<p>No this is not normal discussion. You attributed to someone words that were not posted, and then accused that person of racism. Man up and apologize. Learn a lesson here. There is a protocol and you violated it. Your own words put the lie to you and you are going to get a poor reputation as a poster here.</p>
<p>Some of you act like public services are a fixed cost that works the same no matter how many people benefit. It's not. More users of services = higher costs to provide those services, or in some cases, diminished quality of services. </p>
<p>Pretending taxes are unimportant is a very bad case to try to make in support of using greater resources to take care of illegals. Taxes are absolutely critical.</p>
<p>Wow. This thread has really created a lot of comments. Just another fact to fuel the fire:</p>
<p>According to a study by the Center for Immigration Studies:</p>
<p>"With nearly two-thirds of illegal aliens lacking a high school degree, the primary reason they create a fiscal deficit is their low education levels and resulting low incomes and tax payments, not their legal status or heavy use of most social services."</p>
<p>Yeold, I think that's right. The students that I work with often have no history or family history of literacy in any language. That's very, very tough to overcome. We in America are much more alike than we are different, so it's often difficult for us to understand just how truly disadvantaged some people are in this world. The question is whether the American taxpayer should be forced to pay for the poor and uneducated in the rest of the world, while their own countries do nothing.</p>
<p>For the purposes of this thread and the OP's original question, I see it more narrowly: Should we help educate illegal children who have been here most of their lives? I vote yes. These children have little or no relationship with their original countries.</p>
<p>ye,</p>
<p>Illegal alien minors are required by law to attend K-12 in the same manner as citizens.</p>
<p>I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that I don't think the fact that N.C. might bar undocumented immigrants from attending its public colleges is that big of a deal.</p>
<p>I believe I read that about 50% of high school graduates attend college right now, so that means that about 32,500 of the 65,000 undocumented students graduating annually would be college-material. That averages out to about 650 students per state. I'm not sure of how many, but at least 3/7 of the schools FiveKey applied to will accept undocumented students, as well as the CA schools and HYP etc. So there are options available.</p>
<p>Many high school graduates are unable to attend college for various reasons, including lack of money and the need to support their families. Being shut out is not unique to undocumented students.</p>
<p>If and when undocumented immigrants become eligible to work in the U.S. legally, then a college degree will be of tangible value for them. So at that time, they can apply to attend.</p>
<p>Additionally, not all agree that a college degree is all that valuable. See,</p>
<p>"For the purposes of this thread and the OP's original question, I see it more narrowly: Should we help educate illegal children who have been here most of their lives? I vote yes. These children have little or no relationship with their original countries."</p>
<p>I vote to make an arrangement whereby they give some and get some, and the taxpayers give some and get some. But only for people who have done the right thing and are prepared to take advantage of the education.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Your analogy you posted below this isn't the same thing .... there you <em>have</em> disposed of law and order.</p>
<p>You have yet to answer my questions, and you keep on posting the same argument over and over again even though I have challenged its premises, and you have not properly defended those premises. </p>
<p>Again I ask you -- please respond -- is it never just to break any law, regardless of the circumstances? Never ever ever?</p>
<p>Let's go to the heart of your argument.</p>
<p>
[quote]
There is no principle or theory in this given context upon which civil disorder is appropriate or beneficial,
[/quote]
</p>
<p>But I contest that it is not civil disorder. (For an elaboration, you can refer to the posts I have already made.) </p>
<p>How is it wishful thinking? They are not theories about what a society should be, but how society works -- theories that have been affirmed throughout history, from the Founding Fathers to John Rawls.</p>
<p>
[quote]
After all, an admissions letter is just a piece of paper, it's not substantive or anything meaningful, right? All that would matter is how they interact with the other students and administators, right?
[/quote]
</p>
<p>This is not the same because the principles of acceptance are not the same. University admissions is not a social contract ... furthermore if a student gave birth to a child for example, he/she won't automatically be admitted to Harvard. The principles of, "what is a good Harvard student," are more subjective and not quite the same as, "what is a useful member of society."</p>
<p>In the United States, family planning officials do not check each child of every family to see whether the government wants the child in or not. Immigration is not analogous to the college admissions process for many critical reasons. Unlike Harvard, ownership of the United States is not private, nor is there an oligarchy ruling it ... for critical reasons of liberty.</p>
<p>You talk about civil disorder? These college-ready students are already part of the order.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Upon what moral basis do you base your ideas of debt? Do you have a competing idea against social contract theory?</p>
<p>Suppose anomie and chaos erupted in those countries, plunging those governments into complete disarray, with each country fragmented into pieces -- do the little fiefdoms that form now owe the undocumented immigrants in the US [that were born in that geographic location] anything?</p>
<p>Who owes what? You Westerners came to the New World and blatantly subjugated every territory in your path...</p>
<p>If you're going to be so legalistic about nation of ancestry, why shouldn't England owe YOU people of English ancestry (or German ancestry, or Dutch...) anything? After all, all you German, Dutch, Scandinavian, Irish, Scottish, Italian, Eastern European immigrants were a product of the SAFETY VALVE right? You should go back to your original countries rather than prevent those governments from absconding from their duty!</p>
<p>Let us be really really asinine about original birth and ancestry.</p>
<p>OR we could look rationally at the social contract, which was a major motivation for the US Declaration of Independence....</p>
<p>When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another</p>
<p>Those immigrants have found reason to dissolve those political bands, and look for a new social contract in another land.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>That actually sounds rather rational. I'm glad we can finally look to the future rather than fuming on the past. :) </p>
<p>Many (undocumented) immigrants are eager to give back to American society .... let them have the chance.</p>
<p>"Many (undocumented) immigrants are eager to give back to American society .... let them have the chance. "</p>
<p>And what about you? I've asked you that several times.</p>
<p>"Many (undocumented) immigrants are eager to give back to American society .... let them have the chance."</p>
<p>Yes, but I feel as if most people immediately think that we only want to "leech" from their society and then never give anything back.</p>
<p>"Too hard to answer, isn't it? Might make you have to face some painful truths."</p>
<p>By "cheese twist of words", I meant that it was a typical variation of "ask not what your country can do for you—ask what you can do for your country". <em>rolls eyes</em></p>
<p>"Speaking of cheesy. I know personally some people in Korea. Every one of them has a mind."</p>
<p>I fail to recall when I even mentioned that people in Korea have no minds. Now I feel as if you're trying to put words in my mouth. Please read a post carefully before commenting on them. I was referring to people who are unable to obtain an education here in the U.S.</p>
<p>"Not at the college level."</p>
<p>I guess I do live in a fantasy world where everyone is highly educated, or atleast given the opportunity to become highly educated through public universities if they cannot afford to attend private universities.</p>
<p>
[quote]
The question is whether the American taxpayer should be forced to pay for the poor and uneducated in the rest of the world, while their own countries do nothing.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>If you believed American society to be the most enlightened, to have the best economic and political models against other countries, why shouldn't the best system eventually absorb the rest of the world? It would after all, improve overall efficiency. If you believe it is the system that makes the best use of the resources that are put into put as input, not in the least because that system is also based on the concepts of self-interest where each individual has a stake in temporarily aiding his peer, then eventually we shall have converted those poor and uneducated into our own citizens. And why not? If we are the best system, why should the other countries exist? Why should people be forever tied to their countries of birth, based on some outdated ideas of moral debt?</p>
<p>Nationality is superficial ... cultures and social institutions imaginary lines drawn across a map. Why must debt be confined within those lines? Take for example, border towns, where a healthy relationship and trade (even personal and cultural relationships) have developed across borders. But according to your concepts of nationalism (the belief that nationality and sovereign borders are more important than the cultural institutions that transcend borders), people across a border owe nothing to each other.</p>
<p>
<p>And what about you? I've asked you that several times.
</p>
<p>Don't tell me you have doubted that all the while? How can you possibly think I am not eager?</p>
<p>"I guess I do live in a fantasy world where everyone is highly educated, or atleast given the opportunity to become highly educated"</p>
<p>I think you simply misunderstood what level of education is mandated.</p>
<p>""Speaking of cheesy. I know personally some people in Korea. Every one of them has a mind."</p>
<p>When I said that, I was poking fun at you for using the cliche that a mind is a terrible thing to waste. But I now realize that you may be too young to know what I was referring to. If so, I apologize. The quotation used to be the slogan for the United Negro College Fund.</p>
<p>"By "cheese twist of words", I meant that it was a typical variation of "ask not what your country can do for you—ask what you can do for your country". <em>rolls eyes</em>"</p>
<p>That's not what I meant at all. What I did mean was to ask you in complete seriousness what, if you were to get an education and become prosperous, you intended to give back.</p>
<p>This thread needs a healthy dose of King Lear, Act I, scene i; particularly the parts where Cordelia makes her speeches about duty.</p>
<p>"This thread needs a healthy dose of King Lear, Act I, scene i; particularly the parts where Cordelia makes her speeches about duty."</p>
<p>That is my favorite play :)</p>
<p>"That's not what I meant at all. What I did mean was to ask you in complete seriousness what, if you were to get an education and become prosperous, you intended to give back."</p>
<p>Unless my memory serves me incorrectly, I did write in my last-last reply what I do intend to do. I can't promise enormous charitable donations or anything of the sort as I've never mentioned that I do intend to get prosperous. I doubt I'll be a Carnegie of any sort. However, I do intend to give back my mental efforts in research as I've previously mentioned:</p>
<p>"Although a bit blunt, it is true that I am simply a leech in the eyes of some people. However, I still do believe in returning something back to the U.S. when I am capable of doing so. I think that when I am able to legally enter the field of biomedical research, I plan to use my efforts to help find cures for certain diseases. A stretch but it isn't everyday that someone finds a new cure for a disease. Still... isn't everyone contributing to the U.S. in some form? Why does it all have to be in the form of taxes? A janitor is helping to keep a certain complex clean, a teacher is helping to foster the minds of future Americans, and even a person working at McDonalds is helping people from their hunger. I still don't understand why "contributing" to the American society has to be strictly in the form of paying taxes."</p>
<p>However, I cannot assume that you did not read that section of my writing. Maybe you had thought that I did not mean that in complete seriousness.</p>
<p>"Don't tell me you have doubted that all the while? How can you possibly think I am not eager?"</p>
<p>I too can't believe that anyone would question whether or not I am eager to help out the country in which I currently reside in. I'm currently not at the age to pay taxes yet, but I can assure you that if I were asked to pay, I would. I do know that my parents and my older sister pay taxes, but their cases are of no relevance to me. Am I a special pea in a pod? Maybe I am lying... What you believe is up to you, but I can safely say that I'd rather pay taxes than spend the effort to dodge them. I can't speak for everyone else in my situation.</p>
<p>"Unless my memory serves me incorrectly, I did write in my last-last reply what I do intend to do"</p>
<p>You did but that post was after the one I was clarifying.</p>
<p>" too can't believe that anyone would question whether or not I am eager to help out the country in which I currently reside in."</p>
<p>Have you read Galosien's posts in the other thread? In that context, it's not outrageous to wonder.</p>
<p>Just because I don't flatter you doesn't mean I bear no gratefulness towards you.</p>
<p>"Just because I don't flatter you doesn't mean I bear no gratefulness towards you"</p>
<p>That's absolutely true, but you've never expressed gratitude.</p>
<p>"Have you read Galosien's posts in the other thread? In that context, it's not outrageous to wonder."</p>
<p>By other "thread", do you mean another topic? In that case, no. I've only been following this specific topic.</p>
<p>EDIT: very weird post order .... reposting</p>