Ask Lemmy

Swede here, absolutely not, around 2015 or so we got hit by the mass migration wave, there were plenty of documented cases of migrants throwing away or destroying their documents to try and claim refugee status when they clearly didn't need it, thus taking spots from actual refugees.

There were also real refugees who did this, they registered in Greece, Spain, Italy or other southern Europe country, but then they kept going north, trying to get to a better country. At that point you are no longer a refugee, but an economic migrant.

I 100% oppose these migrants.

The dumb thing is that the EU would distribute refugees throughout the union, just because you registered in Spain, didn't mean you had to stay there, you would stay for an interim period and be distributed to your proper host country.

I have zero issues with migrants/refugees who come the legal route, learn the language, work, and integrate in the culture.

Most of the current immigration laws are due to racist intent. In the 80s they didn't like how many Mexicans were coming across the border each year to do farm work. The workers would come, stay while there was work to be had, and then return home. When new laws were enacted making it harder for workers to get across the border, there came a class of people that would sneak the workers across. And this came with a fee from the workers. Now it costs them more to get here, so they need to stay longer to make up the money. It became easier to just find a place to live in the US all year round.

The US needs the Mexican workers. To simultaneously demand help, and punish them for showing up to help is dumb, and I suspect fueled by racist thoughts. The immigrants boost our economy, help feed our population, and are less likely to break laws that citizens. There's a whole (probably many) book about it, and it's even in comic form. https://www.amazon.com/Open-Borders-Science-Ethics-Immigration/dp/1250316960

While we need to know who is coming across our border to prevent spys and terrorists, the current laws make those entrants easier to hide, as there is now a whole industry to sneak people across.

Not really, but most people's reasoning is racist.

I worry a lot of it is human trafficking or at least human trafficking lite. A lot of employers really like having employees they don't actually have to pay properly or obey workplace safety and other protections for, and who will be afraid to speak up about fraud and other illegal practices.

But to me that would be easily solved if we only made it illegal to hire people without a permit, but never deport or otherwise penalize the workers. And publicize that heavily. So if you don't have a permit and your boss is abusing you, just call the hotline on the billboard and let us know and we'll arrest them and you can go find another sketchy employer and tell on them too when they piss you off.

No one would be hiring people without permits if there were actual consequences for the employer. We wouldn't be stuck with trying to figure out how to deport people and whatnot. They'd only be able to hire people the law is already protecting as workers. but nobody actually wants to hold rich people accountable for having caused all this trouble in the first place.

No

I wouldn't say it's considered to be racist to oppose outlaws who came here without the proper paperwork, visa, etc.

YES.

If you're an American, our entire history of immigration legislation is racism bundled on racism following in the tradition of racism. Were it not for chattel slavery and our betrayal of the native tribes our racist immigration laws would be the most shameful part of our history.

And if you're not American, your own country's immigration laws are almost certainly based on either racism or "nationalism", with the latter mostly being a holdover from when "French" and "English" were considered different races.

Unlawful emmigration to a country should be, at worst, a bureaucratic fine and probation. Anything more is simply bigotry in a polite suit.

Often people who oppose illegal immigration do seem to also be racists.

I think if someone says they oppose illegal immigration and also genuinely feels they have done serious introspection and feel they are not racist, they might benefit from asking themselves what they dislike about illegal immigration and see if those things actually have the negative impacts they fear or if the negative impacts they see are but drops in the bucket compared to other sources of similar impacts.

Not all opposed to illegal immigration are racist, but (obviously) all racist are against illegal immigration (And immigration in general).

Feels like it's a dog whistle most of the time and not a very good one. I've seen people assuming that someone isn't here legally much more often with someone of a different race. A lot of the time people will bring it up for the sake of racism. Inherently? I don't know if it would be racist to oppose them for it's own sake, but you'd have to have just as much a problem with the German guy overstaying a visa. I'd also say that opposing it for it's own sake is unchristian.

First off: technically, almost everyone opposes illegal immigration—the issue is whether it should be reduced by deporting undocumented immigrants, or by changing the laws to legalize more of them. (The exceptions who do support illegal immigration as-is are generally employers who exploit immigrants.)

Second: If the current law is racist, then supporting increased enforcement is racist while supporting reform (probably) isn’t. (And I would describe a law as racist if it disproportionately impacts racial minorities when alternative laws with an equivalent effect on public safety would not.)

yes

In a perfect world, immigration would just be regulated due to welfare and legal reasons, which seems reasonable enough. In reality you might want to question why some legislation actually exists. Is it reasonable, or is its whole purpose to prevent some immigration?