People Without A Country
The Pew Hispanic Center just released some poll results on Latino attitudes toward immigration and life in America at this point in time. The numbers bolster comments made by DC and other Latino bloggers--It's an Anti-Latino World!
Sixty-four percent said the immigration debate and Congress' failure to enact bills revamping immigration laws has made life harder for Hispanics. Just more than half said the increased attention to immigration has hurt them personally, ranging from 12 percent who said they are having more trouble keeping a job to 24 percent who said they are less likely to travel outside the U.S.
While a minority — 41 percent — said they or someone close has experienced discrimination in the past five years, that proportion has grown since 31 percent said so in a 2002 poll by Pew and the Kaiser Family Foundation. Roughly eight in 10 say they think discrimination against Hispanics is a problem in schools, the workplace and when it comes to success in America, with an increase in those citing school discrimination since 2002 and the other numbers changing little.
"Hispanics in this country are feeling vulnerable in the current political and policy environment," said Paul Taylor, acting director of the center.
Walk in my shoes in right-wing territory and you can feel the anti-Latino attitudes! There's an unwritten litmus test: If he/she speaks English, he/she might not be illegal. Obviously, we have reason to worry because the attitudes are so blatant.
The poll found 53 percent of Hispanics said they worry about deportation for themselves, a relative or close friend, including 33 percent who said they worry about it a lot. While foreign-born Hispanics were most anxious, even one in three native-born Hispanics — who are all U.S. citizens — expressed worry.
In this day and age when our government is spending millions on concentration camps for undocumented families (children included), when politicians in both parties are falling for the right-wing rhetoric, when our government is using gestapo tactics to divide families through raids and "local enforcement," and when Latinos are wondering if their vote in 2008 will really matter based on media and political leadership that promotes the hate rhetoric, what does the rest of America really expect? Citizen-Latinos are just supposed to roll over and agree with the bigots to "prove" they're good Americans? Not when we're feeling it, too!
Lou Dobbs and the right-wing can say it's not about "race." It is!
What we need to remember is that the one in power doesn't get to define what "racism" is, it's the one who is feeling the effects of it.
Sixty-four percent said the immigration debate and Congress' failure to enact bills revamping immigration laws has made life harder for Hispanics. Just more than half said the increased attention to immigration has hurt them personally, ranging from 12 percent who said they are having more trouble keeping a job to 24 percent who said they are less likely to travel outside the U.S.
While a minority — 41 percent — said they or someone close has experienced discrimination in the past five years, that proportion has grown since 31 percent said so in a 2002 poll by Pew and the Kaiser Family Foundation. Roughly eight in 10 say they think discrimination against Hispanics is a problem in schools, the workplace and when it comes to success in America, with an increase in those citing school discrimination since 2002 and the other numbers changing little.
"Hispanics in this country are feeling vulnerable in the current political and policy environment," said Paul Taylor, acting director of the center.
Walk in my shoes in right-wing territory and you can feel the anti-Latino attitudes! There's an unwritten litmus test: If he/she speaks English, he/she might not be illegal. Obviously, we have reason to worry because the attitudes are so blatant.
The poll found 53 percent of Hispanics said they worry about deportation for themselves, a relative or close friend, including 33 percent who said they worry about it a lot. While foreign-born Hispanics were most anxious, even one in three native-born Hispanics — who are all U.S. citizens — expressed worry.
In this day and age when our government is spending millions on concentration camps for undocumented families (children included), when politicians in both parties are falling for the right-wing rhetoric, when our government is using gestapo tactics to divide families through raids and "local enforcement," and when Latinos are wondering if their vote in 2008 will really matter based on media and political leadership that promotes the hate rhetoric, what does the rest of America really expect? Citizen-Latinos are just supposed to roll over and agree with the bigots to "prove" they're good Americans? Not when we're feeling it, too!
Lou Dobbs and the right-wing can say it's not about "race." It is!
What we need to remember is that the one in power doesn't get to define what "racism" is, it's the one who is feeling the effects of it.
posted by Dos Centavos at 12:34 PM
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