Roof over your head? Eat out much?
Do you have a roof over your head? Do you like to eat out?
Problem is...people (including some in the Jewish community) have an idea of their family's own immigrant background that's not quite accurate. One common myth: "My people came here legally, so should everyone else." Well, it's not that simple. First of all, immigration law until the 1920s was simpler. People could get in from Europe, including Eastern Europe, where most Jews came from, much more easily, than can people today who come from Mexico and points south. Second, all that changed beginning in the 1920s. Eastern Europeans could no longer get in easily--or at all. So, it's no accident that Jewish emigration to the U.S. dropped dramatically about that time, and that people were stuck in Europe during the '30s and '40s, in spite of their desperation to get out of there and to get in here. Second of all, there are not visas available for people who want to come here to take low-wage jobs. We want restaurants, which need restaurant workers, and we want roofs, which need roofers, and we want gardens, which need landscapers, but we don't want to give the visas to those most willing to do these difficult, dangerous, and exhausting jobs. So I ask all of you who have landscaped property, roofs over your head, and who like to eat in any restaurant, whether you are willing to do without these things?
Problem is...people (including some in the Jewish community) have an idea of their family's own immigrant background that's not quite accurate. One common myth: "My people came here legally, so should everyone else." Well, it's not that simple. First of all, immigration law until the 1920s was simpler. People could get in from Europe, including Eastern Europe, where most Jews came from, much more easily, than can people today who come from Mexico and points south. Second, all that changed beginning in the 1920s. Eastern Europeans could no longer get in easily--or at all. So, it's no accident that Jewish emigration to the U.S. dropped dramatically about that time, and that people were stuck in Europe during the '30s and '40s, in spite of their desperation to get out of there and to get in here. Second of all, there are not visas available for people who want to come here to take low-wage jobs. We want restaurants, which need restaurant workers, and we want roofs, which need roofers, and we want gardens, which need landscapers, but we don't want to give the visas to those most willing to do these difficult, dangerous, and exhausting jobs. So I ask all of you who have landscaped property, roofs over your head, and who like to eat in any restaurant, whether you are willing to do without these things?
posted by Jewish Community Action Staff at 10:53 AM
1 Comments:
good afternoon JCA members staaff and board members.
I am a long time member of JCA. I have always viewed myself as leaning towards the left--In fact I view myself as a Green Party member BUT i am very confused when it comes to the issue of Immigration reform. In my mind, I still see the current group of immigrents here as being Illegal as opposed to Undocumented. I worked in Hennepin County Adult Dention Center for 1 year and of course I had the chance to book in quite a number of immigrants who were here "undocumented" or "illegal". Many pertended not to know English. Many also pretened to not know that what they did was wrong--usually some kind of misdemenaor offense. can any one really
the other thing that I think about is this: obviously people are leaving Latin American Countries as there are a lot of social problems: why don't the poeple look to solving the problems at home? why are we as a nation not pressuing these countries to start solving their own problems? do you think that America can really handle all these poeple? what about Americans who live here who don't have enought ot eat, or enought clothing or have places to live???
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