David Cole Five Myths About Immigration
For its entire history, America has dealt with the influx of immigrants from all over the world. David Cole, a professor at Georgetown University Law Center and volunteer staff attorney for the Center for Constitutional Rights, proves that immigration is more beneficial than some Americans believe it to be. In Cole’s essay titled, “Five Myths about Immigration,” he debunks the common stereotypes about immigrants and embraces the facts. These common stereotypes about immigrants are often fueled by ignorance and misinformation and can cause real-world harm to immigrants. According to Cole’s essay, “Passion, misinformation, and shortsighted fear often substitute for reason, fairness, and human dignity in today’s immigration debates” (558). Politicians
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Some Americans argue that immigrants refuse to assimilate into U.S. culture, but according to Cole, “our society exerts tremendous pressure to conform, and cultural separatism rarely survives a generation” (559). Little by little, immigrants newly living in the U.S. pick up on our language, behaviors, customs and so on, all through exposure alone. Over time, immigrants adapt to our culture and in return, they also enrich our culture by adding more diversity. It is this diversity that enhances environments within our country such workplaces, neighborhoods, and also schools. After all, being a diverse country shows that we are a country that openly accepts the differences of others and embraces their freedom to be different as well. Pressuring immigrants to completely leave behind their previous culture and conform to “American Culture” is not only seen as controlling and unjust, it also assumes America has one single culture when in fact, American culture is composed from various individual cultures. Although sometimes it can be rather difficult to work with different cultures and some cultures negatively interact with others, that should not be an excuse for anyone to fear immigrants nor immorally prohibit them from making a home where ever they please to do so. America is a melting pot of cultures, which helps portray itself as a beautifully diverse country where anyone is accepted with open arms. Immigrants choose this country for a reason; America is one of the most opportunity-filled countries that is rich in culture and diversity. Not only does immigration enrich our culture, but it also enriches the lives of
Some Americans argue that immigrants refuse to assimilate into U.S. culture, but according to Cole, “our society exerts tremendous pressure to conform, and cultural separatism rarely survives a generation” (559). Little by little, immigrants newly living in the U.S. pick up on our language, behaviors, customs and so on, all through exposure alone. Over time, immigrants adapt to our culture and in return, they also enrich our culture by adding more diversity. It is this diversity that enhances environments within our country such workplaces, neighborhoods, and also schools. After all, being a diverse country shows that we are a country that openly accepts the differences of others and embraces their freedom to be different as well. Pressuring immigrants to completely leave behind their previous culture and conform to “American Culture” is not only seen as controlling and unjust, it also assumes America has one single culture when in fact, American culture is composed from various individual cultures. Although sometimes it can be rather difficult to work with different cultures and some cultures negatively interact with others, that should not be an excuse for anyone to fear immigrants nor immorally prohibit them from making a home where ever they please to do so. America is a melting pot of cultures, which helps portray itself as a beautifully diverse country where anyone is accepted with open arms. Immigrants choose this country for a reason; America is one of the most opportunity-filled countries that is rich in culture and diversity. Not only does immigration enrich our culture, but it also enriches the lives of