This week, millions of Arizona citizens will be asking themselves a now critical question: "Could I be mistaken for an illegal immigrant?" Those same citizens have something else in common... their racial appearance. Yes, we have explicit assurances that racial profiling will not be done. In other words, one or more other factors such as activity, behaviour, location (location, location...), dress, etc have to play into the determination. But--let's be honest here--race is always going to be the first-order term in this equation. To meet the definition of profiling, it would have to be the only term in the equation.
And so, because of this new anti-immigrant law, legitimate Arizonans of Latino descent have cause to worry, to imagine scenarios of a sort somewhere between worst-case and every-day, where they are challenged to present their papers. The usual right-wing canard applies: "if you've done nothing wrong, you've got nothing to fear." How fearful would you be, having to ponder the consequences of being in the wrong place at the wrong time with the wrong skin color?
Better make sure we always have our driver's licenses handy, they'll say. For some reason, that seems to be an acceptable form of ID, despite the lax requirements to get one. Maybe next year it will be more stringent; liberty being ratcheted down. That family picnic a little ways up the mountain now seems distinctly unwise, better just to go to the park downtown. Fascism in action.
The perception of an illegal immigrant problem outweighs the reality. Yes, there is border violence, there is drug trafficking. Just recently, a rancher was killed. A few years ago, a Park ranger was killed also. These crimes have received a lot of attention. The Mexican teen who was shot and killed for throwing a rock at a Border Patrol agent barely made the news. Hundreds of migrants die in the desert every year, but those who leave water caches for them are arrested for "littering." And many places along the border have had a big increase in crimes in general. What gets people up in arms, however, is not the trouble along the border. I recently overheard a woman in a hospital waiting room complaining vehemently about how illegals were getting treated "for free." I've heard it elsewhere too--these are supposed crimes that have outraged off many middle-class Arizonans--that illegals are an internal friction in the system, taking services without paying taxes. Arizona's right-wingers have, of course, stoked this outrage while benefiting from it politically.
What I've read presents a very different picture. The vast majority of illegals are doing exactly what you or I would do in their situation: find a way to support our families. And it is a fact that there is a substantial labor shortage here in Arizona, but not one in Mexico. Take into account to, that getting into America legally as a labourer is a byzantine process requiring years of persistence. They've committed no crime other than the shortcut to get here. But they're politically an easy target, and it's an election year.
