The border as we know it is a modern invention
December 4, 2024 12:52 AM Subscribe
And yet in certain respects the area is deadly. Starting with the Clinton administration, the federal government has enforced a policy known as Prevention Through Deterrence, which aims to force crossers into more dangerous terrain. The result has been what the anthropologist Jason De León calls “a killing machine that simultaneously uses and hides behind the viciousness of the Sonoran Desert.” Since 1994, Border Patrol has documented the deaths of over ten thousand border crossers, most often from dehydration, exhaustion, or cold: humanitarian groups estimate that the number is many times higher. from Death in Nogales [NYRB; ungated]
In fact, the Framers' original intent in 1789 was the open borders this nation had at the time. This is why the words "immigration" and "border" do not exist anywhere in the Constitution's text.
posted by mikelieman at 3:44 AM on December 4, 2024 [8 favorites]
posted by mikelieman at 3:44 AM on December 4, 2024 [8 favorites]
Not to distract from the general horror of channeling migrants into harsher parts of the desert...
Pushing migrants into the Rio Grande, in which barrels with razorwire had been placed.
“I believe we have stepped over a line into the inhumane.” (The Guardian)
Shocked.
"...investigators with the DPS Office of Inspector General found 'no reasonable cause to believe that the South Texas leadership of the department institutionally engaged in a pattern or practice of conduct that violated law or department policy.'"
Read between the doublespeak. "The term push in this regard was never intended...", "[no evidence concertina wire was] deliberately placed with the intent to cause migrant injuries..."
Appalled.
“The only thing that we’re not doing is we’re not shooting people who come across the border,” Governor Greg Abbott said this year, “because, of course, the Biden administration would charge us with murder.” (from OP)
posted by rubatan at 4:03 AM on December 4, 2024 [5 favorites]
Pushing migrants into the Rio Grande, in which barrels with razorwire had been placed.
“I believe we have stepped over a line into the inhumane.” (The Guardian)
Shocked.
"...investigators with the DPS Office of Inspector General found 'no reasonable cause to believe that the South Texas leadership of the department institutionally engaged in a pattern or practice of conduct that violated law or department policy.'"
Read between the doublespeak. "The term push in this regard was never intended...", "[no evidence concertina wire was] deliberately placed with the intent to cause migrant injuries..."
Appalled.
“The only thing that we’re not doing is we’re not shooting people who come across the border,” Governor Greg Abbott said this year, “because, of course, the Biden administration would charge us with murder.” (from OP)
posted by rubatan at 4:03 AM on December 4, 2024 [5 favorites]
I've spent at least two decades wandering the border deserts, on both sides. A lot has certainly changed. When I was last on the Arizona border, in 2021, I asked locals within the 100 mile zone (where there are more border patrol and checkpoints) if they felt safe. They said they leave keys in the car and the car running.
I was driving to a canyon territory that crossed the border and asked a migra at a border stop "Are there any safety issues with me in [the canyon] at night?" He looked at me even confused by the question. So I rephrased, adding "because of immigration." "Nope," he answered, "if you even see anyone, they're usually pretty scared to even approach you. The most they'll do is ask for water."
I drove past a police truck with multiple men sitting on the roadside, and I stopped at a lake with two young men handcuffed in the shade. The thing that stood highest above the ground were remote viewing surveillance towers with optical lenses more than 1 foot across for whatever long-range thermal cameras, radar, and laser illuminators that were packed into them. I'm convinced a failure of the media and the Democrats in the last election was even giving immigration so much airtime to let it be as large of an issue.
posted by rubatan at 4:03 AM on December 4, 2024 [16 favorites]
I was driving to a canyon territory that crossed the border and asked a migra at a border stop "Are there any safety issues with me in [the canyon] at night?" He looked at me even confused by the question. So I rephrased, adding "because of immigration." "Nope," he answered, "if you even see anyone, they're usually pretty scared to even approach you. The most they'll do is ask for water."
I drove past a police truck with multiple men sitting on the roadside, and I stopped at a lake with two young men handcuffed in the shade. The thing that stood highest above the ground were remote viewing surveillance towers with optical lenses more than 1 foot across for whatever long-range thermal cameras, radar, and laser illuminators that were packed into them. I'm convinced a failure of the media and the Democrats in the last election was even giving immigration so much airtime to let it be as large of an issue.
posted by rubatan at 4:03 AM on December 4, 2024 [16 favorites]
Border, is it? The Edge of the Plain: how Borders Make and Break Our World (2022) by James Crawford has a chapter on Sonora. Autoblogoquote: In the Sonoran Desert, a super fragile ecosystem shared by Mexico and the USA, the human victims number in the hundreds. They have been forced to trek through a desert at night because the US border patrol acts performatively in El Paso to show that it will be impossible to cross the border there where you can almost spit across the Rio Grande. Walls across the desert and relentless roving Border Patrol ATVs, not to mention a USAF bombing range, have more or less driven the Sonora pronghorn antelope Antilocapra americana sonoriensis to extinction. And it's not just the glamorous large mammal that is affected by this illegal assault on a protected environment. Crawford covers Edges between Spain and Morocco, Israel and Palestine, Norway and Russia etc. etc. - recommended.
posted by BobTheScientist at 4:17 AM on December 4, 2024 [6 favorites]
posted by BobTheScientist at 4:17 AM on December 4, 2024 [6 favorites]
Will it be much longer until no one would even want to immigrate to the US?
posted by nofundy at 4:38 AM on December 4, 2024 [1 favorite]
posted by nofundy at 4:38 AM on December 4, 2024 [1 favorite]
Will it be much longer until no one would even want to immigrate to the US?
That will never happen, imo. No matter who is in power, no matter the obstacles--whether it be crossing by foot or entering by air, the American Dream is so pervasive, that there will always always be people who want to risk it.
I mentioned in another thread that I work with a young Nigerian woman who is here in Canada on a student visa and her absolute goal is to head to the US when she is done. She doesn't want to stay here and when I asked her if she still wanted to do that now that Trump is elected again, she shrugged and said that it didn't matter to her if he was, she wanted all the possibilities of America anyway.
posted by Kitteh at 4:59 AM on December 4, 2024 [2 favorites]
That will never happen, imo. No matter who is in power, no matter the obstacles--whether it be crossing by foot or entering by air, the American Dream is so pervasive, that there will always always be people who want to risk it.
I mentioned in another thread that I work with a young Nigerian woman who is here in Canada on a student visa and her absolute goal is to head to the US when she is done. She doesn't want to stay here and when I asked her if she still wanted to do that now that Trump is elected again, she shrugged and said that it didn't matter to her if he was, she wanted all the possibilities of America anyway.
posted by Kitteh at 4:59 AM on December 4, 2024 [2 favorites]
Pushing migrants into the Rio Grande, in which barrels with razorwire had been placed.
“I believe we have stepped over a line into the inhumane.” (The Guardian)
Folks, there's no particular reason those outside the UK would have picked up on this, but journalists at The Guardian & The Observer are on a two-day strike and have asked people not to cross their digital picket line by posting or following links to the site today and tomorrow.
Carol Cadwalladr has published a good piece offsite about what's going on there.
posted by rory at 5:04 AM on December 4, 2024 [11 favorites]
“I believe we have stepped over a line into the inhumane.” (The Guardian)
Folks, there's no particular reason those outside the UK would have picked up on this, but journalists at The Guardian & The Observer are on a two-day strike and have asked people not to cross their digital picket line by posting or following links to the site today and tomorrow.
Carol Cadwalladr has published a good piece offsite about what's going on there.
posted by rory at 5:04 AM on December 4, 2024 [11 favorites]
I've talked with people from No Mas Muerte, and the most chilling thing they told me was:
Border patrol will use the blades of their helicopters to fly at migrant groups, causing them to panick and run, leading to the group getting separated. Getting separated likely means death, because you've lost your guide and won't have anyone to help you. If you're unlucky, someone else (bigger) was carrying a bunch of your water.
posted by constraint at 5:14 AM on December 4, 2024 [2 favorites]
Border patrol will use the blades of their helicopters to fly at migrant groups, causing them to panick and run, leading to the group getting separated. Getting separated likely means death, because you've lost your guide and won't have anyone to help you. If you're unlucky, someone else (bigger) was carrying a bunch of your water.
posted by constraint at 5:14 AM on December 4, 2024 [2 favorites]
In "The Injustice Never Leaves You: Anti-Mexican Violence in Texas", the historian Monica Muñoz Martinez describes the early-twentieth-century reign of terror carried out by the Texas Rangers—a group composed mostly of armed volunteers, many of them recent immigrants to the area, who worked to consolidate white control of the land on which indigenous Americans and Mexicans had long lived. During a particularly bloody ten-month period between 1915 and 1916, the Rangers and other vigilantes lynched between one hundred and three hundred Mexicans and Mexican Americans.
This is a sidebar but I didn't realize the Texas Rangers baseball team was named after a murder squad. WTF?!
posted by nouvelle-personne at 5:25 AM on December 4, 2024 [5 favorites]
This is a sidebar but I didn't realize the Texas Rangers baseball team was named after a murder squad. WTF?!
posted by nouvelle-personne at 5:25 AM on December 4, 2024 [5 favorites]
El Mar La Mar is an excellent film on this subject, less a traditional documentary and more an immersive sensory plunge into the terrain. Includes first-hand accounts by border crossing survivors, official and volunteer border patrollers and residents of the region.
posted by remembrancer at 5:37 AM on December 4, 2024 [2 favorites]
posted by remembrancer at 5:37 AM on December 4, 2024 [2 favorites]
Will it be much longer until no one would even want to immigrate to the US?
When one's own country has become uninhabitable due to climate change, rampant poverty, warfare, government repression and/or corruption in varying levels? No.
America has (at least historically) been a place that has room, has opportunity, and has at least a reputation for a better life being possible. It is increasingly hard to gain access, but once you're there, you've at least got a shot -- and when you look around your country of origin and think "ANYWHERE has to be better than this, and we can't remain here," you take what options you have.
posted by delfin at 5:59 AM on December 4, 2024 [3 favorites]
When one's own country has become uninhabitable due to climate change, rampant poverty, warfare, government repression and/or corruption in varying levels? No.
America has (at least historically) been a place that has room, has opportunity, and has at least a reputation for a better life being possible. It is increasingly hard to gain access, but once you're there, you've at least got a shot -- and when you look around your country of origin and think "ANYWHERE has to be better than this, and we can't remain here," you take what options you have.
posted by delfin at 5:59 AM on December 4, 2024 [3 favorites]
But it might discourage people who have the means to move elsewhere or have some money/social capital where they're from. Finally a cure for brain drain.
posted by subdee at 7:01 AM on December 4, 2024 [2 favorites]
posted by subdee at 7:01 AM on December 4, 2024 [2 favorites]
Will it be much longer until no one would even want to immigrate to the US?
Well, since (presumably) you just read an article where people are literally dying in the attempt to get here, I am going to go with "infinity years" as my answer.
posted by Back At It Again At Krispy Kreme at 9:05 AM on December 4, 2024 [3 favorites]
Well, since (presumably) you just read an article where people are literally dying in the attempt to get here, I am going to go with "infinity years" as my answer.
posted by Back At It Again At Krispy Kreme at 9:05 AM on December 4, 2024 [3 favorites]
I lived in Tijuana from 1994-97. I have a few thoughts on this.
Human migration is natural. I knew several people who, annually, would follow the harvest up the coast, ending in Washington State. Getting into the US was more perilous. The border is the friction point where enormous captial is made. How it is made, is the question.
I always, always, always have to remind myself that we are living with choices. How we operate in the US is a choice. When people die trying to cross, it was choice(s), that lead to their demise. I often posit, to immigration hardliners this question: If there were plentiful jobs where you could make $50-75 in cash per hour, under the table, in Canada, would you go? Now imagine that you have children and see their future crumbling, would you cross? The answer is obvious.
To my understanding of America, in the early days, if you could make it to America, you were in. A little later, you needed to be a good citizen for 17 years and you were in. The definition of what constitutes citizenship has changed over time. It is fluid.
The solutions require good governance and there is no intention to ever do that. Alas, the falcon cannot hear the falconer.
posted by zerobyproxy at 9:28 AM on December 4, 2024 [9 favorites]
Human migration is natural. I knew several people who, annually, would follow the harvest up the coast, ending in Washington State. Getting into the US was more perilous. The border is the friction point where enormous captial is made. How it is made, is the question.
I always, always, always have to remind myself that we are living with choices. How we operate in the US is a choice. When people die trying to cross, it was choice(s), that lead to their demise. I often posit, to immigration hardliners this question: If there were plentiful jobs where you could make $50-75 in cash per hour, under the table, in Canada, would you go? Now imagine that you have children and see their future crumbling, would you cross? The answer is obvious.
To my understanding of America, in the early days, if you could make it to America, you were in. A little later, you needed to be a good citizen for 17 years and you were in. The definition of what constitutes citizenship has changed over time. It is fluid.
The solutions require good governance and there is no intention to ever do that. Alas, the falcon cannot hear the falconer.
posted by zerobyproxy at 9:28 AM on December 4, 2024 [9 favorites]
I've had three old contacts from West Africa make the border crossing in the last two years. Incidentally, two left on their own accord after awaiting deportation/asylum hearings as they couldn't work or make any money, and didn't know what else to do.
One of the guys in particular had a harrowing story. He ended up detained in Guatemala and Mexico while en route and had to bribe his way out. But more to the point, his traveling companion, also from Mauritania, fell of one of the trucks, and died shortly after. And he relayed many other similar stories that he heard from other migrants traveling with him.
posted by iamck at 9:44 AM on December 4, 2024 [3 favorites]
One of the guys in particular had a harrowing story. He ended up detained in Guatemala and Mexico while en route and had to bribe his way out. But more to the point, his traveling companion, also from Mauritania, fell of one of the trucks, and died shortly after. And he relayed many other similar stories that he heard from other migrants traveling with him.
posted by iamck at 9:44 AM on December 4, 2024 [3 favorites]
In response to the second comment of the thread, the idea that the Founding Fathers were wholly and entirely for open borders is decidedly untrue. Like most founding myths, in any case, we should be coming to our conclusions and not relying upon original intent.
"why should the Palatine boors be suffered to swarm into our settlements, and by herding together establish their languages and manners to the exclusion of ours? Why should Pennsylvania, founded by the English, become a colony of Aliens, who will shortly be so numerous as to Germanize us instead of our Anglifying them, and will never adopt our language or customs, any more than they can acquire our complexion?"
-Benjamin Franklin, Observations Concerning the Increase of Mankind, Peopling of Countries, etc.
posted by ockmockbock at 9:59 AM on December 4, 2024 [2 favorites]
"why should the Palatine boors be suffered to swarm into our settlements, and by herding together establish their languages and manners to the exclusion of ours? Why should Pennsylvania, founded by the English, become a colony of Aliens, who will shortly be so numerous as to Germanize us instead of our Anglifying them, and will never adopt our language or customs, any more than they can acquire our complexion?"
-Benjamin Franklin, Observations Concerning the Increase of Mankind, Peopling of Countries, etc.
posted by ockmockbock at 9:59 AM on December 4, 2024 [2 favorites]
I'd say that it is certainly the case that open borders is an American ideal since time immemorial, it's just that being bigoted towards immigrants is also an American tradition. Both are true and exist alongside each other. For example, you can look to the open borders that exist internally between states and territories, but also you can see the bigotry every time a large group of people moves from one place to another. Puerto Ricans and Californians and Oklahomans are the examples that spring to mind, but I'm sure there are others. (And I know, I know. "Californians." But just last year I overheard a conversation in an Idaho gun/outdoor shop about shooting recently arrived Californians. They weren't serious but they were sincere in thier animosity is my point.)
Given how many of us have immigrant ancestors, and how many Americans are immigrants, I'm comfortable saying it's unpatriotic to be against immigrants, whatever Ben Franklin might have said on the subject. Number of immigrants is a huge number, more than an 8th of the total population... If you are an American you almost certainly are one or you know and care about someone who wasn't born in this country. We could and should let in more.
I feel like the anti-immigrant sentiment is a kind of mass delusion, and it makes me crazy every time I read about it. Coincidentally, the idea that it's legal to shoot trespassers just for trespassing is also a mass delusion. It isn't legal in any state. You might get away with it, but you are definitely getting away with a crime. I think about that every time I see a "trespassers will be shot" sign. It seems to me like would only add premeditation to the crime.
It's understandable that people who own property on the border don't like potentially dangerous strangers coming across thier land, but it strikes me that the cause of that trespassing is a draconian border policy, which encourages crossing in unofficial places.
Also, if you haven't seen the border wall out in the wilderness, it's worth going out to take a look. It's an absurdist art work with a cost in the billions. It's translucent from a distance, and it looks like someone has painted a stripe on the landscape in fifty percent gray. It reminds me of Christo and Jeanne-Claud or one of those land artists from the 70s.
posted by surlyben at 3:13 PM on December 4, 2024 [6 favorites]
Given how many of us have immigrant ancestors, and how many Americans are immigrants, I'm comfortable saying it's unpatriotic to be against immigrants, whatever Ben Franklin might have said on the subject. Number of immigrants is a huge number, more than an 8th of the total population... If you are an American you almost certainly are one or you know and care about someone who wasn't born in this country. We could and should let in more.
I feel like the anti-immigrant sentiment is a kind of mass delusion, and it makes me crazy every time I read about it. Coincidentally, the idea that it's legal to shoot trespassers just for trespassing is also a mass delusion. It isn't legal in any state. You might get away with it, but you are definitely getting away with a crime. I think about that every time I see a "trespassers will be shot" sign. It seems to me like would only add premeditation to the crime.
It's understandable that people who own property on the border don't like potentially dangerous strangers coming across thier land, but it strikes me that the cause of that trespassing is a draconian border policy, which encourages crossing in unofficial places.
Also, if you haven't seen the border wall out in the wilderness, it's worth going out to take a look. It's an absurdist art work with a cost in the billions. It's translucent from a distance, and it looks like someone has painted a stripe on the landscape in fifty percent gray. It reminds me of Christo and Jeanne-Claud or one of those land artists from the 70s.
posted by surlyben at 3:13 PM on December 4, 2024 [6 favorites]
From October, I liked this Texas Monthly piece: The Border Crisis Won’t Be Solved at the Border
Congress, however, has not passed meaningful immigration legislation in three decades. There’s a perverse equilibrium at play: Politicians, especially in the Republican Party, benefit from the status quo. Fanning fears of “murderers” and “rapists” flowing across “open borders” helped Trump win the White House in 2016, and it might help him return there in 2024.posted by adamsc at 5:06 PM on December 4, 2024 [5 favorites]
While many Republican business owners and executives have pushed for increased legal immigration—especially of highly educated workers such as engineers and software developers—those who employ large numbers of undocumented workers are often comfortable keeping them that way and paying them less than would be necessary if they were here legally.
Also, if you haven't seen the border wall out in the wilderness, it's worth going out to take a look. It's an absurdist art work with a cost in
I have an annecdote about the border wall... A coworker is married to a materials engineer who worked on a section of the wall, and he says they used a special, expensive kind of pre-rusted steel that requires almost no ongoing maintenance as it won't rust any further.
Anyway, trump or his goons got it into their heads that they wanted that section of the wall painted black so that, paraphrase, migrants would burn their hands on it as they tried to cross.
So this already symbolic section of wall, specially designed to not need any further maintenance, was at enormous taxpayer expense symbolically painted black, and now less than five years later the paint is peeling and needs touching up also at enormous taxpayer expense.
Stupid, cruel, expensive, shortsighted and ineffective. Trump in a nutshell.
On the bright side, the payment my coworker's husband received paid for their (gay) wedding.
posted by subdee at 4:58 AM on December 5, 2024 [4 favorites]
I have an annecdote about the border wall... A coworker is married to a materials engineer who worked on a section of the wall, and he says they used a special, expensive kind of pre-rusted steel that requires almost no ongoing maintenance as it won't rust any further.
Anyway, trump or his goons got it into their heads that they wanted that section of the wall painted black so that, paraphrase, migrants would burn their hands on it as they tried to cross.
So this already symbolic section of wall, specially designed to not need any further maintenance, was at enormous taxpayer expense symbolically painted black, and now less than five years later the paint is peeling and needs touching up also at enormous taxpayer expense.
Stupid, cruel, expensive, shortsighted and ineffective. Trump in a nutshell.
On the bright side, the payment my coworker's husband received paid for their (gay) wedding.
posted by subdee at 4:58 AM on December 5, 2024 [4 favorites]
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posted by deeker at 3:13 AM on December 4, 2024 [3 favorites]