VivirLatino

From truthout comes this really important article about immigration, detention and who is profiting from the business of anti-immigration:

Pedro’s mother arrived in the United States from Guatemala with her young son in tow in 1988, seeking asylum she was never granted from the turbulent political situation following the overthrow of the country’s president in 1982.

According to Emily, Pedro’s mother’s “memory is not great,” which proved to be a serious problem when she was called into immigration services for a permanent residency interview. Her responses led to the denial of her request for permanent residence. Because he entered the country with her, Pedro’s immigration status was connected with hers, and he was sent a notice to appear in court.

However, as Emily and Pedro’s attorney, Glenn Fogle, confirmed, the letter was sent to the wrong address. Yet, Pedro’s failure to appear at the court date resulted in the issuance of an order of deportation. The order came to the correct address, and on Monday, September 28, 2009, two black SUVs pulled up to the couple’s home in Durham, North Carolina.

Two men handcuffed Pedro and, after allowing Logan to kiss his father goodbye, took Pedro to the first of three jails or detention centers in which he has lived over the past ten months. Immigration authorities have since admitted their initial mistake in sending information to the wrong address and stayed his deportation. Due to entering the detention center with two marijuana convictions, Pedro was not eligible for bail, but after one misdemeanor charge was dropped, the BIA recommended that Pedro be released on bail.

Meanwhile, his immigration judge, a notoriously tough one with an asylum case denial rate of 87 percent, has rejected Pedro’s pleas for bond and residency under an asylum program known as the Nicaraguan Adjustment and Central American Relief Act (NACARA), under which two of Pedro’s siblings have gained residency. Pedro is now appealing with the BIA for both these issues, continuing to fight his case from the inside.

You should definitely read the whole thing–but I wanted to highlight this particular section of the post because it brings up something that’s been coming up in comments quite a bit lately. The idea of human rights and the role human rights–or, basic human compassion for another human being–has in working through immigration as a violent systematic structure that controls the flow of workers throughout the world.

Is there a place for human compassion and human right in the immigration debate? Is there a place to say–I feel for Pedro as a human being and I don’t want him or his family to suffer in this manner over an unjust law? I think the way the debate is run today, the answer would be no. Fox news, Michelle Malkin, Lou Dobbs–all of the people of that ilk, have made it a sign of weakness, of shame, something to mock, for caring about other human beings who are hurting. And of course, all of the reasoning on why we shouldn’t care about other human beings carry very strong undertones of anti-gay hysteria and nationalism (Oh, wah wah, bleeding heart pussy liberal! Love your country before any human! Weak response! We don’t want to be weak! We want to be manly strong men!).

The response to “being weak” from those on the left has been to get very logical. The law says XYZ! Let’s talk about Title 208 first paragraph from the end! etc. But I have to wonder why pointing to stories like the one MLK told in his final speech about the injured man–the one that Jesus said, “it’s not a question of what will happen to me if I stop to help him–but what will happen to him if I *don’t*?”–are not considered adequate responses any more.

Why is operating from a place of compassion (in many cases based on the very word of the very Bible that hardliners like to thump at us) considered taboo, and a bad thing? An unproductive way of dealing with the question of immigration?