It's really courageous of him to come ahead with his story. I really hope he gets shipped back to the Philippines.
Go ahead and call me a xenophobe now. Whatev.
I think it is in poor form for the NYT to print this manipulative article that tries to make me feel bad for the gay, minority, do-gooder author and excuse his years of criminally fraudulent behavior.
Sure, call me heartless. But, this guy is cheating you, and not in the "Oh cool hack" kind of way. He is cheating you in a Bernie-Madoff-conned-me-out-of-my-money-for-ponzi-investments-so-that-he-could-live-a-cushy-life kind of way.
How and who is he cheating? You think he's not paying taxes? You think he's contributing to overloaded social services?
From what I can tell he's not working under table. (i.e. taxes are being withheld and paid on behalf of whatever social security number he's using.) And he obviously was unable to avail himself of college financial help due to his immigration status, so it seems pretty unlikely that he's able to be a drain on many other social programs.
What exactly has he conned you out of? He paid his taxes, he contributed to American society. It seems pretty clear that he put in more than he took. Who's losing by having him here?
How is he cheating me? His family "cut the line" in building a life in the US, one of the best nations to be in, in the eyes of many on this planet. His chances of winning a Pulitzer would be severely diminished if his family had stayed in the Philippines. So he cheated me by not being subject to the same US immigration rules as I and the rest of the world. He cheated the many other aspiring college students, journalism interns, journalists by occupying a spot each time he was employed or given the opportunity to advance with fake documents.
*His family* (...). His chances of (...) *if his family* (...)
He didn't cheat you into one damn thing. The opportunities that were given to him would not be given to you or "the next in line" had he not been here.
Part of what makes a wealthy nation, hum... wealthy, is the fact that it has enough resources to offer opportunities and services to the whole population. The US can give opportunities for you, him or any one that shows the necessary abilities.
I guess I'm looking at this situation as if he were someone whose parents faked his admission to MIT, somehow the papers slipped to the right places and he began enrolling, midway through college he learned about the faking, and then he still kept going, graduated magna/summa cum laude ("Pulitzer" - and yes I know MIT doesn't have latin recognitions), and now the truth is out. Even though he did not began college in a criminal way, in my opinion he ended it as such and all his super achievements don't justify keeping the facade.
Of course all that fails if, like you say, there would be no "next in line" because there is no "line", but somehow I think there is. I tend to think there are a finite number of schools, colleges, internships, and jobs. But that seems to be the core of our argument and I may need to change the way I view opportunities in nations.
Your 'lump of labor' logical fallacy contradicts the principle of 'the bottom line'. As a journalist, he is not creating work, but performing work assigned to him by a superior. His amount of available work to perform is limited.
What years of criminally fraudlent behavior? He was brought into the country at age 12. Legally, he wasn't even capable of committing fraud because he hadn't reached the age of criminal responsibility. You can't even hold someone under the age of 18 to a contract, which is why most companies require an adult co-signer for any minor who wants to enter into one.
But, he was not a minor or forced against his will when he decided to check the citizen box on the I-9, or when he decided to pursue a writing career in New York instead of Manilla, or every time he decided as an adult to stay in the USA while knowing he was here illegally.
I suppose if you suddenly were to find out that you were actually illegally present in the U.S., you'd be a good, law-abiding noncitizen and cheerfully go back to the country you don't know?
I'd dispute the "country you don't know" part. He keeps using the Filipino language. Having spent 12 years there, he isn't exactly a stranger. If, as a young 12-year old, he could adapt to the US (a country he _really_ didn't know), then why can't he, an educated and grown adult, adapt to the Philippines, a country where he grew up, whose language he speaks, and where he still has relatives (mom)??
This "country they don't know" falsehood is parroted by some people, and I find it very disingenuous. You don't have to lie to make your case. People immigrate to the US from other countries at all ages, and get along just fine. There's no reason that an American can't immigrate to his/her place of birth either. Growing up American doesn't make a person dumb, you know.
If a person's answer to this question is "no, I'd stay, even after I realize that I am breaking the laws of the country", I don't know how that person can expect sympathy after being busted (or "coming out").
I think it's totally fair to expect sympathy. I'm very sympathetic toward this guy, and as you can see from this HN thread, the majority of posters are as well.
Imagine you spent your whole life thinking you were part of Family A. But then, you discovered you weren't biologically part of Family A or actually adopted by Family A, instead Family A kidnapped you. Would you be inclined to stay with Family A, or would you seek out Family P - your biological family? Similarly, would you want to stay with Nation A or go seek out Nation P?
Do you disagree that nations are basically large families? Am I in the wrong to want to hypothetically seek out my biological family or nation of origin?
Or, do you disagree with my viewpoint and want me to shut up?
I didn't downvote you, but yes, I do disagree that nations are large families. And I think the analogy is flawed and attempts to emotionally twist the situation in favor of your conclusion.
Up until a few years ago I would have agreed with you. But, then I started studying genealogy and history and I had to revisit just what the definition of a nation is. Wikipedia states that a nation refers "... to a community of people who share a common territory and government; and who often share a common language, race, descent, and/or history." The USA is comprised of a community of people who, except for recent immigrants, are mostly distantly related. For example, 25% of USA citizens claim descent from the Pilgrims. Also, Obama and Cheney are eighth cousins. My personal ancestors have been here for nearly 400 years. USA citizens are distantly related. The same holds true, and probably more so, for other nations around the world.
Immigration is the official process of adoption into this large family. Illegal immigrants are masquerading as family members. Yeah, the situation sucks for this guy, but he has not gone through the official adoption process either. Instead, he wants us to think that it is cool that he has been knowingly stealing opportunities from legit members of the American family, and that gall, that cheating behavior, just doesn't sit right with me.
Instead, he wants us to think that it is cool that he has been knowingly stealing opportunities from legit members of the American family, and that gall, that cheating behavior, just doesn't sit right with me.
Sorry, dude, but I just can't have a productive discussion with you. This kind of xenophobic attitude is reprehensible in my opinion, and I just don't see either of us changing each others' minds.
Let's assume for a moment that he "stole" writing jobs from legal American citizens (or legal aliens). Let's also assume for the moment that the hiring processes for those jobs were concerned with finding the best candidate for the position.
I don't want a "real American" to fill that position. I want the best person for the job to fill that position. If a citizen/legal alien is actually the best person for the job, that's great. But if not: I don't care who it is, where he/she comes from, or what his/her immigration status is.
Maybe for a job like a newspaper/magazine writer, it isn't absolutely critical to have the best person possible in that job. But for other jobs it's certainly important, and regardless, I'm not willing to make that value judgement.
Most countries today _are_ based on ethnicities. They may not purely be of a particular ethnicity, but their basis is some ethnic grouping. There's a reason why all Germans speak German, and all Finns speak Finnish (to name a couple).
This is one of the things that's so great about America. It wasn't founded on an ethnicity; but an idea. But if you go to some of the other (more backward) countries, people still think of American as an ethnicity.
It's a not-insignificant marker of nationality for nations which have experienced diasporas. The citizenship laws of both Israel and the Republic of Ireland grant citizenship on a fairly liberal basis, based upon Jewish or Irish descent.
Pre 1940s Europe is a transnational jumble of overlapping ethnic groups. Result: war after war after war.
Post 40s and 50s after millions of people relocate to their linguistic and ethnic homelands and coalesce into new nations carved out of empires: lasting peace. Last major war was in former Yugoslavia, which failed to get with the ethnic nationalist program.
Hell, even Belgium is falling apart now. You are dead wrong on this. Ethnic nationalism is the only system that works, long term.
You conveniently left out the late 1930s and 1940s, in which a nation-state perpetuated ethnic war and genocide before being stopped primarily by two fairly transnational states.
Would you be interested in a summary of 20th century armed conflicts, classified by the type of states involved? There are a couple in Asia and Africa I'm thinking of.
That is illegal, I agree. But while I wouldn't do that, I don't feel able to condemn him for dealing with a situation not of his own making. The government does not offer any procedure for a person in his position to regularize their legal status (eg do XYZ and pay a fine in restitution, which will allow you to apply for permanent residency on the same basis as a new visitor). Absent a way to live legally, he has little other choice.
The immigration laws in this country were practically constructed to create this exact situation, and the same politicians who voted these draconian laws onto the books have persistently underfunded and frustrated the very systems designed to help enforce them, like entry-exit databases and the like.
"Absent a way to live legally, he has little other choice."
No he has a choice and he chooses to risk being busted and live in the land of opportunities. He can live legally. He can choose to go back to the native country of his parents and start a legal life there. He has graduated from a university in the US. He has done work in the US. He is much better off resume-wise than many of his peers.
That is irrelevant to the question of his legal relationship with the US government, which is the matter at issue. Sure, he could go to the Philippines, but that's essentially wishing the problem away.
There are a lot of people who are technically citizens of other places but who arrived in the US at such a young age that they have no memory of ever living abroad, and often don't even speak the language. Why should such people suddenly find themselves excluded from legal participation in the workforce when they reach adulthood? From a constitutional standpoint it's a very problematic question, because those persons are at a significant disadvantage without having broken any laws.
Although I disagree with you, I applaud you for your eloquence.
AFAIK, immigrants (whether legal or illegal) are in a gray area wrt constitutional protections. For example, on entry all aliens (including perm. residents) are fingerprinted whereas citizens are not. The lowly officer examining your papers can decide to not admit an alien into the country if you mouth off, and he's pretty much the final authority.
I seriously doubt any of things you describe are "problematic" from a constitutional point of view. It seems well-settled that aliens need not be treated the same as citizens.
Excuse me for following this up late, as I did not have time previously. The problematic aspect of this is that while an admitting officer has a great deal of discretion and someone excluded from entry to the US has little immediate recourse, a person who is already in the US has a somewhat different legal situation. Of course, how and when the person arrived affects that, but in the case of someone brought as an infant or small child (and thus, incapable of criminal responsibility at entry), it's legally rather difficult to say whether they have in fact broken any laws.
This raises some complex 14th amendment issues. In one sense, I'd like to see these clarified by the Supreme court. In another, I'm skeptical of the wisdom of doing so because Chief Justice roberts argued against equal treatment of illegal immigrant children in the Texas school system in a famous case called Plyler v. Doe (1982). He lost, and I have a hunch he is still a bit sore about it.
He has knowingly used fraud for years to get work, educational, and lifesytle opportunities that would have otherwise gone to people legally allowed to work, study, and reside here. Paying taxes or writing keen articles does not excuse this fact.
Hence, he is cheating[1].
[1] Wikipedia defines cheating as, "... the breaking of rules to gain advantage in a competitive situation." That seems to be a accurate summary of the author's activities. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cheating.
If the game is 'get a job' and the competition is merit based. Then no, he didn't cheat, he kicked ass.
If the game is 'obtain the opportunity to get a job' then, yup he cheated.
Barriers to entry are sometimes needed, but if the only thing you did to get over that barrier was be born on the correct side of an imaginary line, well, that just doesn't impress me.
Really, american born citizens can't complain about this without sounding like entitled brats. 'I want to win despite my lack of ability.' No sympathy there.
Foreign born citizens that worked hard through the system to get citizenship have a little to be annoyed about, but really the only class of people who can really even say 'boo' to Jose are people who faced his situation and chose to leave and then worked their way back in. If that class of people exists then I would have just one question for them:
"Would you support the DREAM act?"
I really and truly have a hard time believing that they would say, "No."
"foreign born citizens that worked hard through the system to get citizenship have a little to be annoyed about"
I'm from this group and I am annoyed. Yes, it sucks that being born on the right side of an imaginary line determines many of your future opportunities. Agreed. Let's change that. Agreed.
But meanwhile, there can't be anarchy. Just because you think it's unfair, you (or your parents) can't go ahead and break the rules, fake to be citizen of a place that you are not, and after enough water has passed under the bridge, come out and expect for everything to be the same, just because you lived your life in a commendable way after that.
I think it's unfair and insulting that he got the opportunity to attend schools in the US, get to do internships in the US, while thousands of children from the Philippines were not smuggled across the border and have to cope with life without such opportunities. Who knows all the great people they might have become if they had started a life in the US.
Exactly. Paying taxes does not make the situation fair. All his life he has "filled a spot" of an opportunity that would have otherwise been available to someone else. His achievements ("the end") do not justify the means.
Go ahead and call me a xenophobe now. Whatev.
I think it is in poor form for the NYT to print this manipulative article that tries to make me feel bad for the gay, minority, do-gooder author and excuse his years of criminally fraudulent behavior.
Sure, call me heartless. But, this guy is cheating you, and not in the "Oh cool hack" kind of way. He is cheating you in a Bernie-Madoff-conned-me-out-of-my-money-for-ponzi-investments-so-that-he-could-live-a-cushy-life kind of way.