Immigration

In my line of day-job work, I have the privilege of sitting across from all different kinds of people, from all over the world.  A few weeks back, a woman whose citizenship was a day old sat down with me.  I congratulated her on the accomplishment.  It’s a huge ordeal to become a citizen.

It was the day after the first GOP debates, and she had Trump on her mind.  She gave me a piece of it.  She was hurt and angry, worried that most Americans felt like he did, that immigrants were a ruination.  She said, “You all don’t know.  You don’t know how afraid you must be, or how terrorized to leave everything, knowing you can never go back to family, to friends, knowing they might not live to do the same thing you have done.”

I agreed with her.  I don’t know.  I don’t want to know.

She said, “I wouldn’t wish it on anyone.  All we want is something better for our children.”

All Abdullah Kurdi wanted was something better for his children.

We’re all the same.  We would all do anything we could to make a better life for our children.

We lack the social and economic infrastructures to just open our borders.  We have immigration laws for a reason.  I’m not saying we have to throw open the gates.  I don’t have any answers to the immigration question, but I have this to say: If you cannot find an ounce of compassion in you for people who are looking for freedom, then you don’t deserve the freedom you have.