Because they’re lives are shit and they need somebody to blame.
The right will accept a boot on their face as long as they’ve got a face on which to rest their own boot.
The USA prided itself on a nation of immigrant, heck even the Statue of Liberty says it. When did immigrants (US citizens from the old world) become anti immigrant and why?
Submitted 22 hours ago by Patnou@lemmy.world to nostupidquestions@lemmy.world
Comments
Blackmist@feddit.uk 5 hours ago
False@lemmy.world 21 hours ago
People hated immigrants DURING the time period you’re thinking of. And it wasn’t always a skin color thing either, the Irish were one of the big targets for a long time.
jqubed@lemmy.world 20 hours ago
Italians were also targeted. Being from a Catholic country was sometimes enough to get targeted. Always found it funny (Woody Allen marriage funny, not Woody Allen film funny) that the Protestants who came to what is now Massachusetts seeking “religious freedom” meant it only for themselves and drove out anyone who didn’t subscribe to their views.
Plebcouncilman@sh.itjust.works 17 hours ago
You need to put it in context, many if not most of the denominations that came to America seeking religious freedom did so because continental Christians considered them extremists. So yes, they were seeking it only for themselves.
floo@retrolemmy.com 21 hours ago
The term “black Irish” didn’t come from nowhere
obinice@lemmy.world 17 hours ago
That’s a term? What’s it mean, besides identifying someone as black and Irish? O.o
Skullgrid@lemmy.world 17 hours ago
And it wasn’t always a skin color thing either, the Irish were one of the big targets for a long time.
Irish and Italians were not considered white, so … it’s still a “where is the migration from” kinda thing
Hideakikarate@sh.itjust.works 19 hours ago
There was a reason businesses would put a sign out front that said “NINA”. No Irish Need Apply.
ininewcrow@lemmy.ca 21 hours ago
It was always racism at it’s core.
European immigrants accepted immigrants as long as they were other European immigrants. At the same time they were encouraging immigrants, they were systematically eliminating the original inhabitants or forcing them to assimilate to European culture.
It’s always been a variation of white nationalism … they don’t mind the world becoming more open and inclusive … as long as it only includes other white European people and cultures.
protist@mander.xyz 20 hours ago
European immigrants accepted immigrants as long as they were other European immigrants.
This is just not the case. Read again
fmstrat@lemmy.nowsci.com 1 hour ago
Easier communication. Thousands of people each living far apart had no way to amplify each other. Immigrants were mostly centered around cities, thus the rural divide.
DeathByBigSad@sh.itjust.works 21 hours ago
Everything can be summarized in one Chinese idiom (成语):
过河拆桥Aka: Crossing the river, then dismantle the bridge.
You’re already crossed it, why care about the bridge, you wont be using it anymore.ieatpwns@lemmy.world 21 hours ago
They pull up the ladder behind them
garbagebagel@lemmy.world 21 hours ago
So like burning your bridges in English? Although I guess that’s more for people. Maybe more like pulling up the ladder behind you.
lemmyng@piefed.ca 20 hours ago
The English version is "I got mine, fuck you."
Also applies to immigrant minorities who them vote conservative to keep other immigrants out.
NABDad@lemmy.world 21 hours ago
I think how generally “burning bridges” is used refers to not leaving yourself a way out. However in this case we’re talking about not leaving others a way in.
TimewornTraveler@lemmy.dbzer0.com 19 hours ago
I love Chinese four letter aphorisms and I’m glad you shared this one but i dont think this really answers the when or the why 😛
eatCasserole@lemmy.world 19 hours ago
Perhaps along with de-industrialization; as more labour is outsourced, less labour_ers_ are needed.
hddsx@lemmy.ca 20 hours ago
What and the conservative states trying to prosecute people in the Democrat states is 合久必分分？
DeathByBigSad@sh.itjust.works 20 hours ago
What?
Nah, that phrase more accurately applies to US Civil War.
ExLisper@lemmy.curiana.net 5 hours ago
General population was always anti immigrant but the ruling class was smart enough to understand they needed immigration to sustain the growth. What changed is that everyone got so dumb they don’t know what’s in their best interest anymore.
blarghly@lemmy.world 17 hours ago
Anti-immigrant sentiment is nearly universal across human cultures. It’s a form of tribalism/fear of “the other”. Just look at the backlash against arab refugees in Germany and Sweden, or the relatively recent tightening of Canada’s immigration policy which used to be one of the most liberal in the world, for modern examples. Historic examples are even easier to find.
In general, we see more anti-immigrant sentiment in a country due to (a) the general population feeling insecure for some reason, (b) the perception that immigrants are immigrating faster than they are integrating.
When times are good and people feel secure, they look back at the past and say to themselves “look at how great our society is - we welcome people from all over the world, and now we have korean-mexican fusion. Yay, us!” But then when times get harder and people feel less secure, they say “these goddamned Nigerians keep coming here and taking all our video-editing and corporate accounting jobs! And they chew with their mouths open and have annoying laughs. And on top of that, their food isn’t even that good. They’re the worst, stop letting them in!”
Immigration is part of the mythologizing of the United States, but that doesn’t except it from the great overarching trends of humanity.
Aceticon@lemmy.dbzer0.com 3 hours ago
More broadly, it’s all Tribalism.
You’ll see it at many levels, not only towards the “outsiders” in nation terms (and examples are not only the anti-immigrant discourse but also in the discourse mainly blaming a country’s problems on some “foreign power” or other, in both cases as insiders didn’t have vastly more power than such outsiders) but also at various other tribal levels (race, political party, region, city and even town in so-called “small town” environments).
The human tendency from Tribalism will turn even otherwise “good people” (but not very competent when it comes to introspection or having a strong keen sense of what is Just) into mindless “us vs them” drones who are easy to manipulate into blaming outsiders for the outcomes of the actions of insiders.
QuarterSwede@lemmy.world 13 hours ago
That’s quite insightful.
frustrated_phagocytosis@fedia.io 21 hours ago
Within a single generation. My grandfather showed up here at 11 from Romania. Never became a US citizen. His son, my father, is a rabid anti-immigrant racist Fox News fan boy. It's disgusting. Ironically my mother's great-great grandmother lost her birthright citizenship by marrying a Finnish immigrant before the 14th amendment existed and had to reapply for her own citizenship along with her husband because women's status was tied to the male head of household at the time, and now he rants about how birthright citizenship is wrong, despite being the exact person who benefits from it.
homesweethomeMrL@lemmy.world 19 hours ago
His son, my father, is a rabid anti-immigrant racist Fox News fan boy.
Ding!
Ask not for whom the right-wing propaganda tolls, rest-of-the-world, it tolls for thee
lechekaflan@lemmy.world 6 hours ago
The “fuck you, I got mine” mindset aka FYIGM or getting first dibs.
That is, kicking out the ladder or destroying bridges or cutting off reach so that no one else is getting what one has achieved. Like, “I got first, you’re getting nothing!”
devolution@lemmy.world 10 hours ago
America was never accommodating.
GnerphBaht@sopuli.xyz 32 minutes ago
And the Irish.
devolution@lemmy.world 19 minutes ago
And how do you think the Irish became accepted?
CarbonIceDragon@pawb.social 21 hours ago
Here’s a wiki article about the topic, because it would be a bit much to list it all out in a lemmy comment: en.wikipedia.org/…/Nativism_in_United_States_poli…
flop_leash_973@lemmy.world 19 hours ago
Its called “ladder pulling”.
Mouselemming@sh.itjust.works 18 hours ago
One way the wealthy and powerful stay that way is by constantly promoting the narrative that it’s those poorer than you who are your enemy, not the bosses who starve you both.
Aceticon@lemmy.dbzer0.com 2 hours ago
There are two ways to deal with one’s position in the Social Ladder: one can either concentrate one’s efforts in climbing up or one can concentrate one’s efforts into keeping the ones below down.
IMHO, the US used to have mainly the former, but not anymore, whilst the UK (at least by the time I got there, in the 00s) has mostly the latter (and judging by this traditional idea that “people should know their place”, it has been so for a long time).
FlashMobOfOne@lemmy.world 18 hours ago
Yeah, sorry OP.
Racism has always and will always be a part of America’s identity. I’d go so far as to say I think it’s part of human nature, given how pervasive and common it’s been throughout all of human history.
TheFlopster@lemmy.world 21 hours ago
Mostly personal opinion incoming, with a few facts mixed in: I think the message on the Statue of Liberty was what the best of us at the time wanted the majority of us to be. I’m not sure we ever were.
First we get the Puritans, wiping out Native Americans, and trying to push their religion on everyone.
Then you get the slave trade, which is not immigration, but a large influx of a new population regardless, that was suddenly a problem for some when those people were free and citizens.
Then you get the Ellis Island years. Immigrants would get here, get sucked into “the American dream” of capitalism (which can help only very specific people), then want to close the door behind them. That way none of the new, filthy immigrants from (insert ethnic/religious group of your choice) could get the same advantages. But everyone kept coming.
Now, in power due to the way everything got handled (badly) after our civil war, you have a combination of the religious right, who want christianity to continue to be number one, and the racists, who want to make sure their daughter doesn’t sleep with anyone who’s the wrong color. They were always here, festering in the background, but now they’ve gained power, and they’re louder than before.
The rest of us are still here, suffering, watching the country we were told was great reveal its ugliest population to everyone. I’m left wondering if we were ever a country who actually wanted immigrants. Or if it was merely aspirational.
switcheroo@lemmy.world 15 hours ago
When stupid and hateful took over all three branches of government and runs unopposed…
SoftestSapphic@lemmy.world 21 hours ago
The Unites States was founded by religious extremists who were pressured to leave their community because of their extremist Christian beleifs.
Until we force wealth equality people in the US will not be equal.
Zwuzelmaus@feddit.org 21 hours ago
As soon as they settled down and thought, now they have got something to loose.
Steve@communick.news 20 hours ago
Blaming immigrants is classic political trope.
Right along with blaming the poor.Even when the nation was welcoming immigrants, handing them a weapon, and shoving them to the front line. They were being denigrated and demonized by other Americans.
slazer2au@lemmy.world 22 hours ago
When immigrants from the “wrong” country started applying.
What is the wrong country? What ever the media says it currently is.
mugita_sokiovt@discuss.online 12 hours ago
This was done to keep our Catholic roots in check. I’m no longer a Catholic-aligned guy as a result. My producer was Catholic-aligned and Jesuit-associated for his entire life until he started making changes he felt was right with his higher power.
brucethemoose@lemmy.world 20 hours ago
See the 1947 US Army video: “Don’t be a Sucker”:
archive.org/details/DontBeaS1947
It’s always been a hypocritical ideal. Even the US Army acknowledged our xenophobic tendencies, and the constant struggle against them. That’s the point.
…But I think the radical shift of the “attention economy” is what makes it feel like the ideal is finally collapsing. The population is sucked into doomscrolling Fox News (for example) at such scale that makes this US Army video feel quant. If they did the same thing today, no one would even notice.
the_q@lemmy.zip 19 hours ago
Lead and propaganda.
sunzu2@thebrainbin.org 21 hours ago
Owner class wants cheap slaves... But they don't want to be blamed for it.
So they got Indigenous population to blame the slaves while they exploit both.
Indigenous Americans are just useful idiots fighting culture wars. They should know better but propaganda be good!
Endymion_Mallorn@kbin.melroy.org 20 hours ago
The Statue of Liberty wasn't something commissioned by the USA. It was just how one French guy saw us. The New Colossus is not law, it's a poem.
We've never really been proud of immigration. The only President with a reasonable take on immigrants was Teddy Roosevelt - and his belief was that the only path forward is full assimilation.
count_dongulus@lemmy.world 21 hours ago
Anti-immigrant sentiment in the US has been a thing for hundreds of years. Consider watching Scorcese’s “Gangs of New York” for a (fictionally dramatized) depiction of it in times past.
As for why mass deportations are possible today - - until the late 1800s, immigration to the US was essentially unregulated. The Chinese Exclusion Act and later systems of quotas and literacy tests introduced around the turn of the 20th century instituted the first national immigration policies.
I frankly don’t find it unfair or unreasonable that the US government’s executive branch has chosen to enforce existing immigration laws for political gain. Americans should change their immigration laws if they get upset when they’re actually enforced. If anything, the executive branch was utterly failing to enforce laws that representatives had placed and kept on the books for a long time. If you want more immigrants, make it easy and legal to receive more immigrants without tests, long wait periods, or country of origin quotas.
badbytes@lemmy.world 15 hours ago
Distraction is the point.
shalafi@lemmy.world 16 hours ago
I have a take no one else has talked about. I think much of the recent hate is down to there being too many damned people, and suddenly it seems a lot of them are brown.
Young me honestly wasn’t quite sure what Hispanic meant because there weren’t any around. LOL, imagine my culture shock when I moved to Chicago! Then I came down to Florida, and once again, no Hispanics. They were so rare it was kinda freaky. Then Hurricane Ivan flattened us, loads of immigrants showed up to build and never left.
Now people are looking around and seeing America on the first downward trajectory since the Great Depression. They’re casting about to lay blame. Know what’s different? Well lookee here, millions of new brown people that weren’t here before!
I don’t think liberals understand just how many immigrants came across the southern border in the last 20 years. When I brought up that there was indeed a crisis at the border during the Biden admin, I got beat up here and on reddit. Y’all can stick your fingers in your collective ear, but shitloads of people were piling up to get it. It was a humanitarian crisis.
Not saying the hate is logical, but I can at least understand where it’s coming from. It’s a little more nuanced that screaming RACIST at everyone.
Adderbox76@lemmy.ca 17 hours ago
When said immigration switched from primarily being Europeans emigrating from a post WW2 Europe, and instead became primarily brown folk coming from all the countries that the U.S. itself bombed to shit.
It’s not immigration that they hate. It’s brown immigration.
Never forget that.
Kurallier@programming.dev 17 hours ago
The Irish would like to have a word with you
CatDogL0ver@lemmy.world 16 hours ago
The US didn’t welcome Irish and Italian
BakerBagel@midwest.social 17 hours ago
They became anti-immigrant once they had kids and saw other people arriving to the boat. My sister in law’s family are refugees from El Salvador. Now they are all raging Trumpers, despite half of them not being naturalized yet.
quick_snail@feddit.nl 1 hour ago
The US is not anti immigrant.
There’s a few greedy white people with lots of money who bought the media and the elections who are anti-immigrant.
Don’t confuse policy with popular sentiment.
CH3DD4R_G0BL1N@sh.itjust.works 16 minutes ago
I get what you’re going for, but it’s hard to believe that when said billionaires’ propaganda campaign was so easily and eagerly adopted by the majority of one of our political party bases. Including some of our own family members who had never openly expressed such sentiments before.
Propaganda is powerful, but can it make you suddenly, deeply believe something you weren’t already secretly feeling?
lemmyknow@lemmy.today 2 minutes ago
Maybe. Fictional stories can make you feel things, even though these stories aren’t real. Just look at (fiction) movies, tv shows, books. If people can watch scary movies and get scared of fiction, maybe people can be made to be scared of other, real life people. Or worried, or whatever. Especially if maybe one doesn’t know or doesn’t have experience enough on the matter at hand.