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Why was the Minuteman Project started? |
Unfortunately, despite the many years fighting for basic human rights, the United States is still a mess. The first big event in the 2000's that sparked even more anti-immigrant sentiment was 9/11, the attack on the twin towers and the pentagon. After 9/11 there was a sweeping sense of patriotism but also xenophobia. Once again, people of color, particularly Muslim Americans, were treated differently because of their background. However, after this attack, the United States government realized that something needed to change and changed the requirements for airport security. A concept, identifying the problem and doing something to actively change it so the same thing does not occur again. The solution was not to ban Muslim Americans but rather update security and place restrictions on what you can take on an airplane. At this same time, the Department of Homeland Security was created.
An important act that was created was the No Child Left Behind Act. This was an act implemented in schools to help aid children in their learning. It was later changed to the Every Student Succeeds Act that was implemented by President Obama. Also, the Esther Martinez Act was implemented to help protect languages in the school setting. Each of these acts were influential in the United States, some being better than others. In the 2000's Natives are STILL having to fight for the right to their land and yet STILL, the United States goes against the treaties with Natives and disregards their rights. In 2004 was Save the Peaks and more recently is the fight against pipelines through their land. Remember, the Natives once lived all across the land the United States now is but it was taken, they were killed, and pushed onto reservations. It is the reservation land that the United States keeps infringing on. The very little land Natives have is still being taken, this is an issue. Alongside all of the other anti-sentiment, was anti-Mexican sentiment. Therefore, came the Minuteman Project. This Project was not actually implemented by anyone with power but white nationalists who believed they could use force against anyone that wanted to come to the United States. These white nationalists, as history has shown many times, felt unreasonably threatened. It is interesting to look at that these men feel they have the power to not allow people into their land and pride themselves on being 'American' but as history shows, white people used force to push people out of their land. A big debate, especially since the election of Donald Trump is DACA. DACA is not a harmful program to the United States at all and in fact holds many benefits to the United States economy. It is a common misconception that 'illegal immigrants are all terrible people' but as DACA, the Dream Act, shows this is not the case. The only people that are qualified to be apart of DACA are people who are upstanding people that have shown their remarkable character. Yet, this sense of white nationalism has said otherwise about the people using DACA. To an unreasonable amount of people immigrants do not have a place in the United States and therefore came the Day Without Immigrants to show just how important immigrants are to the United States. The United States is founded on immigration but sadly, immigration has been given a negative connotation with no help to Trump. With the negative connotation of immigrants, many immigrants are said to be murderers and rapists and apart of gangs. However, when looking at mass shootings alone, the vast majority have been done by white people. These acts however, are not labeled as terrorism or some other absurd word that has been used to label people of color. When looking at police brutality, if the victim is a person of color the media drags any small negative part of their life and uses it to describe them. If the victim is white, the victim is suddenly a respected and loving father. Also, interestingly enough, Natives are just as likely if not more, to be victims of police brutality, but this is not covered in Media. There are many more issues that can be dived into and the issues presented can be given whole pages discussing but the main thing to take away is that white privilege exists. White privilege is real and although segregation is not legal, racism exists even in small ways like micro-aggressions. The United States has a long history of treating people of color unfairly and unfortunately although the circumstances are different, the mistreatment is still present today. |