More often than not, there's an issue of money, which is something they can't make a lot of here, even after they send a vast majority of what little they do make back home to the family that was left behind. Because they're willing to take a huge pay cut because someone like you or me wouldn't want to work in the fields, I'll admit it. I don't want to work in the fields, not because I feel it's beneath me, but because it'd be a huge pay cut for me because I've worked for what I have. They're doing the exact same thing.
It takes a lot of time and money to become a resident or citizen. More so to become a resident than a citizen. Again, I will reiterate that more often than not, people are here "illegally" due to circumstances out of their control. Mind you, I'm not saying that there aren't people here of their own volition, because that's certainly the case for a lot as well. Let us never mind the fact that a large portion of the western United States actually belonged to Mexico before we got our grubby and greedy hands on it, no matter how much we paid for it after a war that started because Americans couldn't agree with Mexico's laws.
What is truly wrong about this whole immigration thing is the amount of arrogance and ignorance Americans have. What irks me to no end is that it is primarily Mexicans that are targeted by this, you know, the ones that pick our produce from the fields and orchards, wash our dishes at a restaurant, clean up after our mess in a movie theatre or a weekend away in a hotel. Jobs we'd stay away from because you find it's beneath you or it's not the pay you were looking for, or we feel we're way too over qualified for, that's not what we spent $20,000 a year for 4-5 years to do. Never mind those from Europe, China, Japan or any other country who let their work or school visas expire and continue to stay here, some for decades, undetected. But what saddens me the most is that very, very few realise that legal or illegal immigrants are people too. No matter the language barriers, their feelings get hurt just as easily as ours do and to be exiled, reviled and humiliated only worsens the matter. How would you like to see the news and see your people beaten down and ridiculed? There would be a public outrage. How would you like it if you were in that position? Look at it from a HUMANITY standpoint. We're all people and deserve to be treated as such regardless of status.
It seems to me that we have forgotten what was etched into the tablet of the Statue of Liberty.
“The New Colossus” by Emma Lazarus
Not like the brazen giant of Greek fame,
With conquering limbs astride from land to land;
Here at our sea-washed, sunset gates shall stand
A mighty woman with a torch, whose flame
Is the imprisoned lightning, and her name Mother of Exiles.
From her beacon-hand
Glows world-wide welcome; her mild eyes command
The air-bridged harbor that twin cities frame.
“"Keep, ancient lands, your storied pomp!"” cries she
With silent lips. “Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!”