Posted on 01/21/2008 6:53:14 PM PST by forkinsocket
PAWTUCKET — Racism and xenophobia are contributing to a Rhode Island social climate in which immigrants are regarded as the villains, speakers at a pro-immigration rally said yesterday.
“We build walls for people who have to leave their country for economic reasons,” said Gladys Gould of the Providence Presbyterian Church, one of a number of organizations that took part in “Unite for Fairness,” held at the Pawtucket Visitors Center. “You don’t see them going after the Irish. The difference is, the police will stop us because of the way we look. It is all about race,” said Gould, a native of the Dominican Republic.
About 90 persons attended the rally.
Gould said, “This is a nation of immigrants. It’s part of our history. But immigration trends have changed in the last hundred years. The global economy, driven by U.S.-based corporations and free trade agreements like NAFTA, has created a new reality in immigrants’ countries of origin. These agreements have hurt workers on either side of the border and have created conditions of poverty and urgency for people to migrate.”
“I think it is time we talked about what is the Rhode Island we want to be in and live in,” said Ellen Gallagher of the International Institute, in Providence. “We think it’s a Rhode Island that values communities and all Rhode Islanders, including immigrants.”
Gallagher said that many immigrants do not understand that if their spouse is a U.S. citizen, they might be able to acquire legal status or citizenship for themselves. “Unfortunately,” she said, “due to serious backlogs in processing immigration and citizenship applications, many people seeking legal status have been unable to achieve this goal.”
Patrick Crowley, of the Rhode Island National Education Association, said, “The real problems in Rhode Island are about job creation, not immigration.”
He said immigrants in the Ocean State pay taxes, invest in real estate and contribute to the state’s economy.
“And yet there are unscrupulous employers who use people’s immigration status as a means to exploit workers and abandon wage and hour laws. For a strong Rhode Island, we need to enforce our state’s wage and hour law, not take federal immigration law into our own hands.”
Ivette Luna, of Ocean State Action, said Rhode Island “is filled with fear and anti-immigrant ideas.” She said “statements of hate” are frequently expressed on talk radio shows.
“The people on the hill,” she said, referring to the state government, “are feeding into anti-immigrant statements. The key is education. We need the true facts. It’s all about human. We all are people. We are all immigrants. An injustice to one is an injustice to all.”
Get the h*ll out of my country.
If you are here illegally, you are a CRIMINAL INVADER not an “immigrant”.
Ha ha. Now leave.
Show me an Irish protest demanding citizenship and money for Irish illegals and I'll go after the Irish.
What a stupid argument they have.
I am stationed in California where it is literally over ran with tax sucking illegals. Now California is in the hole $18,000,000,000 (yes billions) this year alone. Meanwhile, our schools are failing, streets crowded, hospitals in bankruptcy, gangs everywhere, and billions in government aid to them all so that some businesses can have cheaper labor. Go ahead Rhode Island, dig that grave.
Why don’t these immigrants find the countries that have the jobs Rhode Island doesn’t have and then go to those places?
Not if you're here illegally, then you're a criminal.
Immigrants come flooding in to a state and then complain there aren’t enough high paying jobs. DUH. People this dumb we don’t need.
They could only get 90 people to show up? I could find 90 illegals on a street corner in Central Falls. Rhode Island is overrun with illegals.
She'll change her tune when she or someone she loves is gang raped by the misunderstood members of MS-13. Those poor dears! /sarc
Yep, there’s a few here in Houston too. Last time I saw most of them; they were sitting down in the middle of the streets in a demostration here in Houston.
That's because we wisely drove out the Irish after they tried to swarm our nation and declare the areas they infested as historical Ireland. They claimed it was taken from the original (racially pure) Irish by the English by force of arms and that they were there to reclaim the land for true Irishmen. And they drunkenly swarmed the streets waving Irish flags and shouting, "Yes, we can! (Hic!)". And left empty whisky bottles and Harp lager bottles everywhere at the rally site.
That's the liberal playbook 2008. Republicans are "anti-immigrant". I must have missed the single example of a republican who is that. Anti-ILLEGAL immigrant, yes.
There are a lot of Irish here illegally..and I want them gone as well. Illegal is illegal. White, black, yellow or brown..if you are illegal we want you out.
““We build walls for people who have to leave their country for economic reasons,” said Gladys Gould of the Providence Presbyterian Church, one of a number of organizations that took part in “Unite for Fairness,”
.....and this is why I don’t go to the Presbyterian church much any more....it’s been hijacked by moral exhibitionists....they started in the 60s with civil rights; then VietNam; then nuclear disarmament; then the Sandinistas; then gays&lesbians and now it’s illegal aliens....they’re always pissed off about something....always looking to demonstrate their pious anger.
Those employers explicitly know they are hiring illegal aliens. Those weasels don't get a second chance. Prosecute, fine, incarcerate. Put them out of business.
You don't see the Irish demanding that the schools, shops, ballots, and traffic signs all operate in Gaelic either, you silly beeyotch!
Get the hell out of our country!
You're thinkin' ancient history, sport:
the Irish economy is booming due to their low taxes - lower than ours! - and the handful that were here illegally have all gone home.
“You don’t see them going after the Irish. The difference is, the police will stop us because of the way we look. It is all about race,”
“”You don’t see them going after the Irish. The difference is, the police will stop us because of the way we look. It is all about race,” said Gould, a native of the Dominican Republic.”
A friend of mine who is a native born US citizen spent the 1980’s in Boston. He has a typical ‘irish’ last name and every few months he got called into the managers office to meet with INS to prove he was a US citizen. While I think it is silly that he had to do this repeatedly and nobody bothered to keep records of ‘this one has been checked and is OK” I fully support the govt doing its job and wish they could do it in this decade also.
‘Twas glorious was it not!
I am all for legal immigrants speaking out. In fact I want illegal immigrants to be noisey too. Just so that it helps NIE catch em.
Your cartoon reminds me that they aren't necessarily stupid. Just arrogant.
only is such an enclave in such denial of reality could the illegals be the victims and the evil business owners by the villians.
And for those illegals who are whining about the police picking them out because of their skin color??? YOU ARE IN RHODE ISLAND DICKHEADS!!!! Its 98.09% WHITE!!! You Stand Out! Try going to Brazil where you can fit it instead.
If they have to leave for economic reasons maybe they should go back and change the governments in their own countries. Instead of trying to destroy our country by trying to make it like the failed countries they flee from maybe they could try learning why we’ve been more successful and take it back home with them. How about that for understanding?
AFSCME organizer Gladys Gould
(American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees)
Ellen Gallagher [African-American Painter, born in 1965]
Patrick Crowley (b. February 18, 1973) is a Union Organizer and Community Activist currently living in Lincoln, Rhode Island. A graduate of the University of Massachusetts Amherst Labor Relations and Research Center, Crowley is one of many who entered the Labor Movement during the mid 1990’s when the AFL-CIO President John Sweeney issued a call to arms for a new generation of Union organizers to re-energize the American labor movement. He is a student of the philosophy of Saul Alinsky, author of, among other works, Rules for Radicals.
Ivette Luna, lead organizer of Ocean State Action
Ivette Luna, of Ocean State Action, a progressive coalition to win public policy and political victories for economic, social and environmental justice, calls out ‘Unite for Fairness’ at an immigrants’ rights and awareness rally at the Blackstone Valley Visitor Center in Pawtucket Saturday.
Name:
Ivette Luna
Network:
Mexico
Here are some of Ivette’s friends on Facebook...
Patrick Crowley is a Union Organizer and Community Activist
>>Gallagher said that many immigrants do not understand that if their spouse is a U.S. citizen, they might be able to acquire legal status or citizenship for themselves.<<
Please! They know how the system works. I suppose they want taxpayers to hire lawyers for them too?
ping
I hate it when these socialists in the media deliberately blurr this distinction. I guess they are so elite and condescenting that they think we are not smart enough to even notice the difference.
After being a long-term LEGAL U.S. Permanent resident, I was sworn in as a U.S. Citizen on Dec. 14, 2007 !
Unlike that cartoon, I have never thought that I had a “right” to be here - but that it is a PRIVILEGE to be here!
Proud New U.S. Citizen!
“Wrong freaking century, lady.”
I have met illegal immigrants from Canada, England and Ireland. The guy from Ireland says he is planning to marry his fiancee, which will make him eligable for permanent alien status. The other two made no comments about getting legal status.
The Canadian guy simply came in, from time to time for a few months, with tourist status, and knew he could work construction “under the table.” Haven’t seen him in a few years. He was from Cape Breton Island, via Calgary. I am quite sure he is back in Canada, probably Calgary, because their economy is better there, than in the east.
Now that it has come up here, I will find out what I can, about the guy from England.
Wow!....congradulations to you. The feeling must be great, especially since you did it the right way. Proud to have you with us!
Where were you born?
Born in Canada - married a U.S. citizen in 1972.
Within three hours of getting sworn in as a U.S. citizen on Dec. 14, 2007, I registered to vote, and cast my very FIRST vote ever on Jan. 8th in the NH Primary ! I was SO excited to vote for the first time !
Yeah, but did they speak English???
“She’s off by over 100 years, plus the Irish came here LEGALLY!”
There were lots of illegal Irish in the Boston area in the 80’s and early 90’s. Most of them ended up going home because:
1. They were homesick.
2. The cost of living here.
3. The economy improved in Ireland.
Now Ireland has its own immigrant problem.
“We don’t have an Irish illegals problem.”
I didn’t say we did. I simply provided anecdotal experiences I have had.
Taking it a little further, I know the Irishman is from the Republic.
I also know that each of the three of them have been unemployed some of the time they were/are here.
And yesterday I drove by a Home Depot and there were at least 15 men, probably Mexican nationals, around the perimeter. Mostly illegal I expect.
The slow rates at which our military forces and our border forces have been increased in the last few years tells me no big problems are felt, by the government.
No wall, no REAL interior enforcement, no problema.
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