Attacking immigrants is no good for workers

[Czy]

[Source] (http://www.socialistworker.co.uk/art/37118/Attacking+immigrants+is+no+good+for+workers)


Socialist Worker Tue 17 Dec 2013, 16:16 GMT

Restrictions on the ability of Romanians and Bulgarians to work and settle in other European Union (EU) countries are lifted on 1 January 2014. From the reaction of politicians and the media you would think the world was about to end.

Politicians of all mainstream parties see opposition to immigration as a potential vote winner. David Cameron has floated setting a limit of 75,000 migrants a year, even though it breaks EU rules that he supports.

Lib Dem deputy prime minister Nick Clegg came out against the cap, saying it would be illegal. He was concerned that it might damage trade and lead to reprisals from other EU countries—not that it would be racist.

Other politicians claim we don’t have enough resources. Yet new migrants coming to Britain work and create wealth. They buy products and pay taxes. There is a shortage of housing, schools and hospitals because of cuts put through by Cameron and Clegg. It is nothing to do with immigrants.

A new survey found that 80 percent of British people back tougher measures to stop new immigrants claiming benefits. But it also reported that 77 percent welcome migrants who “work hard” and become part of the community.

Convince

The experience of migrants who arrive has always been that they work and in fact claim fewer benefits than the existing population. It is anti-migrant campaigns by the government and the press that convince people that immigrants cause social problems.

Again and again we are told that the only way to defend workers is to block immigration and look after a mythical national interest. Even supposed left wingers come out with these arguments, arguing that migration is a bosses’ trick to undermine wages.

Some go further. Academic Paul Collier’s new book Exodus was lionised in the “left wing” New Statesman. It talks about how brave he is to raise the issue of migration. He didn’t talk of any benefits capitalists might gain and only saw immigrants as a drain.

“Poor countries are poor because their social models are dysfunctional,” he wrote. “Prosperous societies would therefore have reason to be wary of such settlers.” This kind of argument is nonsense. Blaming migrants for social problems does nothing to help working people.

Workers’ interests are best defended by uniting with other workers. Marxists have said this since the revolutionary Karl Marx called for unity between British and Irish workers in the mid 19th century. And it will be true as long as capitalism exists.

[Bala Perdida]

I don't think many people realize how hard it is being an immigrant. They work harder than everyone else, for less than everyone else. They are undermined by restrictions on working and are forced to settle for cheap labor jobs. They are probably the most exploited of the proletarian in the first world. The fact that we must work with and defend thief every right should be obvious to anyone on the far left.

[brigadista]

More hysteria in uk media all the Bulgarians and Romanians are already here and welcome from me - i heard that there is a report in the possession of the uk gov that shows immigration restriction will increase uk nat debt by 30% -

However it's the bosses that are the problem not immigrant labour - Brit workers should be supporting immigrant labour and inviting union membership but the uk unions well where do I start ? In fortunately many are buying the divide and rule ...

[ArisVelouxiotis]

Meanwhile in greece almost everyday immigrants from pakistan mostly get stabbed or beaten up by the neonazi party golden dawn...

[barbelo]

Enjoy your wage being artificially lowered.
Meanwhile to immigrate to a country such as Russia you need to make an HIV test, imagine the hassle to work there with a tertiary degree in a white collar profession.

I'm sincerily tired of seeing no-border policies in EU painted in an humanitistic coat while it actually only damages worker rights and situation, and benefits big corporations in need of cheap labour.

[DasFapital]

Enjoy your wage being artificially lowered.
Meanwhile to immigrate to a country such as Russia you need to make an HIV test, imagine the hassle to work there with a tertiary degree in a white collar profession.

I'm sincerily tired of seeing no-border policies in EU painted in an humanitistic coat while it actually only damages worker rights and situation, and benefits big corporations in need of cheap labour.

You have a black flag for your avatar but support nationalism? Well that's something...

[Lily Briscoe]

I'm sincerily tired of seeing no-border policies in EU painted in an humanitistic coat while it actually only damages worker rights and situation, and benefits big corporations in need of cheap labour.

And what is the solution, in your opinion? "Native" workers rallying around immigration restrictions?

[tallguy]

Blindingly obviously, attacking immigrants is bad for workers generally as well as being inherently immoral in itself. However, it is wholly wrong to conflate a concern with immigration policies and attacking immigrants. Which is what the OP is implicitly doing. In fact, I would go further and suggest such an underhand debating tactic is more or less the inverse synonym of the right-wing race-card used in debates on this topic since it is no less disingenuous or pernicious to transparency in that debate.

[Comrade Jacob]

I don't think many people realize how hard it is being an immigrant. They work harder than everyone else, for less than everyone else. They are undermined by restrictions on working and are forced to settle for cheap labor jobs. They are probably the most exploited of the proletarian in the first world. The fact that we must work with and defend thief every right should be obvious to anyone on the far left.

You should see how people treat immigrants in the UK, it's truly despicable. Although it definitely has improved in the last few years.

[hatzel]

More hysteria in uk media

I know it's the done thing nowadays to stand news reporters in 'appropriate' locations when they're giving their pieces to camera, but - for those outside the UK, or who didn't watch the evening news - they had them on a live link to the airport in Bucharest, to report on exactly how many hundreds/thousands/millions of people were flooding onto planes. The conclusion was...ah...very few. Maybe tomorrow?

[helot]

I find the focus on workers fucking disgusting. It's pretty obvious that the ordinary person's hostility to migrant workers isn't from their own thoughts but from propaganda outlets. It's why the focus is on workers in the first place and not on capitalists. All the claims that immigration needs to be restricted yet then ignore the movement of capital makes it pretty apparent.

[RedWaves]

Racism towards immigrants is wide spread in the south. It's really just a trick that the bourgeoisie use "they are taking your jobs" and it works every time, cause the people down here are so fucking stupid they can't put two and two together and see the one's blaming immigrants are the same ones that bring them in for cheap labor.

It's not that most of them don't understand how difficult it is to be an immigrant, it's that they don't give a shit, and don't want to care. They look at them as invaders, as filth, as the scapegoat cause they can't imagine not worshiping their rich labor masters that are the true ones oppressing them. Most of the fear on the Mexicans coming over is solely based on "they'll date your daughter!"

It comes down to class warfare, just like how the manipulate the poor into hating each other with "welfare queens" and the whole tagline that you should hate people that get benefits when you don't.

If anything, the workers could easily buddy up with the immigrants to fight the rich establishment oppressing both of them, but no. This is America, you can't do that, cause Americans love to have an enemy, and what better enemy than immigrants coming over to ruin the great American land? This has went on for so many generations, you could write books on American racism towards immigrants dating back to the early days.

That's how it goes, and that's why they attack them. Blame everyone but the true class that is oppressing them; the bourgeoisie capitalists. That's how it is in Alabama anyway. When they aren't moaning about blacks on food stamps and high crime rate, they are blaming everything else on immigrants, even though statistically they aren't the problem when they are blamed for crime and unemployment.

[RedWaves]

I find the focus on workers fucking disgusting. It's pretty obvious that the ordinary person's hostility to migrant workers isn't from their own thoughts but from propaganda outlets. It's why the focus is on workers in the first place and not on capitalists. All the claims that immigration needs to be restricted yet then ignore the movement of capital makes it pretty apparent.


True, the same ones screaminging about "immigrants taking our jobs" won't say a word about the massive corporations that move factories to the third world for slave labor. It's OK for the capitalists to do it. They have more sympathy for the ones oppressing them than they do their fellow man.

[Schumpeter]

Enjoy your wage being artificially lowered.
Meanwhile to immigrate to a country such as Russia you need to make an HIV test, imagine the hassle to work there with a tertiary degree in a white collar profession.

I'm sincerily tired of seeing no-border policies in EU painted in an humanitistic coat while it actually only damages worker rights and situation, and benefits big corporations in need of cheap labour.

Who are you to tell someone else which country they can and cannot live in? People own themselves and thus no-one has any right of deciding where they decide to take themselves ( unless if infringes on others right to self ownership). So yes I support mass immigration.

[barbelo]

Who are you to tell someone else which country they can and cannot live in? People own themselves and thus no-one has any right of deciding where they decide to take themselves ( unless if infringes on others right to self ownership). So yes I support mass immigration.

I'm sorry for such a late reply. Only now I'm checking this thread.

You clearly don't see the hypocrisy of your point of view, and it's the same hypocrisy of people who criticized Switzerland when they voted against immigration. Direct democracy is only good until it goes against my ideologies, uh?

Anyway, in the comparison you made, people also "own" their houses; people "own" their countries, their borders and the land that exist within them; and they are free to politically decide who enter and who not, in the same way you decide who can enter your house and who can't.

You can be anti-nationalist all you want (as I am) but you can't deny it's under a national framework that we work today and that it's your national citzenship that determines whetever you can live or work in a certain place.
You say that you support mass immigration: you also support mass immigration to African, Asian and Gulf countries? You also support foreign ownership of industries? Tax shelters and fiscal paradises for international billionaires? Outsourcing of manufactaring industires to poor countries?
If not, I ask you your same question: Who are you to tell someone else which country they can and cannot live in? If a CEO admires Monaco tax breaks, why shouldn't he live there instead of financially contributing to the country who raised, educated and qualified him?

[#FF0000]

people "own" their countries, their borders and the land that exist within them

No they don't. Borders are set by states, which themselves exist first and foremost to protect the interests of the ruling classes. People don't own their countries -- their bosses do.

And further, there are loads of groups that push down wages -- the elderly, young workers, the unemployed, temporary workers, non-union workers, etc. However, there's never any witch hunt over them, and for good reason. The biggest threat to wages is allowing xenophobic bigots to divide the labor movement with this nationalist bullshit.

[Prometeo liberado]

Is it me or is the posting of this article here a given? Maybe I was expecting something controversial? Kinda like a thread supporting the back handing of babies. Obviously if you're here you're not on the "pro" side of that one. And if you are then what in the hell are you doin here? This is RevLeft correct?

[barbelo]

Borders are set by states, which themselves exist first and foremost to protect the interests of the ruling classes. People don't own their countries -- their bosses do.

I get what you are saying but I just gave the example of a country where the people democratically, not by political representation but direct vote, decided to curtail immigration. One can argue about propaganda influencing them, which indeed existed on both sides, but in the end it was what the people wanted. It's their country and they can decide this.

Only now I realize I replied to a banned user who calls himself reactionary. These argument of "people own themselves" and "right to self ownership" reeks of classical liberalism.


And further, there are loads of groups that push down wages -- the elderly, young workers, the unemployed, temporary workers, non-union workers, etc.I don't see any sense in comparing elderly with immigrants, at best elderly raise public expenditure without contributing to the workforce. What you meant by them lowering wages?
Are you saying that if I go to Spain now I won't see thousands of North Africans picking fruits on plantantions, without even a place to sleep and that this is on the same level as people who left the university in interships?


However, there's never any witch hunt over them, and for good reason.Indeed, immigrants are the target of xenophobia and demonization, but on the other side, many other European politicians are globalist neo-liberals for whom immigration is only a way to make the economy grow and look good on paper. For them immigration is a necessity.

[Anglo-Saxon Philistine]

You clearly don't see the hypocrisy of your point of view, and it's the same hypocrisy of people who criticized Switzerland when they voted against immigration. Direct democracy is only good until it goes against my ideologies, uh?

Communists aren't vulgar democrats. We don't think a decision is good or acceptable simply because it was made in a "democratic" manner (not to mention that divorcing democracy, even "direct" democracy, from the class nature of the state is ridiculous).


You say that you support mass immigration: you also support mass immigration to African, Asian and Gulf countries?

Sure. In particular, we agitate for an end to the disgusting oppression of migrant labourers by reactionary Gulf monarchies.


You also support foreign ownership of industries?

We don't support private ownership of industries - including "national" ownership under a bourgeois state - period. But as long as private ownership exists, we don't care if the owner is "native" or "foreign".


Tax shelters and fiscal paradises for international billionaires?

Ha, what's this? An "anarchist" who is concerned about the ability of the bourgeois state to collect its "rightful" taxes? What happened to "not a man and not a penny for bourgeois militarism"?


Outsourcing of manufactaring industires to poor countries?

That's part of the development of capitalism, particularly the development of imperialist capitalism. We don't support or oppose it, it's inevitable.


If not, I ask you your same question: Who are you to tell someone else which country they can and cannot live in? If a CEO admires Monaco tax breaks, why shouldn't he live there instead of financially contributing to the country who raised, educated and qualified him?

Yes of course, Mr. "anti-nationalist", people have an obligation to "contribute" to "their" state.

[Slavic]

I get what you are saying but I just gave the example of a country where the people democratically, not by political representation but direct vote, decided to curtail immigration. One can argue about propaganda influencing them, which indeed existed on both sides, but in the end it was what the people wanted. It's their country and they can decide this.

Its easy, direct democracy or not, they are wrong. It doesn't matter if the majority of the people wanted it; if a referendum was overwhelmingly supported to legislate segregating public institutions by a person's ethnicity, such law would be wrong regardless if it has popular appeal.

[Jimmie Higgins]

I get what you are saying but I just gave the example of a country where the people democratically, not by political representation but direct vote, decided to curtail immigration. One can argue about propaganda influencing them, which indeed existed on both sides, but in the end it was what the people wanted. It's their country and they can decide this.

Workers or "the people" are not magical... They're just people. And folks living under the competitive pressures of capitalism, the nationalism and xenophobia promoted by pundits and politicians can and do support all kinds of awful things or short sighted things. From a revolutionary perspective, most would believe that for workers, holding such views or supporting restrictions on immigrants is not in their interests, in fact it weakens the position of all workers. And we can back it up with a lot of historical stuff. "The people" can have different views of things and what to do and they can try and convince each other.


I don't see any sense in comparing elderly with immigrants, at best elderly raise public expenditure without contributing to the workforce. What you meant by them lowering wages?if the argument is that an influx of workers increases competition and is therefore bad for the existing population of workers, then why not support sexists who want to remove women, racists who want to remove blacks, misanthropes who want to kill the babies of workers? Why of all the multitudes of people being thrown into the labor pool is one section worthy and not another?

[tallguy]

Workers or "the people" are not magical... They're just people. And folks living under the competitive pressures of capitalism, the nationalism and xenophobia promoted by pundits and politicians can and do support all kinds of awful things or short sighted things. From a revolutionary perspective, most would believe that for workers, holding such views or supporting restrictions on immigrants is not in their interests, in fact it weakens the position of all workers. And we can back it up with a lot of historical stuff. "The people" can have different views of things and what to do and they can try and convince each other.

if the argument is that an influx of workers increases competition and is therefore bad for the existing population of workers, then why not support sexists who want to remove women, racists who want to remove blacks, misanthropes who want to kill the babies of workers? Why of all the multitudes of people being thrown into the labor pool is one section worthy and not another?
Would you equally disapprove of people voting to stop oligarchs registering as citizens in, say, the UK in order to avail themselves of a preferential UK tax regime and so avoid contributing taxes in their countries of origin that raised and educated them, in turn impoverishing those countries and their people? After all, who are the people in the UK to decide where oligarchs can live, right?

[barbelo]

We don't think a decision is good or acceptable simply because it was made in a "democratic" manner.

So let me put in other terms: a group of people decided to create a collective community, an agricultural cooperative which produces all its internal subsistence. Decades later a family decided to join too. The original group of founders don't have any say in the matter?
Why they are obliged to accept these new members without any agreed/collective decision?


Ha, what's this? An "anarchist" who is concerned about the ability of the bourgeois state to collect its "rightful" taxes?

Here is where I think you failed to see my point. I won't pretend the state isn't there to collect taxes or that it'll cease to exist in a brief future.
And since it's here, since it won't be going away anywhere soon- what doesn't mean we shouldn't oppose it- it's under the state framework that these relations, laws and customs work.

The only argument in defense of mass immigration I read is that workers know no borders. In the same way I can argue that the capital also know no borders.

[Sinister Intents]

So let me put in other terms: a group of people decided to create a collective community, an agricultural cooperative which produces all its internal subsistence. Decades later a family decided to join too. The original group of founders don't have any say in the matter?
Why they are obliged to accept these new members without any agreed/collective decision?

Why should someone have a decision in someone else's choice? If someone or some family decides to move they should be accepted readily into another commune, collective, et cetera. It'd be really shitty to decide to move some where on your own accord and they kick you the fuck out. What authority have they? In reality none! No one would have the authority to dictate your own choices and you and other people can go where you please freely.

[barbelo]

if the argument is that an influx of workers increases competition and is therefore bad for the existing population of workers

The argument isn't only this, it's also immigration as a form of modern slavery, where you import people who'll never integrate, who'll never have any social mobility, to work in low paid jobs as waiters, cleaners, receptionists, plumbers, etc.


Why should someone have a decision in someone else's choice?

Indeed, the members of the community are also free to shoot on sight any invader.

[Sperm-Doll Setsuna]

The argument isn't only this, it's also immigration as a form of modern slavery, where you import people who'll never integrate, who'll never have any social mobility, to work in low paid jobs as waiters, cleaners, receptionists, etc.

Unlike those good immigrants that conform to the requirements of the society, right? Hard-workers. Unlike those no-good benefits-scroungers! Britain for the British! Germany for the Germans!

[Anglo-Saxon Philistine]

So let me put in other terms: a group of people decided to create a collective community, an agricultural cooperative which produces all its internal subsistence. Decades later a family decided to join too. The original group of founders don't have any say in the matter?
Why they are obliged to accept these new members without any agreed/collective decision?

The question misses the point entirely. Communism is not a federation of cooperatives, but the social ownership of the means of production. That means that your example is besides the point. We don't support cooperatives or agricultural communes. We support the subordination of all such local economic entities to society at large. And yes, we don't think the decisions of that "collective community" are sacred. We judge decisions based on their class content and their relation to the historical tasks of the proletariat, not the number of hands in the air.


Here is where I think you failed to see my point. I won't pretend the state isn't there to collect taxes or that it'll cease to exist in a brief future.
And since it's here, since it won't be going away anywhere soon- what doesn't mean we shouldn't oppose it- it's under the state framework that these relations, laws and customs work.

The only argument in defense of mass immigration I read is that workers know no borders. In the same way I can argue that the capital also know no borders.

Again, you talked about "international millionaires" (doubtlessly rootless cosmopolitans) "evading taxes", as if we should care whether the bourgeois state gets taxes to fuel its police and military machine.

[Sinister Intents]

Indeed, the members of the community are also free to shoot on sight any invader.

No... Communists and anarchists aren't seeking to create mini states defended by militias. We seek to abolish the class system and eliminate all states and statism through a few a few methods like using the DotP as a transitional state to eliminate statism and destroy class based society. Divisions between people will be destroyed in this time. If a family or individual moves to a different commune, collective, et cetera. Then they'll be met with acceptance. The working man and women has no country and they should be able to live where they please without some fucked up state deciding upon their own decisions.

[Yukari]

So let me put in other terms: a group of people decided to create a collective community, an agricultural cooperative which produces all its internal subsistence. Decades later a family decided to join too. The original group of founders don't have any say in the matter?
Why they are obliged to accept these new members without any agreed/collective decision?

Now that's a fucking stretch if it's supposed to be an allegory of immigration of Western first world countries. And no self-respecting sympathiser of revolutionary thought should give a toss about the feelings of flag-waving xenophobes. We're not going to pander to their delusions and have no intention to start to, no matter the situation.

If we're so concerned about the survival of bourgeois states now ( those immigrants, taking all our gubment monies!! ), then we might as well support austerity and other such measures as well. Requires some proper mental gymnastics to argue an anti-immigration sentiment for the supposed benefit of the "native" worker into revolutionary leftist thought. Needless to say, your avatar is not very fitting.

[barbelo]

If we're so concerned about the survival of bourgeois states now

In all honesty, when people argue against immigration they are not concerned about the survival of the bourgeois state or anything like that, they are just trying to avoid being killed in an alley like Theo Van Gogh.

[motion denied]

In all honesty, when people argue against immigration they are not concerned about the survival of the bourgeois state or anything like that, they are just trying to avoid being killed in an alley like Theo Van Gogh.


Theodoor "Theo" van Gogh (Dutch: [ˈteːjoː vɑŋ ˈɣɔx] (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Help:IPA_for_Dutch_and_Afrikaans)) (23 July 1957 – 2 November 2004) was a Dutch (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dutch_people) film director, film producer, columnist, author and actor.
Van Gogh worked with the Somali (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Somalia)-born writer Ayaan Hirsi Ali (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ayaan_Hirsi_Ali) to produce the film Submission (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Submission_%282004_film%29), which criticized the treatment of women in Islam (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Women_in_Islam) and aroused controversy among Muslims. On 2 November 2004 he was assassinated (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assassination) by Mohammed Bouyeri (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mohammed_Bouyeri), a Dutch-Moroccan Muslim (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Islam_in_the_Netherlands).


Aren't you something.

[Anglo-Saxon Philistine]

In all honesty, when people argue against immigration they are not concerned about the survival of the bourgeois state or anything like that, they are just trying to avoid being killed in an alley like Theo Van Gogh.

Those damn Muslims, taking the jobs of honest, hard-working native Nazis.

[tallguy]

In all honesty, when people argue against immigration they are not concerned about the survival of the bourgeois state or anything like that, they are just trying to avoid being killed in an alley like Theo Van Gogh.I don't think you are in a position to make such a sweeping generalisation of the reasons for the majority of those who would place restrictions on immigration levels. Indeed, I would go further and suggest you are projecting your own agenda there.

Although by no means scientific, my own experience of all the people I know in my local community who have concerns with immigration levels is much more prosaic and practical and is to do with competition for scarce resources such as jobs and housing. Fears of cultural clashes do also figure to be sure. But they only do so after the fact because people are already stressed economically.

[tallguy]

Those damn Muslims, taking the jobs of honest, hard-working native Nazis.
Whilst I am sure you think that post is cute, it is no more less of a cliché than the post to which you replied I can assure you.

[Yukari]

In all honesty, when people argue against immigration they are not concerned about the survival of the bourgeois state or anything like that, they are just trying to avoid being killed in an alley like Theo Van Gogh.

Lolol that's a classic. Go out all cannons firing.

[Anglo-Saxon Philistine]

Whilst I am sure you think that post is cute, it is no more less of a cliché than the post to which you replied I can assure you.

The point is that, unless barbelo is the whitest, straightest, most macho cis-male person who ever lived - and hey, maybe he is, it would explain a lot - he has much more to fear from native fascists than immigrants. Of course there is a problem with reactionary attitudes among the immigrant population - not helped by the shameless tailing of Islamists by ostensibly "socialist" parties - but immigration controls, and generally the bourgeois state, aren't going to solve that problem. Why would it? It's not in their interest.

[Sinister Intents]

In all honesty, when people argue against immigration they are not concerned about the survival of the bourgeois state or anything like that, they are just trying to avoid being killed in an alley like Theo Van Gogh.

Lol, you're hilarious.

Do you not like people from other lands coming to your area? Are you afraid of people who look a little different than you?

[Anglo-Saxon Philistine]

He's afraid of being gunned down by Muslamic rayguns.

[Sinister Intents]

He's afraid of being gunned down by Muslamic rayguns.

I hope the mods let us torture the racist fuck before he gets banned.

[barbelo]

Do you not like people from other lands coming to your area?

Me? No, I actually love foreign people; I'm specially found of eastern europeans and I identify with them/their culture a lot.
This is why I used the word "people". What people are feeling. I was not referring to me- strangely the target of your posts- but what I infer by observing the ones around me. And I see people avoiding to put their kids at school, avoiding entire neighbourhoods, moving to the suburbs, getting used to be served by immigrants...
Like tallguy said I could be making a big and erroneous generalization, I admit it, but this is what I see nonetheless, I won't be politically correct for the sake of not being called a racist and pretend I'm not seeing this process.

Please don't attack me, call me nazi, or racist. Reading some of the replies it seems that you guys are trying hard to be confrontional, to take something of the context, twist and see a flaw in it, like when you replied that communists aren't trying to create mini states protected by militias: you knew very well I wasn't talking about this.

And ignoring all this talk about oposing immigration, since it's racist, I make the same question as before: why should communists support mass immigration?
For humanitarian, moral, subjective and arbitrary reasons?
Because the proletariat is universal, ie. preserving the status quo of other countries by receiving their surplus workforce?
Because states should be abolished so it's better that we start with some instead of others?

[Sinister Intents]

And ignoring all this talk about oposing immigration, since it's racist, I make the same question as before: why should communists support mass immigration?
For humanitarian, moral, subjective and arbitrary reasons?
Because the proletariat is universal, ie. preserving the status quo of other countries by receiving their surplus workforce?
Because states should be abolished so it's better that we start with some instead of others?

Communists should support mass immigration and immigration in general because the working man and woman has no country, but that's not a very strong argument. People should be allowed to move where they please, live where they please. We should be all allowed to move freely around this world so that we can fully experience life and experience the wonders of this small, fragile world. People should be able to live somewhere they connect to, somewhere that'd make them the happiest. No state should dictate people's decisions, people shouldn't be forced to conform or to fall in line in anyway. Honestly your questions make me want to slam my hands into the keyboard. If I wasn't working on an essay I'd provide better, more significant answers

[#FF0000]

Immigration isn't something to support. I don't care if people stay where they are or come here or go there. What I support is the right of workers to go where they want.

What I think is interesting is the whole "should we support the destruction of some states before others" as if immigration could possibly lead to that. Even if one subscribes to some idiot form of ethnic nationalism, there just aren't that many people immigrating.

In any case, the immigration issue Europe is facing was faced in the US before, and it's pretty disheartening to see so called "revolutionaries" taking the same position as our conservative, collaborationist unions like the AFL did historically.

[#FF0000]

Why don't labor-nationalists complain about workers from other parts of their own country? In the US, Southern workers are often brought up to work in, for example, fracking sites, or on docks and tugboats in the North, because they'll often work for lower wages and benefits. What about that?

[Per Levy]

Why don't labor-nationalists complain about workers from other parts of their own country? In the US, Southern workers are often brought up to work in, for example, fracking sites, or on docks and tugboats in the North, because they'll often work for lower wages and benefits. What about that?

well thats why they are nationalists, its the same in germany too, in eastgermany the former gdr the wages are way lower then in the west and south and eastgermans who moved to the west usually also worked for lower wages. hardly any protest there from unions or calls for for bringing the wall back.

[#FF0000]

hardly any protest there from unions or calls for for bringing the wall back.

Ah, well in the US we often wish we let the South go.

[Jimmie Higgins]

The argument isn't only this, it's also immigration as a form of modern slavery, where you import people who'll never integrate, who'll never have any social mobility, to work in low paid jobs as waiters, cleaners, receptionists, plumbers, etc.And supporting restrictions on immigration (which mostly do not hault immigration, but just allow the state to harass immigrants and for employers to deney them the wages and rights other workers have won) helps facilitate a lower tier of immigrant labor. It's like slavery in the sense that the "rights" won by existing workers are not applied to migrant workers - hence, class solidarity helps the entire class fight against unilateral control by the boss of working conditions and arrangements.

The need for waiters, cleaners, receptionists and a low wage workforce is not CAUSED by immigrants, bosses exploit the legal and social precariousness or ostrazization of immigrant groups in order to maintain a lower, less defended, group of laborers. Globalization and the tendencies of capitalism in general create a group of people who need to go find work, the bosses set the conditions of that work. This is the main reason for migration to find work today - the same reasons poor farmers in the mid-west had to start looking to the cities for industrial jobs. If we compete with eachother, if differnet groups of people who need work play by the bosses rules, then it's a race to the bottom. If we have solidarity and defend the ability of any workers to not be harassed or pressured by the bosses, then we are all in a stronger position. At best (and being very generous) supporting immigrantion restrictions or protectionism is a short-term gain by one groups of chauvanist workers that leads to an overall weaker position for workers in the long run.


Would you equally disapprove of people voting to stop oligarchs registering as citizens in, say, the UK in order to avail themselves of a preferential UK tax regime and so avoid contributing taxes in their countries of origin that raised and educated them, in turn impoverishing those countries and their people? After all, who are the people in the UK to decide where oligarchs can live, right?Frankly I could care less. Yeah it's slimy that the rich use their lawyers and political cronies to exploit loopholes, but really in the big picture it's like complaining that the mass-murderer also pick-pocketed his victims.

At any rate, in terms of popular or class movements to limit the "freedom" of capitalists to do whatever they want are not the same as supporting restrictions on migrant laborers. It's a class issue. Restrictions on migrant labor is a restriction on a section of the class. If people fight corporations who are crossing borders and exploiting people or driving people off their land, the issue isn't "borders" or "nationality" in the abstract, the issue is the exploitation - using national laws or international loopholes is just the specific method of being able to maybe have a higher rate of exploitation for, say, US factories on the US/Mexico border who are allowed to ignore labor laws for either country because of some special legal status.

If a rich guy just wanted to move somewhere else, I could care less. If a middle class guy wanted to open a store in another country, I would care as much as if they opened a store in their country of origin.

[DOOM]

I don't think many people realize how hard it is being an immigrant. They work harder than everyone else, for less than everyone else. They are undermined by restrictions on working and are forced to settle for cheap labor jobs. They are probably the most exploited of the proletarian in the first world. The fact that we must work with and defend thief every right should be obvious to anyone on the far left.

I remember how my father's doctor told him once, that he needs to be 200% better than a swiss guy, to be successful.
I didn't believe that first, I was kind of an idealist, regarding that. But then I noticed just how many of my immigrant friends didn't find an apprenticeship. And that kind of opened my eyes. Racism in switzerland isn't an evident phenomena, it's more hidden and structural. And that makes it so dangerous.

[Anglo-Saxon Philistine]

Me? No, I actually love foreign people; I'm specially found of eastern europeans and I identify with them/their culture a lot.

"Why, some of my best friends are Muslims."


This is why I used the word "people". What people are feeling. I was not referring to me- strangely the target of your posts- but what I infer by observing the ones around me. And I see people avoiding to put their kids at school, avoiding entire neighbourhoods, moving to the suburbs, getting used to be served by immigrants...

And I see people avoiding outed gays, beating them up in the street, spraying "kill the faggots" on the walls etc. Perhaps you think that needs to be condoned as well.


Please don't attack me, call me nazi, or racist. Reading some of the replies it seems that you guys are trying hard to be confrontional, to take something of the context, twist and see a flaw in it, like when you replied that communists aren't trying to create mini states protected by militias: you knew very well I wasn't talking about this.

In fact you were. You were talking about "agricultural communities" that would have exclusive control over who enters and leaves "their" piece of land, and later talked about members shooting any damn foreigner that tries to enter.


And ignoring all this talk about oposing immigration, since it's racist, I make the same question as before: why should communists support mass immigration?

Because communists take the side of the proletariat against the bourgeois state, which means we oppose any effort by the bourgeois state to restrict the ability of proletarians to move.

[Jimmie Higgins]

And ignoring all this talk about oposing immigration, since it's racist, I make the same question as before: why should communists support mass immigration?

First, while some people have been making sharp or even personal responces - it's not about you as a person, it's about the arguments. Historically working class movements and revolutionary tendencies/parties which have supported or even been soft on immirgration or racism or sexism have undermined themselves and helped the bosses to divide and rule - to put it simply crudely. So many of us feel this is a very important point and one we need to be solid on.

And you know internet debates always end up with NAZI accusations anyway:).


For humanitarian, moral, subjective and arbitrary reasons?For class reasons. This isn't about being "PC" or not wanting to come-off racist or having positions close to racists (though this should always set off alarm bells and when there is any true overlap - like antisemites who oppose Israel - the suface similarity often for totally opposing reasons). It's about how do workers defend themselves in the short-term (having to deal with the realities of capitalism) and the long term. To have a strong working class, workers need to unite around their common interests as much as possible.


Because the proletariat is universal, ie. preserving the status quo of other countries by receiving their surplus workforce?Capitalists need, create and CULTIVATE suprlus labor pools. Where the hell do you think the populations of modern industrial cities came from? People migrating first from the countryside as they lost the ability to be peasants or tenant farmers due to both political coersion and capitalist development, and then later from migration from rural areas in other parts of the world. Capitalism create people who have to sell their labor - so they go where they can sell their labor!

Creating de-skilled low-end jobs cheapens the labor costs because it makes people interchangeable. If everyone is interchangeable, then fighting for just one section, ethnicity, one craft, etc undermines itself because the bosses will just turn around and hire women, repressed ethnicities, young workers, etc. Since capitalism makes us interchangeable, we need to block-up in as much of a unified way so we can oppose the pressures put on us by the system and by specific bosses in the near-term. In the long term, such a class-wide movement is necissary for us to ideologically break from siding with middle class or ruling class politics and have an independant politics that speaks for all workers if they were born on one side of an imaginary line created by rulers one or two hundred years ago or another.

[/quote]Because states should be abolished so it's better that we start with some instead of others?[/QUOTE]Why would immigration "abolish" a state?

I also think this phrase "mass immigration" is strange. Is that a European thing? It's not like radicals have some program for specifically encourgaing the movement of people - it just happens and the question is how do we respond? By supporting restrictions that only aid business in controlling immigrant labor, by privilaging some workers as "legitimate" over other workers; or by fighting to make it so that all workers are on the same level in terms of their ability to fight and organize together on their common class basis?

[Sperm-Doll Setsuna]

I also think this phrase "mass immigration" is strange. Is that a European thing?

Yes, it is a European right-wing anti-immigrant term intended to conjure up a vision of the dangerous evil swarthy Muslim hordes invading Europe en masse and whatever else they have in mind (but that and random stories about locals being raped by random migrants whoevers are usually the limit of their ideological depth, and thus the term 'mass-immigration' comes in handy; it can also be used in the manner of "I'm not a racist but..." by saying, "I'm not against all immigrants, I'm just against mass-immigration", which is code for "I'm not against hard-working Italian migrants but the gypsies and Romanians and the Middle-Easterns and Africans need not apply"). Think of it as something similar to calling a migrant an "illegal" in the U.S.

In the left, users of 'mass-immigration' are usually what I'd term Dodgerists.

[Sinister Cultural Marxist]

Why don't labor-nationalists complain about workers from other parts of their own country? In the US, Southern workers are often brought up to work in, for example, fracking sites, or on docks and tugboats in the North, because they'll often work for lower wages and benefits. What about that?

It's not actually unheard of, especially in very large multinational states like India, China and Russia

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shiv_Sena#Origins


On one hand, people belonging to the Gujarati (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gujarati_people) community owned the majority of the industry and trade enterprises in the city.[17] (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shiv_Sena#cite_note-Public_sector.2C_Threats_against_other_communities .2C_businesses_owned_especially_by_Gujarati_and_Ma rwaris.2F-17) On the other, there was a steady flow of South Indian (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/South_India) migrants to the city, and who came to take over many white-collar employments. In 1960 Bal Thackeray (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bal_Thackeray), a Mumbai-based cartoonist, began publishing the satirical cartoon weekly Marmik (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marmik). Through this publication he started disseminating anti-migrant sentiments. On 19 June 1966, Thackeray founded the Shiv Sena as a political organisation. At the time of its foundation, the Shiv Sena was not a political party as such.[18] (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shiv_Sena#cite_note-shakha-18)
The Shiv Sena especially attracted a large number of disgruntled and often unemployed Marathi youth, who were attracted by Thackeray's charged anti-migrant oratory. In its early days, the Shiv Sena followed an anti-South agenda and its slogan was "Pungi Bajao, Lungi Bhagao" ("Blow the flute, and drive the lungis (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lungi) or South Indians away").[19] (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shiv_Sena#cite_note-IndianTheo2002-19)[20] (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shiv_Sena#cite_note-Pankaj2005-20) Shiv Sena cadres became involved in various attacks against the South Indian communities, vandalising South Indian restaurants and pressuring employers to hire Marathis.

These days it is often poor migrants from Bihar that get the attention of Maharashtra's nationalists.

[Vladimir Innit Lenin]

Me? No, I actually love foreign people; I'm specially found of eastern europeans and I identify with them/their culture a lot.

Ah ich liebe doch alle menschen mein herr! Super!



And ignoring all this talk about oposing immigration, since it's racist, I make the same question as before: why should communists support mass immigration?
For humanitarian, moral, subjective and arbitrary reasons?

As has been said, as a communist I don't support (mass) immigration or emigration either way, I support the freedom of movement of the working classes. That, to me, is a fundamental human right - freedom of movement - like education, healthcare, housing, clothing, food, socialisation etc. There's no legitimate economic reason for opposing the freedom of movement of workers, so the only reason one would oppose freedom of movement is due to racism, ignorance or some twisted desire for a powerful state (fascism).

[blake 3:17]

Thanks to all who've made thoughtful contributions in this thread. I would suggest that issues of migration be taken seriously by the radical and revolutionary Left and that there are real contradictions that can't be explained away with a simple slogan.

During the anti-globalization mobilizations of the late 90s early 2000s there were some very interesting proposals put forward around very radical forms of solidarity between workers in the Global North and workers and peasants in Global South. One of the brighter proposals was for workers in the North to support struggles for land reform in the South to reduce competition on a global scale. In terms of Europe, that might also have meant union members paying into solidarity funds that would support local communities and economies in Eastern Europe that were facing incredible hardships.

After a lot of thought and discussion, I've decided I'm opposed to Canada's Temporary Foreign Worker Program and in some parts stopped entirely immediately and others slowly phased out.



If a rich guy just wanted to move somewhere else, I could care less.

@JH-- not picking on you, only responding because I respect you. I do have a big issue with capital flight. Rich people don't just move their bodies...

Edited to add: And BTW just to make it clear -- I am in no way opposed to non-citizens working. Canada has multiple forms of ways in which non-citizens can work, I believe the largest number being Permanent Residents. Immigration bureaucracy is very very complicated and I would like to see less of it, which I think most of us are in favour of. The TFWP is extremely bureaucracy heavy, extremely unfriendly to both legal unions and not so legal ones, and undercuts workers rights across the board. On occasion opposition to it has appeared national chauvinistic, but a lot of the opposition has come from workers who were either part of it or had family who were part of it and got screwed over in the process.

[blake 3:17]

Why don't labor-nationalists complain about workers from other parts of their own country? In the US, Southern workers are often brought up to work in, for example, fracking sites, or on docks and tugboats in the North, because they'll often work for lower wages and benefits. What about that?

Extremely good question.

[blake 3:17]

I'm now a bit curious about Paul Collier's book on migration. The SW article in the OP trashes it, but from the various reviews it sounds like it might be well worth reading. Here's the wikipedia page: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exodus:_How_Migration_is_Changing_Our_World
And one review from the Guardian: http://www.theguardian.com/books/2013/sep/19/exodus-immigration-paul-collier-review

Might be totally full of shit, but I am curious.

And while I agree "Attacking immigrants is no good for workers", I also think shoddy journalism is no good for workers. I spotted two errors on second reading. I know the SWP breathing heavy these days, but if you want address anything controversial effectively, don't make stupid mistakes.

[blake 3:17]

A very interesting story on McDonald's franchises hiring through Temporary Foreign Worker Program: http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/mcdonald-s-accused-of-favouring-foreign-workers-1.2598684

There's a whole lot of interesting bits to it. The most startling is that there were over 17 000 fast food positions filled through the TFWP.


****

Anyways... here's a link to a very interesting issue of a journal called Refuge which had a special issue with the theme/title of No Borders As Practical Politics. http://pi.library.yorku.ca/ojs/index.php/refuge/issue/view/1828

For an overview, see the editorial here: http://pi.library.yorku.ca/ojs/index.php/refuge/article/viewFile/32074/29320

[ckaihatsu]

Deportations to continue at a record pace all summer

By Masao Suzuki

San José, CA - On May 27, President Obama told the head of Homeland Security, Jeh Johnson, to postpone his recommendations for changing deportations policies until after Congress wraps up in August. Under pressure from immigrant rights activists to stop the record number of deportations, more than 2 million, the President had promised a review of deportations back in March.

Obama claimed that any action to stem the tide of deportations would make the Republicans mad so that they won’t act on immigration reform. But the reality is that it has been almost a year since the Senate passed their Comprehensive Immigration Reform (CIR) bill last June 27. Despite this bill being so loaded up with more militarization of the border, expanding workplace verification, expanded temporary worker visas and elimination of the diversity visa to woo right-wing Republicans, the Republican led-House of Representatives has refused to consider an immigration reform bill. While there are a lot of rumors that Republicans are softening, the House just shot down a bill sponsored by a California Republican that would legalize undocumented veterans of the U.S. military.

Many forces in the immigrant rights movement have condemned Obama’s latest action to appease Republicans. Pablo Alvarado, executive director of the National Day Laborer Organizing Network (NDLON), said that the delay “damages legislation’s prospects, hurts real people...” Marisol Marquez, of the Tampa, Florida immigrant rights organization Raices, told Fight Back!, “Obama needs to stop hiding behind the House Republicans. Face the people and put a stop to deportations.”

But sadly enough, a few organizations, including the Service Employees International Union (SEIU) and the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops Committee on Migration, among others, not only approved of Obama’s delay, but actually encouraged him to do so. With deportations running at a pace of more than 1000 per day, supporting this delay means supporting the deportation of at least another 60,000 immigrants, many of whom could be eligible for legalization.

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