, even illegally, to escape from that extreme poverty.

In the US (and in Europe, I suspect) we talk about poverty, but we really 
have no idea what real poverty is like.  Not to diminish the situation 
that the less fortunate in our respective countries live in (and I know 
there are a few here who identify in that economic category), but 
comparatively speaking, many of those in the US we think of as "the poor" 
have a roof over their heads.  This family in Mexico had 2 walls.  No 
roof, no plumbing, no source of potable water nearby.  A really sad 
situation.

Anyways, the Minuteman who went and saw this came back, and it was 
reported that he then left the "front lines" of the Minutemen and focused 
instead on ways to improve the situation back home for those who would do 
anything to escape the extreme poverty they were leaving.

Unfortunately, in the US, we are a society who looks for "quick fixes", 
and repairing the socioeconomic problems in Mexico is seen (and to an 
extent, rightly so) as being Mexico's problem.  The thing is, Mexico has 
little incentive to do this, so the "quick fix" here in the US is to 
build a wall and put men with guns on that wall to keep the illegals from 
coming over (yes, that's a somewhat simplistic picture of the proposal).  
What would work better is for charitable organizations here to work with 
small towns in the affected parts of Mexico to improve things.  The 
problem with this is that it isn't a quick fix, and it doesn't change 
things overnight - and we are so much a society who lives for instant 
gratification in everything we do.

Jim

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