2009 New Year baby: anchor baby of an 8th grader
Kennedy: It's a new year, but reaction to births shows same old hate
By BUD KENNEDY
bud@star-telegram.com
SPECIAL TO THE STAR-TELEGRAM/EVANS CAGLAGE
Justin Daniel Ramirez, with his mom, Fernanda Rios, was the first baby born in 2009 at Parkland Memorial Hospital in Dallas.
Justin Ramirez is 3 days old.
Yet some people already hate him.
Baby Justin was the first newborn this year at Parkland Memorial Hospital in Dallas. His mother is 15 and in the eighth grade.
She lives with her parents and the father. He’s 20.
Within hours, readers on news Web sites were already writing about how much they loathe Baby Justin, and his mom, and his dad.
Some of the writers even signed their own names.
They resent Baby Justin for being Hispanic.
They don’t even know him or his family, but they call him illegal and a foreigner just because of his surname.
They say he’s not even entitled to grow up as an American, even though Justin was born right here in Texas.
One East Texas lawmaker must really hate babies like Justin. He has already filed a bill to refuse birth certificates to lots of babies by next New Year’s.
The writers also despise Baby Justin’s mom, Fernanda Rios. They call her a "lawbreaker" and "trash" and a "leech" for being poor and having a baby in the county hospital.
They hate his dad most of all.
They call him a criminal.
All this because a young couple who made life-changing mistakes decided to keep the baby and raise him together.
Don’t get me wrong. I’m worried about Baby Justin, because no baby should have a 15-year-old or an eighth-grader for a mom.
There is more than one way to prevent that, and somebody should be teaching our sons and daughters, particularly when more than half the teenage girls in poor families are getting pregnant before age 20.
But Baby Justin is not evil.
He is our fellow American.
Someday he might fight for our flag, or serve in Congress, or grow up to be a firefighter or law officer who saves lives.
Whatever he grows up to be, he will help pay the taxes to bankroll future Social Security payments and public healthcare for the aging baby boomers, who didn’t beget enough children to replace the population or sustain the economy.
Baby Justin doesn’t deserve to be called names like "illegal" and "welfare baby" and others less printable, as he was in some of the more than 200 comments across local newspaper and TV Web sites.
On our own Web site, "fripper1," writing from a Watauga address, complained that "my tax dollars are going for some illegal’s birth."
Obviously, fripper1’s American education failed to teach him the U.S. Constitution. By two decisions of the Supreme Court, any baby born in the United States is an American, not "some illegal."
"Knvsmom," writing from a Yahoo e-mail address called "hotlegs_99" in Cleburne, wrote sarcastically, "I guess in Mexico they don’t have statutory rape laws?"
I have no idea about Mexico. But Texas law says that voluntary sex is OK for a married couple, no matter the age. If this couple weren’t living with her parents and planning marriage, the father might face charges for sex with a girl more than three years younger.
But the couple seem to be belatedly trying to do something right, and since they might legally marry with a court order under Texas law, I doubt prosecutors would spend taxpayers’ money on the case.
The most spiteful comments were by "midcitiesyj," a Hotmail user in Hurst complaining about a baby with a Hispanic surname at John Peter Smith Hospital who was the region’s first born in 2009, winning the 29-year-old mother a half-carat diamond earring set in a Zales Jewelers promotion.
He wrote, "This is pathetic, the news covering illegals . . .  It’s just a guess but if she doesn’t speak ENGLISH and she is in JPS Hospital that they are both illegal aliens. They should be DEPORTED IMMEDIATELY."
Folks, 4 out of 6 Hispanic residents in Texas are Americans. They’re not foreigners. And 2 million legal Texans speak mostly Spanish.
It might be a new year.
But it’s the same old hate.
Bud Kennedy’s column appears Sundays, Wednesdays and Fridays. 817-390-7538
http://www.star-telegram.com/news/colum ... 22179.html
Re: 2009 New Year baby: anchor baby of an 8th grader
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His mother is 15 and in the eighth grade.
She lives with her parents and the father. He’s 20.
In America, we call that RAPE!!!
Quote:
They resent Baby Justin for being Hispanic.
NO!! For being illegal and an anchor. For getting all FREE medical and her FREE 8th grade eddication.
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They say he’s not even entitled to grow up as an American, even though Justin was born right here in Texas.
Fertility does not make you an American.
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They call him a criminal.
Rapists are criminals in America.
