Singapore Expats

Interesting article.

"The people who stay in Omelas aren't bad; they just find it easier and easier to live with the misery they depend upon."

http://www.straitstimes.com/news/opinio ... tor=CS1-10

Interesting article, I was surprised no one commented on it

Brah wrote:Interesting article, I was surprised no one commented on it

The fact is that, universally, people look away from things that pain them or cause inconvenience.

You could write that same story in Texas... or Louisiana... or New York. In Texas, it's the invisible illegal immigrant... that person that the nutcase right rants and raves about... while everyone else wants them here to work. You don't get giant McMansions on the cheap without cheap labor. You don't get your lawn mowed for $40 without cheap labor. You don't get your crops picked or your chickens processed or your beef slaughtered and butchered without cheap labor.

People here are purposefully delusional. Otherwise, they'd have to face the fact that they are part of a scheme that amounts to slavery and permanent class distinctions.

Strong Eagle wrote:... while everyone else wants them here to work. You don't get giant McMansions on the cheap without cheap labor. You don't get your lawn mowed for $40 without cheap labor. You don't get your crops picked or your chickens processed or your beef slaughtered and butchered without cheap labor.

People here are purposefully delusional. Otherwise, they'd have to face the fact that they are part of a scheme that amounts to slavery and permanent class distinctions.

I don't think it's so much that everyone else wants them here to work, but more that they want them here legally. It's okay if the gahment make a visa category for them and they are properly documented and monitored. It's okay if they want to have children here as long as the gahment make codocils to the law of citizenship by being birthed on US soil. At least that way, they cannot vote. If it takes the issuing of "NRIC'" like Singapore has, so be it. But, please, lets stop the amnesty for votes programs. Let's do it right and put the proper controls on it. Less hostility and insanity that way.

sundaymorningstaple wrote:

Strong Eagle wrote:... while everyone else wants them here to work. You don't get giant McMansions on the cheap without cheap labor. You don't get your lawn mowed for $40 without cheap labor. You don't get your crops picked or your chickens processed or your beef slaughtered and butchered without cheap labor.

People here are purposefully delusional. Otherwise, they'd have to face the fact that they are part of a scheme that amounts to slavery and permanent class distinctions.

I don't think it's so much that everyone else wants them here to work, but more that they want them here legally. It's okay if the gahment make a visa category for them and they are properly documented and monitored. It's okay if they want to have children here as long as the gahment make codocils to the law of citizenship by being birthed on US soil. At least that way, they cannot vote. If it takes the issuing of "NRIC'" like Singapore has, so be it. But, please, lets stop the amnesty for votes programs. Let's do it right and put the proper controls on it. Less hostility and insanity that way.

Unfortunately, we are not going to get it done "right" because of the right wing extremists who will only settle for complete deportation of 11 million immigrants... a completely impossible task.

I don't much like the amnesty programs, either, but when you consider what happens to children that were brought or born here and know nothing of their home country, something has to be done. These are human beings and we must use compassion in dealing with them.

Truly, a pox on the right wing extremists who refuse to deal with the problem in any kind of realistic way. It was George Bush who first came up with a workable plan and he was pilloried by his own party for having done it. Now we have assholes like Ted Cruz and Louie Gohmert, heartless panderers.

Strong Eagle wrote:Ted Cruz

Which is ironic.

This conversation reminds me of a Dennis Miller podcast I heard this week in which about immigration to Australia was discussed.

Strong Eagle wrote:

Brah wrote:Interesting article, I was surprised no one commented on it

People here are purposefully delusional. Otherwise, they'd have to face the fact that they are part of a scheme that amounts to slavery and permanent class distinctions.

I hadn't commented earlier, as I missed the post, and I don't follow the local media, not expecting to gain anything of use or value from it in the 'greater scheme of things' [life]. The biggest surprise for me, was that this was published in a state controlled newspaper. It's not directly critical of the government or citizenry as such, but it seems to be pointing a torch in that general direction. Since when did the state media start publishing this kind of self-deprecating Op/Ed piece; it surprises me?

Given that the vast majority of transitory labour here is just that, there is a difference vs the US. In the US the equivalent underclass flock there, not solely to fill their bellies today, but with the dream of staying and settling down forever. The equivalent here come to do a job, and know before they arrive that they have almost nil chance of remaining here, once that job is done.

So more a case of 'send them here for a few years hard labour for little return, and then we'll return them in due course when we no longer want them' - than - 'Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to be free'.


p.s.
Irony alert
Be sure to read the few comments under the ST article, all four of them. In fact comment-wise there seems to be more interest in the topic here...

sundaymorningstaple wrote: I don't think it's so much that everyone else wants them here [USA] to work, but more that they want them here [USA] legally. It's okay if the gahment make a visa category for them and they are properly documented and monitored. It's okay if they want to have children here as long as the gahment make codocils to the law of citizenship by being birthed on US soil. At least that way, they cannot vote. If it takes the issuing of "NRIC'" like Singapore has, so be it. But, please, lets stop the amnesty for votes programs. Let's do it right and put the proper controls on it. Less hostility and insanity that way.

Yes I agree, that would seem to make sense. Either allow them in, in a regulated manner, or don't let them in in the first place [and/or deport them ASAP].

I know of one family who lived in the busy suburb of Queens, NYC. IIRC they were Indons. They'd entered legally and later overstayed. Subsequently they'd bought their house, had children, held jobs, and put their children through education. Heavens knows how they managed all of that interfacing vs the authorities given their lack of legal status. Last I heard after 20+ years in the States, the family were petitioning via their church against deportation. You might ask whether it is humane that they were able to progress so far in their lives, completely undetected by the authorities.

Several of the sub-contractors my go-to building contractor hired in Europe were illegals from 'Kosovo-Albania'. They did outstanding work, and yet were obliged to live all their lives in the shadows of their illegal status.

Life in such shadows obliges them to live alongside other forms of illegality; drugs, prostitution etc. Not a socially enviable place to me. Surely better that such people are either expelled, or allowed to settle and become fully functioning members of society.

Edited: I'll create a new thread.

perhaps the child find that the suffering in this basement is better than where she came from. Or maybe after the suffering, she will grow up to be a better person. it depends on your perspective of suffering.

Lancer4332 wrote:perhaps the child find that the suffering in this basement is better than where she came from. Or maybe after the suffering, she will grow up to be a better person. it depends on your perspective of suffering.

A sex slave who is sold to be just a slave can also be better off.
A prisoner in solitary confinement in Gitmo moved to solitary confinement in a Swedish prison can also be better off.