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John Porvaznik Date Turned in: December 14, 2011 Arizona’s Immigration Discrimination Law Cultural Diversity MWF 1:00-2:00 Arizona’s Immigration Discrimination Law When you hear the word discrimination you think of minorities that have been discriminated in the United States since the foundation of it. These including African Americans, Europeans, Asians, and Middle Eastern, have all been racially discriminated throughout history. Now Latinos make up the majority, specifically Mexicans of being racially discriminated. But, what exactly is discrimination and what does it mean?
Discrimination according to the text is the denial of opportunities and equal rights to individuals and groups because of prejudice or for other arbitrary reasons. There are current local, national, and international incidents of some form of discrimination found in race, class, ethnicity, religion, and gender. These acts of discrimination are an ongoing act that has not left our country. There are stories about discrimination in the news continually on a daily basis, it doesn’t disappear and has no reasons for believing that it will.
The United States is a country of freedom and equal rights, where discrimination should not be accepted in any form. One form of racial discrimination that has made national news is Arizona’s discrimination law against Latinos, particularly Mexicans. The state of Arizona Governor Jan Brewer on April 23rd 2010 signed into law Arizona’s immigration enforcement bill. This is by far the nation’s strictest bill on illegal immigration. This law requires Arizona police and any law enforcement to question individuals, in particular Mexicans, about their immigration status.
This law was to go into effect for more than 90 days. This law gives police agencies permission across Arizona to investigate the immigration status of every person they come across whom they have reasonable suspicion to believe is in the country unlawfully. When police pull over Latino’s they have the right to suspect them of being illegal and can ask them that question. In order for citizens and immigrants to avoid arrest they will have to effectively carry their papers or immigration records at hand at all times.
This law brings intact further guidelines which include that it now makes it a state crime for immigrants to knowingly fail to register with the Department of Homeland Security and carry registration documents. This law makes Arizona the first state to require for immigrants to meet federal requirements to carry identity documents legitimizing their presence on American soil. The law also, allows for people to sue local government or agencies if they believe federal and state immigration law is not being enforced. Many believe that this law is flat out discriminatory towards Mexicans.
President Barack Obama voiced his concern regarding this new immigration law, where he criticized it saying that it goes against the basic notions of fairness, freedom, and equality. Many other strong opponents, including political leaders, are voicing their opinion against this law. They all view this law as an act of discrimination and unfairness towards the Mexican culture. This law is an unfair treatment towards Mexicans and is a racial discrimination. It violates the rights that they share and allows police to harass individuals who they suspect. The Arizona Immigration Law SB 1070 is unlawful and unconstitutional.
This law is an act of racism towards Mexicans that has taken place. Racism is a doctrine that one race is superior. The Whites have been demonstrating racism towards Mexicans, in viewing them all as illegal immigrants who have taken our jobs and provided no place to live and prosper. Also, in that if they only speak Spanish they must be illegal. It is acts of racism in that it is lowering their racial class and making them less superior to whites. They will be discriminated by police officials in a racist way in that Arizona police will view all Mexicans as less superior.
It is racism in that Mexicans are being unfairly treated. In Arizona these officials will suspect right away that they are illegal depending on their job occupation, credentials, and appearance. It is racism in that police as soon as they pull over any Latino they will suspect them as illegal and interrogate them on their immigration status. They will be looked down upon as aliens and will be alienated from other races. It is racism in that they are not being treated fairly as other racial groups are. This is done by not giving them the same opportunities of living as Whites have.
This law is also a form of prejudice; prejudice according to (Schaefer, 36) is a negative attitude toward an entire category of people such as racial or ethnic minority. It is people’s beliefs towards that racial minority. Blaming the victim is another sociological term related to this topic. Blaming the victim is portraying the problems of racial and ethnic minorities as their fault rather than recognizing society’s responsibilities. In viewing that Latinos must to responsible for their own low status. We make it a bigger deal than it is as we promote it through the news and media.
In the news they only talk about the illegal immigration of Mexicans and makes it seem that only illegal Mexicans are living here. The United States has created this problem from the past years and is the reason we have been brought it to this point instead of taking other actions. Blaming the victim is used to account that someone else is responsible. This is being done towards Mexicans in trying to question the immigration status of them, all to try to eliminate the problems they feel that are caused by them.
Immigration is moving from one country into a new country as a permanent resident, in hope to live a better life. Immigration is what has shaped the foundation of the United States and it has been happening all throughout America’s history. Europeans, mostly Irish, Italians, and Polish, were all immigrants that were once discriminated in America’s history. The Japanese were discriminated during World War II, and the Middle East has a whole was discriminated in the past 10 years. Now in recent years the discrimination has been solely on Mexicans.
Most of the immigration coming to United States in the past several years is from their southern neighbor Mexico. There have been an enormous amount of illegal Mexican immigrants living in the United States; according to (pewresearch. org) a record 12. 7 million Mexican immigrants lived in the United States in 2008. Furthermore, (pewresearch. org) points out that Mexicans now account for 32% of all immigrants living in this country. With more than half of the Mexican immigrants in this country are unauthorized. The percent of Latino population living in Arizona is about 30%, and most of that being Mexican.
More than half of the Mexicans living in Arizona are legal. So, why should all of these people be discriminated and racial profiled on their social status. The United States throughout their history has been a country where the white people have discriminated a race in certain time periods. It is now the Latinos, predominantly Mexican, that are being racially discriminated. This law questions the immigration status of all legal Latinos, and goes against their freedom and rights, and shows a strong form of discrimination to their ethnic group.
The Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo was signed on February 2, 1848; in this treaty the United States purchased Texas, California, Arizona, and New Mexico for 15 million from Mexico. Under this treaty the United States granted citizenship to the 75,000 Mexican nationals who remained on annexed land after one year. In this treaty it guaranteed religious freedom, property rights, and cultural integrity. It also, gave the right for Mexicans to continue Mexican and Spanish cultural traditions. The United States took their land from Mexicans, so their culture is going to be dominant in the United States, especially in those four states.
For them than to question Mexicans to see if they are illegal is beyond belief considering that Arizona was once Mexico and of course there is going to be a substantial amount of Mexican families, since their families have always been living there and populations are increasing. It is a racial profile that is being taken place under this law. Racial profiling according to the textbook (Schaefer, 42) is any arbitrary police-initiated action based on race, ethnicity, or natural origin rather than a person’s behavior. The Arizona immigration law is a form of racial profiling towards Mexicans.
This law which was enacted invites racial profiling against Mexicans by law enforcement in violation of the equal protection guarantee. We are all ensured equal rights and equal protection and this law is violating that. In that police are able to go up to Mexicans that look illegal and can interrogate them. It is making a statement that all Latinos are Mexican and illegal which is a racial profile. Giving police the opportunity to do this is going against their freedom. It is humiliating to Latinos to be questioned this and it is unconstitutional.
For legal Mexicans to be interrogated this way is a form of discrimination. It is racial profiling in that it is stating that just Mexicans are the only illegal immigrants living in the United States when this is very much false. It is racial profiling in that they are assuming they are all from Mexico. It is misrepresenting them and putting all Latinos in the same category in that they are all the same. They are classifying all of these people as the same when in fact they can be from South America and Central America. According to (Schaefer, 241) 70% of Mexican Americans have United States citizenship.
So what makes it right for police to assume that all Mexicans are illegal? When in fact seven out of ten Mexicans are going to be legal. This immigration law is very similar to Operation Wetback in that it was an operation that had taken place in 1954. This operation allowed the government to remove illegal Mexican nationals from the southwest, such as Arizona. This was an operation that was discrimination in that they went out to remove any Mexicans they thought were illegal. Another was repatriation; a program in the 1930’s which deported Mexicans.
This program even deported people born in the United States of Mexican background. These two programs are forms of discrimination and this law that was enforced in Arizona is similar to these and is a type of discrimination too. It is an unfair treatment to a racial group. Not to mention that Mexicans from the 1940’s to 1964 were brought to the United States by the government. A program which allowed for Mexican contracted laborers, called braceros, to immigrate to the United States. This brought more Mexicans into the United States and expanded their population.
The United States, you can argue, brought in these Mexicans and started this problem. Maquiladoras were built on the Mexican side of the border; these maquiladoras are foreign-owned companies. The companies do not have to provide insurance for the Mexican workers and offer them a very low wage. They also do not need to pay Mexican taxes. These companies than disbanded these factories and brought them into China to pay workers even a lower wage. According to (Canas et al. 2007) more than 40% of the 700,000 maquiladora jobs created in the 1990s had been eliminated by 2003.
This than brought close to 300,000 Mexicans to unemployment. They were left jobless and in search of a job of course they are going to try to immigrate to the United States. There are many theories and concepts that relate to the Arizona immigration law that is a form of racial discrimination and can give reasons for the act of discrimination towards Mexicans. Conflict theory suggests that human behavior in social contexts results from conflicts between competing groups. Conflict theory originated with the work of Karl Marx in the mid-1800s. Karl Marx understood human society in terms of conflict between social classes.
Conflict theory is a theory that society is constantly changing in response to social inequality and social conflict. In this theory competition takes place between groups with unequal amounts of economic and political power. This conflict happens between Whites and Mexicans. Mexicans being the minorities are exploited and are ignored by the dominant group. Mexicans earn much less than Whites, their education is lower; they earn less income and are being discriminated in these ways. In that the rich and powerful forces special order on the poor and weak, which is an example towards Mexicans now and this law.
They exploit the Mexicans because they have don’t have much rights and discriminate against them. These conflicts have also led to the increasingly illegal immigration that is being seen in the United States. This illegal immigration epidemic is that Mexicans want to leave Mexico to live a better life, away from the difficult living style in Mexico. There is a conflict between the White Arizonians and Mexicans in that they classify Mexicans as a lower class, and perceive Mexicans in such a negative way. Another theory is the exploitation theory that was defined by Oliver Cox in 1942.
Exploitation theory it views racial subordination in the United States as a manifestation of the class system inherent in capitalism. It is that prejudice is rationally and economically motivated on the basis of self-interest. The dominant group being the Whites benefit from prejudice in that it is rooted within the exploitation of a group. This theory explains how racism can brand and classify a group as inferior so that the exploitation of that group can be justified. The dominant group benefits from prejudice in that it is rooted with the exploitation of a group.
It these forms of discrimination were once not towards Mexicans. Until recently when whites thought Mexicans interfered with their occupational jobs. Ever since the economy got worse in the United States and jobs were lost, whites than began to give the blame on Mexicans for everything. They now feel that they are taking all of their jobs when in fact they really aren’t. Since the problem grew toward a growing concern for the whites they began to exploit a minority group, being Latinos. This discrimination and prejudice is happening because Whites are being motivated n ways of self-interest, for the good of themselves. The Scapegoating theory??argues that people who face prejudice are society’s victims. This theory suggests that people transfer the responsibility for a failure to some vulnerable group. This is happening towards Mexicans and is the reason why Arizona has enacted this law. This happens towards Mexicans as Whites feel that they are the reason for failure in the United States. Mexicans are now the most vulnerable group so they are looked as the scapegoat towards one’s own failure.
They then enact this discriminatory law towards Mexicans to check their immigration status. They have a growing concern of Mexican immigration as society feels they are ruining the economic status of America. This scapegoat theory is a form of discrimination, in that a race is not the reason for these causes. The labeling theory is a sociological approach that was introduced by Howard Becker that attempts to explain why certain people are viewed as deviants and other engaging in the same behavior are not. This labeling theory directs our attention to the role that negative stereotypes play in race.
The theory points out that when stereotypes are applied by people it can have negative consequences on that group. This is especially true in Mexicans that they are being discriminated and labeled that all Mexicans living in the United Stated are illegal. Also, labeled in that all Latino’s are Mexican and therefore should be questioned for immigration status. This is a form of a stereotype, which are unreliable, exaggerated generalizations about all members of a group that do not take individual differenced into account.
Americans label all Mexicans as poor, low education and illegal. When in fact there is a substantial amount of Mexicans that are wealthy and legal. They are than unfairly labeling people who don’t deserve to be labeled based solely on their appearance. Just because you look Mexican, it gives permission for police to label them as illegal. This is discrimination towards all Mexicans. Another theory that is related to this is authoritarian personality theory. This theory states that prejudice occurs by a culture’s background.
The personality and characteristics of that group lead to discrimination. This theory is described as aggressiveness towards a group who do not follow norms in a society. The way they were treated years and years ago has been passed down to their children and now they are being discriminated against. Hispanics have their own cultural norms different from the conventional norms of America and this is bringing a strong form of discrimination towards them. The Arizona Immigration law is a form of racial discrimination that has taken into effect.
It allows for police officials to check the immigration statuses of individuals who they feel are illegal. This is a type of discrimination and racial profiling. It is racism towards a minority group. It is injustice and unconstitutional. It is questioning the status of all Latinos and going against their freedom. All of these terms, definitions, concepts, and theories have combined to cause the discrimination that is being faced in Arizona. The United States is the cause of this discrimination towards Latinos, primarily Mexicans. Bibliography American Civil Liberties Union.
Web. 14 Dec. 2011. ;http://Aclu. org;. AZ. gov : Arizona’s Official Web Site. Web. 14 Dec. 2011. ;http://az. gov/;. Http://edu. learnsoc. org/Chapters/3%20theories%20of%20sociology/1%20introduction. htm. Web. Pew Research Center. Web. 14 Dec. 2011. ;http://pewresearch. org;. Racial And Ethnic Groups with Faculty Readings. Print. “Sociology Dictionary | Free Online Social Science Dictionary. “??Social Science Dictionary | Social Science Acronyms. Web. 14 Dec. 2011. ;http://sociology. socialsciencedictionary. com/Sociology-Dictionary/;.