Could 'Illegal' Immigrants Be The Next Victims?

“America is for Americans! Go back to Mexico!”   These battle cries echo across the southwestern United States, where ‘real Americans’ are waging a political and rhetorical war on illegal immigration. Though immigration has always been controversial, economic downturn has intensified anti-immigrant sentiment in recent years. Most affected have been states along the US-Mexico border, where ‘illegals’ are seen as a direct threat to jobs and a drain on tax dollars. In these states, hostility towards Mexican-American immigrants has reached a boiling point. Could genocide be brewing in the American Southwest?

I believe that conflict between established and undocumented Americans in the southwestern United States has genocidal potential. Genocide is by no means inevitable, nor does it seem imminent; however, it would be a grave mistake to look the other way. After our readings on the causes of genocide, the situation in the American Southwest should alarm us. 

In the Southwest, many ‘real Americans’ see immigrants as a threat to their economic security. Especially in recent times of high unemployment, Americans resent having to compete with immigrants for jobs. The fact that many immigrants are paid ‘under the table’ too infuriates Americans, who complain that immigrants benefit from public services such as education, emergency room care, and law enforcement without paying their fair share of taxes. The legitimacy of these allegations is highly suspect. When it comes to analyzing genocidal potential, however, the veracity of the threat is unimportant. According to Levene, genocide requires only the perception of a threat to “the integrity of [a state’s] agenda” by an aggregate group. Alarmingly, the situation in the American Southwest fits this model. Illegal immigrants, or those thought to be illegal immigrants, are widely perceived as threatening to economic security in immigrant-heavy states. Levene argued that in situations such as these, it is possible that genocide can be rationalized as the ‘only way’ for a state to regain the power lost to the threatening group.

 
Armed with a motive, the American Southwest could move forward to perpetrate genocide if its people unify against immigrants, moving to eliminate the ‘threat’ of the ‘alien other’ in their community. Mann argued that “organic” groups – those whose individual and collective interests are aligned – have the potential to commit genocide through majoritarian tyranny. In the southwestern United States, the passage of recent anti-immigration legislation indicates the potential organicism of several states. For example, in 2010, the Arizona state legislature passed the country’s most aggressive anti-immigrant policy – known as SB 1070 – which, among other things, required Arizonans to prove on demand that they were legal residents of the state. Though SB 1070 was initially controversial, opinion polls reveal that nearly 60% of Americans support key provisions of the law, and several states have passed similar laws in recent years. In effect, SB 1070 and similar ‘show me your papers’ laws are, like the yellow stars of World War II, a means to establish who belongs and who does not, so that outsiders may be ‘dealt with.’

Will Arizona and the rest of the southwest choose to ‘deal with’ illegal immigrants through genocide? It seems they would be capable of it; in fact, they’ve arguably already begun. Subtle but insidious destruction of immigrant – specifically Latino – culture is already underway in parts of the southwest. Hispanic and Latino history is under attack in numerous states. In Texas, for example, the State Board of Education made dramatic revisions to the state’s mandatory history curriculum in 2010, erasing practically any reference to Hispanic leaders. Arizona went one step further; in 2011, the state legislature prohibited the teaching of Mexican American studies in a high school curriculum. Immigrants have also been banned from using their native languages. For example, this year, a student was expelled from a school in San Diego for speaking Spanish outside of Spanish class. In some areas, even churches have become unsafe. In 2011, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement conducted raids on Catholic churches in the Latino communities of Las Vegas and other areas, interrogating parishioners during mass and arresting dozens on suspicion of unauthorized immigration. Though it is impossible to know if or when these cultural attacks will escalate to full-fledged genocide, their significance cannot be overstated. Cultural destruction is often just the beginning; it has been said that the burning of books is merely a precursor to the burning of bodies.

The Southwestern United States has become an illegal immigration battleground in recent years. A perceived economic threat has led legislators in states like Texas and Arizona to enact laws to identify and exclude immigrants. Some states have gone even further, attacking the Hispanic and Latino culture that is so closely associated with immigrant communities. In short, the situation in the Southwest resembles what Levene and Mann described as a pre-genocidal society. As frightening as it may be, it seems clear that even the “land of the free and the home of the brave” is ripe with genocidal potential.