Reddit mentions of The Making of Americans: Democracy and Our Schools

i'll begin by saying: you shouldn't be thinking about this in terms of how it affects you personally because there's 300+ million other people you may be fucking over by having such a myopic view of this issue.

next, i want to state clearly that conservatives are not united on the question of borders. there are some people who call themselves conservative who are for open borders, while others want varying levels of border enforcement.

conflicting with american values: replacing our culture with their shitty culture

we should think about the effects of LEGAL immigration on the country. why should we even care about the border at all? if you're someone who cares about american culture, and believes that some cultures are superior to others, then border enforcement is but one aspect of the immigration process that you care about.

to me, our culture IS superior to many of the others around the world. i want immigrants who want to be AMERICANS to come here. i don't want hondurans who want to simply be hondurans in america coming here. i believe in what e. d. hirsch calls the american religion, as enshrined in our declaration of independence and our constitution.

the effects of not assimilating immigrants are being seen in europe at the moment. i don't want that here. but will that affect you directly? maybe not for a long time.

a drain on public services

another nice aspect of maintaining a border and actually having a say in who comes in is that you can determine whether the people coming in can actually make a contribution to the nation's economy or will become a net drag on our economy. consider what illegals cost the US.

look at that caravan. those people are likely unskilled laborers. once here, they will likely either bring their families in or send money home. their kids will go to public schools, for free. they will receive medical care, for free (hospitals in the US cannot decline treatment, whether the person can pay).

these are nice things, don't get me wrong, but they come at a cost. if we just let everyone in, we can't sustain our welfare state. the result is the same number of people working to pay for a growing number of lower class aliens.

how does this affect you? i don't know. given that CA is a sanctuary state, and given that newsome wants to give free health care to illegals, i imagine your taxes will go up, the economy will slow down, more illegals will come, and citizens who need services will find themselves competing with illegals.

more murders

immigrants, as a group, commit crimes less frequently than native born people. however, when you disaggregate immigrants into legal and illegal, illegal immigrants commit murder at a much higher rate than US citizens.

i hope this one never affects you. but CA is a sanctuary state, unfortunately.

the resurgence of third-world diseases in the first-world

finally, there are public health issues to consider. the people in the caravan are poor. they come from third-world countries with third-world medical care. they bring diseases with them that we haven't seen in our country for a long time.

conclusion

these are some of the ways that illegal immigration specifically can affect you.

there's no need to demonize the people coming up through mexico or make up talking points. there's enough evidence to show that unregulated border crossing is an issue we as americans should be concerned about.

knowing who is coming into the country and what they are bringing with them -- their resources, their skills, their desire to become truly american, their families, their health status, their intentions -- makes sense for the health of the nation as a whole.

(edited for paragraph breaks and headings.)