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‘Invasion’ is racist
By Danielle Pellett

March 22, 2006

The week before Spring Break, the YCT tabled a discussion about the evils of illegal immigration.

They wore bright, cautious orange T-shirts with “INVASION” spray-painted in all caps. They put the images from the 9/11 attacks on the back of their flyers; between them was the phrase “We Will Never Forget.” The packet continuously eludes illegal immigration to terrorism, and gave us a false terrorist-to-immigrant ratio of 1:529,412 (though we do not know who a terrorist is until apprehension or until an attack is performed).

They continue with the MS-13 Gang, citing that they are “largely composed of illegal Salvadorans” with estimates between 10,000-20,000 members inside America. In the middle spread of their pamphlet, they place a list of terrorists who have either attacked or conspired to attack the United States or U.S. embassies.
Of the 20 listed immigration statuses, only seven were blatantly illegal aliens, the other 13 were either granted citizenship or had an expired visa.

Remaining once a visa has expired is illegal, yet our government granted them a visa in the first place. Of the 13 non-illegal aliens, five married Americans, while two were naturalized as American citizens. These immigration “invaders” won’t be stopped by walls if Americans are marrying them. Throughout the day, people would crowd the YCT and have heated debates on whether or not their stunt was carrying racist attitudes.

Their next page in the pamphlet seems to corroborate this. The title is “Incursion into the Sovereign Land of the United States of America by members of the Mexican Army.” Needless to say, this has a similar feel as the Gulf of Tonkin affair. One county sheriff deputy claimed that a military-style humvee (similar to the civilian hummer) had occupants wearing Mexican Military uniforms during a high-speed pursuit. If anyone has ever driven down I-35 without traffic would know that it is impossible to identify what the seated people were wearing, much less which country the uniforms are from.

The last inside page of their pamphlet focused on the immigration statutes of the 9-11 hijackers. Once again, they are trying to tie border security (the political line between the United States and Mexico) to Islamic terrorism. The majority of them had received visas at one point in time, and none of them crossed over a broken fence (as shown on the front cover) as illegal immigrants doubtlessly do.

So what was their solution? How would they stop terrorists from getting into the United Sates? Nullify their marriages to American citizens? Perhaps a crackdown on deporting those with expired tourist visas? If they wanted to focus on the illegal immigration of our southern border, why not suggest effective penalties against companies whose illegal hiring practices draw in illegal immigrants? Or perhaps help fix the economies of our neighboring countries in order to reduce the economic gap that draws in illegal immigrants in the hopes of a better life?

Instead, they use the imagery of shabby, dilapidated fences (as they have on the U.S./Mexico border) and spoke harshly about people who get into the United States illegally.

There was a similar historical crackdown on a foreign menace, hyped up because our own fears were played against us, with an ultimatum that demanded that we eliminate them as the only possible way for self-preservation. The Holy Roman Empire had the Inquisition and the Crusades, Germany had the Third Reich, and America had McCarthyism and the Salem Witch Trials.

It seems that we still have a lot to learn.

Danielle Pellett is a senior majoring in sociology. She may be reached at danipellet@unt.edu.