Illegal Immigration/Gang Problems

[Leftsolidarity]

I'd seperate these 2 into different threads but I'm too lazy.

I'm usually pro-immigration almost 100 percent either legal or illegal. I have personally known people who got in the country in less than legal ways. I know that the majority of illegal immigrants are just looking for a better future and I totally support them on that but there are also some fairly bad people who slip through illegally also. I'm starting to feel that illegal immigration really should be cracked down on but only after serious reform to let those that need a better future in without much of a hassle. I was wondering how others here feel about this topic.

Also, this is just a side note but how do you think the Left should deal with major gangs and cartels?

[Agnapostate]

I know that the majority of illegal immigrants are just looking for a better future and I totally support them on that but there are also some fairly bad people who slip through illegally also.

Empirical research indicates that immigrants are often less prone to crime than the host population:

1. Crime, Corrections, and California (www.ppic.org/content/pubs/cacounts/CC_208KBCC.pdf): "We find that the foreign-born, who make up about 35 percent of the adult population in California, constitute only about 17 percent of the adult prison population. Thus, immigrants are underrepresented in California prisons compared to their representation in the overall population. In fact, U.S.-born adult men are incarcerated at a rate over two-and-a-half times greater than that of foreign-born men.

The difference only grows when we expand our investigation. When we consider all institutionalization (not only prisons but also jails, halfway houses, and the like) and focus on the population that is most likely to be in institutions because of criminal activity (men ages 18–40), we find that, in California, U.S.-born men have an institutionalization rate that is 10 times higher than that of foreign-born men (4.2% vs. 0.42%). And when we compare foreign-born men to U.S.-born men with similar age and education levels, these differences become even greater. Indeed, our evidence suggests that increasing educational requirements in the provision of visas would have very little effect in the criminal justice arena."

2. Cross-city evidence on the relationship between immigration and crime (http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/%28SICI%291520-6688%28199822%2917:3%3C457::AID-PAM4%3E3.0.CO;2-F/abstract): "Public concerns about the costs of immigration and crime are high, and sometimes overlapping. This article investigates the relationship between immigration into a metropolitan area and that area's crime rate during the 1980s. Using data from the Uniform Crime Reports and the Current Population Surveys, we find, in the cross section, that cities with high crime rates tend to have large numbers of immigrants. However, controlling for the demographic characteristics of the cities, recent immigrants appear to have no effect on crime rates. In explaining changes in a city's crime rate over time, the flow of immigrants again has no effect, whether or not we control for other city-level characteristics. In a secondary analysis of individual data from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth (NLSY), we find that youth born abroad are statistically significantly less likely than native-born youth to be criminally active."

3. The immigration–crime relationship: Evidence across US metropolitan areas (linkinghub.elsevier.com/retrieve/pii/S0049089X05000104): "Despite popular commentary claiming a link between immigration and crime, empirical research exploring this relationship is sparse. Especially missing from the literature on immigration and crime is a consideration of how immigration affects rates of crime at the macro-level. Although individual-level studies of immigrant criminality and victimization tend to demonstrate that immigrants typically engage in less crime than their native-born counterparts, the effect of immigration on aggregate criminal offending is less clear. In this research, we attempt to address this weakness in the literature by examining the effects of aspects of immigration on crime rates in metropolitan areas. We combine 2000 US Census data and 2000 Uniform Crime Report data to explore how the foreign-born population influences criminal offending across a sample of metropolitan areas. After controlling for a host of demographic and economic characteristics, we find that immigration does not increase crime rates, and some aspects of immigration lessen crime in metropolitan areas."

4. Undocumented Immigration and Rates of Crime and Imprisonment: Popular Myths and Empirical Realities (www.policefoundation.org/pdf/strikingabalance/Appendix%20D.pdf): "Since the early 1990s, as the immigrant population (especially the undocumented population) increased sharply to historic highs, the rates of violent crimes and property crimes in the United States decreased significantly, in some instances to historic lows—as measured both by crimes reported to the police and by national victimization surveys. Moreover, data from the census and a wide range of other empirical studies show that for every ethnic group without exception, incarceration rates among young men are lowest for immigrants, even those who are the least educated. This holds true especially for the Mexicans, Salvadorans, and Guatemalans who make up the bulk of the undocumented population. These patterns have been observed consistently over the last three decennial censuses, a period that spans the current era of mass immigration, and recall similar national-level findings reported by three major government commissions during the first three decades of the 20th century."

5. Debunking the Myth of Immigrant Criminality: Imprisonment Among First- and Second-Generation Young Men (icirr.org/en/node/2664): "Surprisingly, at least from the vantage of conventional wisdom, the data show the above hypotheses to be unfounded. In fact, the incarceration rate of the US born (3.51 percent) was four times the rate of the foreign born (0.86 percent). The foreign-born rate was half the 1.71 percent rate for non-Hispanic white natives, and 13 times less than the 11.6 percent incarceration rate for native black men (see Table 1)...Of particular interest is the finding that the lowest incarceration rates among Latin American immigrants are seen for the least educated groups: Salvadorans and Guatemalans (0.52 percent), and Mexicans (0.70 percent). These are precisely the groups most stigmatized as "illegals" in the public perception and outcry about immigration."

6. Sociological Criminology and the Mythology of Hispanic Immigration and Crime (www.jstor.org/stable/3097078): "Our sociological knowledge of crime is fragmented and ineffective in challenging and correcting mistaken public perceptions, for example, linking immigration and crime. These misperceptions are perpetuated by government reports of growing numbers of Hispanic immigrants in U.S. prisons. However, Hispanic immigrants are disproportionately young males who regardless of citizenship are at greater risk of criminal involvement. They are also more vulnerable to restrictive treatment in the criminal justice system, especially at the pre-trial stage. When these differences are integrated into calculations using equations that begin with observed numbers of immigrants and citizens in state prisons, it is estimated that the involvement of Hispanic immigrants in crime is less than that of citizens. These results cast doubt on the hypothesis that immigration causes crime and make more transparent the immigration and criminal justice policies that inflate the rate of Hispanic incarceration. This transparency helps to resolve a paradox in the picture of Mexican immigration to the United States, since by most measures of well-being, Mexican immigrants are found to do as well and sometimes better than citizens."

7. Immigration and homicide in urban America: what's the connection? (http://www.emeraldinsight.com/books.htm?chapterid=1791227&show=pdf): "Findings – Cities with greater immigrant concentration have lower homicide rates. There is a significant and fairly strong positive relationship between immigration and gang-related homicides.

Value – This analysis with disaggregated homicide adds to the findings that immigration is not associated with increased crime. Its finding of a correlation between immigration and gang-related homicides points to the next question that needs to be addressed with appropriate data."

[Leftsolidarity]

Good stuff but I think that just backs up what I said.

[Agnapostate]

Good stuff but I think that just backs up what I said.

The fairly bad people, as an exception to a general rule, cannot reasonably be the target population in formation of immigration policy.

[Jimmie Higgins]

The fairly bad people, as an exception to a general rule, cannot reasonably be the target population in formation of immigration policy.

And, in fact it is often the existence of migration restrictions that gives power to a black market-driven industry of smuggling (people and things) and makes ordinary migrant workers the victims of gangs and swindlers and so on.

The other thing is that the drug question has to be seen in a much different context than the border question. The border patrol does little to stop the flow of drugs and only militarizes the cross-border drug-distribution system. As long as it is possible to make heaps of money off of black markets and as long as there is rampant inequality that makes the risks of making drug or smuggling profits worth it to some, then drug distribution organizations will continue to operate. Even if it was magically possible to cut off all smuggling across the border, then the domestic drug distribution organizations would be the only beneficiaries and they would then engage in the same violent competition.

The best thing is to not militarize the border and, instead, allow anyone who works in the US to have the same rights regardless of documentation status. This would weaken the power of semi-legal contractors who hire (and are often connected to gangs and cross-border smuggling operations) undocumented workers and can be abusive or blackmail the workers - it would also eliminate the niche (created by the border restrictions themselves) of coyotes and gangs who take advantage of workers seeking work across the border.

The drug problem is bigger and I think many on the left agree that it would be better for all drugs to be decriminalized and heavily addictive ones treated like a medical issue where people can maybe get their fix in a regulated way if they have to. This would decrease the ability to make black-market profits off the drugs because the harder it is to make and distribute the drugs that there is a demand for, the more profitable it is for the select few big black market organizations.

[Arlekino]

Interesting Baltic States lost majority of population young migrated to rest of Europe. Some critical views I got on migration do we as migrant workers doing such big favour to capitalist society weaker unions, less fight against capitalist, there is nobody wish to fight the population left kind of left overs from Soviet Union could not bother to fight.

[pranabjyoti]

Interesting Baltic States lost majority of population young migrated to rest of Europe. Some critical views I got on migration do we as migrant workers doing such big favour to capitalist society weaker unions, less fight against capitalist, there is nobody wish to fight the population left kind of left overs from Soviet Union could not bother to fight.
Sorry to say, but the answer is very very close to "yes". But, not only the people from Baltic countries (like you) are responsible for that. People from third world countries (like India) are also responsible (probably much more). IMO, South Asian people are most poisonous in this regard.

[Arlekino]

Kind of agree yes we are responsible yes we run away and we wanted more money, more commodities work as slaves. What else for capitalist need they would employ from another countries and they work as well hard and more harder.

[danyboy27]

Letting ''bad'' people in is part of the game, and if the majority of immigrant where not put into a situation of isolation has they are right now, the benefits society would get from immigration would be worth the pain of letting a fews murderer and psychopaths slip trought the net.

[Franz Fanonipants]

no mames

E: check this shit out bro this is the entire reason that Mexico is what it is right now

http://www.newspapertree.com/system/news_article/image1/2850/9.14.08_border_fence.jpg

and it gets even bigger in El Paso

basically i am of two positions on this issue:

1. the only way to "calm down" the US-Mexico border is to demilitarize it. I think the average non-border living American would be fucking shocked at what the borderlands are like.
2. if you don't live near the border, you should shut the fuck up about it.

[Thirsty Crow]

Interesting Baltic States lost majority of population young migrated to rest of Europe. Some critical views I got on migration do we as migrant workers doing such big favour to capitalist society weaker unions, less fight against capitalist, there is nobody wish to fight the population left kind of left overs from Soviet Union could not bother to fight.


IMO, South Asian people are most poisonous in this regard

Excuse me, my eyes hurt a bit, but did you just state that a certain migratory population is the most poisonous, in that regard?
If not outright racism, this must be a sign of very poor skills in selecting a lexical item in social contexts. Anyway, you're a moron.

To answer the question, no, migrant workers are not the one to bear the resonsibility for the decline of unions (class compromise and the more or less full integration of these orgs into the capitalist system) and general workers' militancy. Rather, migration is a symptom of open class struggle which is on the agenda of the capitalist class from at least the mid 1970s. Worldwide.

And whoever should place the blame on migrants is, quite explicitly, whether aware of it or not, expressing a fundamentally anti-working class attitude.


Kind of agree yes we are responsible yes we run away and we wanted more money, more commodities work as slaves. What else for capitalist need they would employ from another countries and they work as well hard and more harder.
Its too bad to hear that you buy this pile of shit that would pass as a reasonable argument.
Do you honestly think that accepting this vicious atittude as self-victimization is something productive for the movement of and for the working class?

[Arlekino]

Is not self victimisation at all, I am not against working class as myself migrant worker seems unfair claim on me. Well less we are in group harder to fight.

[Thirsty Crow]

Oh, pranabjyoti, you are wondering if I have any idea about reality? Do you mean, do I have any idea about the toxicology of certain human groups, such as the poisonous South Asians?

You're fucking despicable. And a coward at that. Show some guts and defend your positions in public.

[Rusty Shackleford]

la lucha obreras no tiene fronteras.

[NoOneIsIllegal]

Gangs relating to immigrants are probably the same as gangs relating to "legal" citizens: easy money. A young teenager growing up in a rough neighborhood has a choice: either work his ass off at a stressful, low-paying, and unrespectful job (such as McDonalds), or he can make easy money doing quite illegal business. The latter isn't rare, so it's not like he hasn't seen it before. If he's use to it, aware of the facts, how it operates, etc. then yeah, he's gonna take part of a crew where you can make a couple hundred dollars easily in one-single night, rather than working his ass off for 2 weeks for the same pay.

This isn't an issue for immigrants or citizens, it's just a problem with capitalism in-general, not being able to provide good paying, respectful jobs. It creates slums and crime.

BTW, 94% of "illegal" immigrants have jobs, a higher percentage than any other group in the United States.

[Leftsolidarity]

Gangs relating to immigrants are probably the same as gangs relating to "legal" citizens: easy money. A young teenager growing up in a rough neighborhood has a choice: either work his ass off at a stressful, low-paying, and unrespectful job (such as McDonalds), or he can make easy money doing quite illegal business. The latter isn't rare, so it's not like he hasn't seen it before. If he's use to it, aware of the facts, how it operates, etc. then yeah, he's gonna take part of a crew where you can make a couple hundred dollars easily in one-single night, rather than working his ass off for 2 weeks for the same pay.

This isn't an issue for immigrants or citizens, it's just a problem with capitalism in-general, not being able to provide good paying, respectful jobs. It creates slums and crime.

BTW, 94% of "illegal" immigrants have jobs, a higher percentage than any other group in the United States.


I know, I didn't mean to try to relate the two together I was just tired and didn't feel like making 2 threads. I know why they form and all that since I have been around them a lot but I there are some big ass gangs out there that would be very antagonistic to a revolution. So what do you think could help solve that problem?

[Reznov]

I know, I didn't mean to try to relate the two together I was just tired and didn't feel like making 2 threads. I know why they form and all that since I have been around them a lot but I there are some big ass gangs out there that would be very antagonistic to a revolution. So what do you think could help solve that problem?

Ahh, good point. I was discussing this with a friend online, and we were talking about the EZLN in Mexico and how they had to constantly deal with drug dealers and their own people using the drugs, becoming addicted or lured to easy money and drugs for sabotaging the EZLN operations.

Drug cartels (As they are in Mexico) aren't stupid, and really don't want any government, revolutionary or capitalist too infringe on their operations.

[pranabjyoti]

Oh, pranabjyoti, you are wondering if I have any idea about reality? Do you mean, do I have any idea about the toxicology of certain human groups, such as the poisonous South Asians?

You're fucking despicable. And a coward at that. Show some guts and defend your positions in public.
Certainly yes, because I am from that region and are now facing them everyday as a part of my daily life as a part of working class.

[Leftsolidarity]

Certainly yes, because I am from that region and are now facing them everyday as a part of my daily life as a part of working class.

Keep your racism off of here

[A Revolutionary Tool]

Certainly yes, because I am from that region and are now facing them everyday as a part of my daily life as a part of working class.
Wow how can you say this and not get banned? It's like saying "illegal" Mexicans are poisonous to the working class because they don't join unions, don't want to cause a stir in this country because they feel foreign, etc. It's actually exactly what you're saying, racism is used to split the working class amongst themselves, you shouldn't be calling other workers poisonous. Really that was just fucking stupid of you to say.

[pranabjyoti]

Wow how can you say this and not get banned? It's like saying "illegal" Mexicans are poisonous to the working class because they don't join unions, don't want to cause a stir in this country because they feel foreign, etc. It's actually exactly what you're saying, racism is used to split the working class amongst themselves, you shouldn't be calling other workers poisonous. Really that was just fucking stupid of you to say.
Those who don't want to join the workers struggle, I can not forgive them for any reason and IMO, THEY ARE JUST NOT COMPETENT ENOUGH TO GET SUPPORT OF ADVANCED WORKING CLASS. Helping them is just wastage of resource and time.

[Reznov]

Those who don't want to join the workers struggle, I can not forgive them for any reason and IMO, THEY ARE JUST NOT COMPETENT ENOUGH TO GET SUPPORT OF ADVANCED WORKING CLASS. Helping them is just wastage of resource and time.

I think he has some misled beliefs. Most of these workers don't care to join unions because they feel it is useless and nothing can be done, especially not for an immigrant in a foreign country. This kind of thinking must be reversed by Communists, as we must inform all workers that we all are apart of the class struggle.

[Sinister Cultural Marxist]

Those who don't want to join the workers struggle, I can not forgive them for any reason and IMO, THEY ARE JUST NOT COMPETENT ENOUGH TO GET SUPPORT OF ADVANCED WORKING CLASS. Helping them is just wastage of resource and time.

There's nothing more irritating than a moralistic communist. Do you know what false consciousness is? If you do, then you should not run around judging workers who don't behave as you want them to behave. If you don't, then you have a sloppy understanding of Marxist theory. Instead of blaming the workers, why don't you consider the material conditions for the fact that they are not all revolutionaries?

Anyway, even if this were the case it's fucked up to single out South Asian working class folk for this. If you haven't noticed, most workers in the world, regardless of ethnicity, don't all join Communist Parties either. It's not like the subcontinent working class is any worse in this regard.



This is an important thing to note however-you should stfu with the racist shit, because racism against people from your background is still racism. Just because you're from South Asia, it doesn't give you a right to judge all South Asians. A Jewish Nazi is still as much a fucking dirty antisemite as an Aryan Nazi.

[Jimmie Higgins]

Those who don't want to join the workers struggle, I can not forgive them for any reason and IMO, THEY ARE JUST NOT COMPETENT ENOUGH TO GET SUPPORT OF ADVANCED WORKING CLASS. Helping them is just wastage of resource and time.

Then no workers in the US south and 89% of the entire workforce are a waste of resources and time since US unionization is about 10% or so. The US South is a solid block of anti-union right to work states... also where wages are the lowest in the country and where racial and nationality (immigration) divisions are the strongest.

In the US, undocumented workers can not join unions, are generally not protected by what little rights native US workers have to begin with and are often working in nearly segregated conditions, hired by "contractors" so that the main company running agriculture or hired to build houses or commercial buildings or whatnot has plausible deneyability if caught abusing or exploiting (or in the current xenophobic climate, just hiring) undocumented workers.

Beyond that, competency has nothing to do with shit considering that many of the workers at Republic Windows and Doors were latino immigrants (I don't know about documentation staus, but if documented immigrants fight for their rights, why would undocumented workers magically not be competent enough to want the same thing), the Justice for Janitors struggle in Los Angeles was made up largely of immigrants from Latin America and South East Asia. That and the largest protests of the last decade were immigrant rights marches that consciously picked May Day and in which worker's rights were a central theme in both the form of the protests (workplace walkouts) and in people's signs and slogans.

Far from being incompetent, I'd say that in many ways, the immigrant labor force is a vanguard of the labor movement - if only because without access to the mainstream unions, they are left to fight on their own terms.

What the labor movement needs to be doing in regards to immigrants is

1) fight for cross-border solidarity - this began even with the bureaucratic unions in the 1990s as the labor movement began to grapple with the effects of neoliberalism and capitalist globalization. Factories on the US/Mexico border allow companies to get around Mexican and US regulations and so unions began to support efforts of workers in these US factories that used Mexican labor. There needs to be more of that and real internationalism in the unions where they could use domestic pressure to support, for example, FORD workers in Mexico or Wal-Mart manufacturing workers in China. The alternative labor strategy is more jingoism, trying to get democrats to pass "buy American" laws, etc and this does not strengthen the workers struggle because it helps divide the working class while simultaneously bringing the labor bureaucracy closer to the ruling class and todies for US imperialism.

2) Labor should support all efforts to ensure that anyone working a job in the US has the same rights so they can not be intimidated and can fight and form unions. This means opposing all immigration restrictions and even laws against the employers who hire undocumented workers since that would just push the operations underground forcing these contractors to be even more abusive in their modern-day Shanghi-ing of immigrant laborers. If all workers regardless of staus can have the same rights then there is no "race to the bottom" in wages. This is a lesson from US Labor history where traditionally, the bosses have used black migrants, European immigrants, and even Okiee migrants as surplus labor and a ready-made scab-pool when other workers go on strike. Because unions did not allow blacks or other groups to join at different points, these divisions acted as an Achilles heel for the entire movement. It wasn't until the 1930s that the jingoism and racism began to really be overcome and that made the movement stronger.

[S.Artesian]

I'd seperate these 2 into different threads but I'm too lazy.

I'm usually pro-immigration almost 100 percent either legal or illegal. I have personally known people who got in the country in less than legal ways. I know that the majority of illegal immigrants are just looking for a better future and I totally support them on that but there are also some fairly bad people who slip through illegally also. I'm starting to feel that illegal immigration really should be cracked down on but only after serious reform to let those that need a better future in without much of a hassle. I was wondering how others here feel about this topic.

Also, this is just a side note but how do you think the Left should deal with major gangs and cartels?


So what does that mean, some fairly bad people slip through? So what? Fairly bad people acting fairly badly exist wherever you are? Would you support deporting the "fair bad" native-born people?

My guess is not. "Fairly bad people"? What do you call the House of Lords? the Tories, the US Republicans and Democrats, Sarkozy and his coalition, Berlusconi and the Northern League-- all properly documented citizens?

Look a bit deeper into the origins of the immigrants-- dispossessed in the main from subsistence economies in Asia, Africa, Latin America by things like NAFTA, death squads against rural workers, industrial fishing by EU countries etc. etc.

Why would you want to give an ounce of support to the very forces that devastate the globe, impoverishing people in order to accumulate value, even "after a serious reform," like such a reform is even possible. What's needed, what should be articulated is quite clear and direct.

"No one is illegal. Open borders."

[S.Artesian]

In the US, undocumented workers can not join unions, are generally not protected by what little rights native US workers have to begin with and are often working in nearly segregated conditions, hired by "contractors" so that the main company running agriculture or hired to build houses or commercial buildings or whatnot has plausible deneyability if caught abusing or exploiting (or in the current xenophobic climate, just hiring) undocumented workers.

Undocumented workers can and do join unions, which is one of the main reasons Obama and company has so dramatically expanded its surveillance of the workplace and its actions making employers responsible for the "legality" of their workers.

[Leftsolidarity]

So what does that mean, some fairly bad people slip through? So what? Fairly bad people acting fairly badly exist wherever you are? Would you support deporting the "fair bad" native-born people?

My guess is not. "Fairly bad people"? What do you call the House of Lords? the Tories, the US Republicans and Democrats, Sarkozy and his coalition, Berlusconi and the Northern League-- all properly documented citizens?

Look a bit deeper into the origins of the immigrants-- dispossessed in the main from subsistence economies in Asia, Africa, Latin America by things like NAFTA, death squads against rural workers, industrial fishing by EU countries etc. etc.

Why would you want to give an ounce of support to the very forces that devastate the globe, impoverishing people in order to accumulate value, even "after a serious reform," like such a reform is even possible. What's needed, what should be articulated is quite clear and direct.

"No one is illegal. Open borders."

By 'fairly bad people' I meant people like major drug runners and wanted murderers. You're acting as if I am somehow anti-immigration, I am not. I just think that while we still have bourgeois nation-states that we do need to protect our borders while still letting people into the country that are just looking for a better life. I do believe such reform is possible since not all reform is impossible. I am not a reformist because I think revolution is the only thing that can truely solve our problems but I'm not going to just sit around saying "oh, I don't need to worry about that cuz the revolution is coming any day now"

[S.Artesian]

So you expect the same forces, the same classes, that have fomented the drug trade, that have reduced Mexico to a state of civil war with its "war on drugs," that has locked up, at various times, about 1/3 of black males, many on phony drug charges to "protect 'our' [sic] borders"?

First, those borders arent' "ours." I have no allegiance to the land seizures, grabs, thefts, occupations, annexations of the United States government.

Secondly, "protection" hasn't been, and isn't going to be the issue. It will be used in the future as it is now-- to target poor, working class migrants; to scapegoat them, while the drug dealers buy their protection, along with their firearms, from the very institutions you expect to protect the borders.

That's a fact.

No, not all reform is impossible. Why hell, just the other day...... wait a minute, refresh my memory: what substantive reforms have been enacted by the US bourgeoisie for the benefit of the working class, the poor, the homeless, the malnourished, in the last 10 years?

Can you name one? I can't.

[brigadista]

erecting borders and legislating for immigration by categorising entry as legal or illegal thus criminalising certain immigrants will attract existing criminal gang activity by virtue of the illegality classification - put the blame in the right place- its a global economic capitalism issue -don't scapegoat immigrants