I woke up on Friday April 30th and felt a little festive knowing that the following week was Cinco de Mayo and there would be some great celebrations to attend or great Mexican Food to be served at someone’s home… but I also felt an urgent need to get involved, so I decided to attend the May 1st rally downtown Los Angeles to show my support for the thousands of immigrants here both legally and illegally that would be subject to racial profiling with the passing of Arizona SB1070. Now I am not stating that I am in favor for others that come here illegally from Canada or China undocumented and stay longer than their visas allow them to as I believe everyone wanting to become a US Citizen should do so by the rules, so either you come from a rich and powerful family which allows you to buy your citizenship or you pay someone to marry you who you don’t really know and have to memorize EVERYTHING about that person including what doors he puts his/hers chonies in and what their favorite food is.
What is the legal way? Has anyone ever done a documentary on the process it takes to become a LEGAL US CITIZEN? Are there handbooks that out line the process? I remember those educational books we first read when we were just wee radicals once upon a time… “See Spot Run… Run Spot Run”. I am beginning to understand why Spot was running… Poor Perro didn’t have his papers! As my grandmother Armida Acosta would say “Ayi Dios mio”.
I once had a friend who insisted that I was Anglo as I was born in the United States of America. “I am Mexican/American,” I proudly would say. “No you were born here so you are American”… my come back, “well I was born in the United States so shouldn’t I be a United Statistician?” I quickly explained (the best way I could) by using the old dog theory…. “If you were a French Poodle and were bred to another French Poodle and the bitch gave birth in El Monte…. Are you a French Poodle or a American El Monte Poodle?” I think he understood. We are all from somewhere was my point. Different backgrounds, different countries, different cultures. Our blood is made up of many others from different parts of the world. I am American, I am a United States Citizen, I am also XICANO and Mexican American… that is my blood, I can’t change that, but first and foremost I am a proud United States Citizen.
What makes me proud is that I live in a country where I have the right to freedom of speech (well at least some). But with freedom comes respect, we must respect the other person and realize that we are not always going to agree with them. Disagreement is OK, not accepting other views is OK but trying to push your values or them trying to push theirs upon you is not acceptable. Many people, many opinions that is what makes the world go round. So I respect my freedom and those of others. I chose to support my fellow brothers and sisters on May 1st. No one should live in fear, no one should be stopped because they don’t look like you or talk like you.
A newsflash to those who support this kind of hate, it’s the terrorist and crazies we should be concerned with, not the many that clean up our tables, clean our homes, cut our lawns, pick our fruit, nanny our children, work in our kitchens… these people are important to the many businesses that we patronize everyday. They are not thieves, drug addicts nor the criminals that angry Americans paint them to be. They are hard working people. And if a recession causes those who are out of work to become angry and blame the illegal for taking jobs, well I suggest you walk your sorry self down to McDonalds and put in your application, or better yet but on your $150.00 designer jeans and take a bus up to farm land and help pick what is going to be on your dinner table that night. No one wants those jobs, but these people are doing just that.
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