Essay 631

The following appeared in newspapers nationwide…

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Lifting the veil off ‘Latinophobia’

Immigration debate covers for an assault on a culture

by Ruben Navarrette Jr.

May 26, 2006

SAN DIEGO -- In declaring English the national language of the United States, the Senate finally did something useful.

Oh, I don’t mean the result. It was dreadful. What I mean is that the Senate did the country a service by lifting the veil and revealing what (much of) the immigration debate is really about. Here’s a hint: It ain’t immigration policy. And it ain’t pretty.

Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid wasn’t far off the mark when he called the English language amendment racist and said it was “directed basically to people who speak Spanish.”

People don’t like to hear it, but now that much of the country has come down with a touch of “Latinophobia,” racism, nativism, ethnocentrism and other unpleasant “isms” are back in style.

I don’t have a problem with declaring English--as in a related amendment also approved by the Senate--merely a “common and unifying language.” But calling English “the national language” is more absolute, as if no other languages should be spoken. It is also unnecessary, divisive and insulting to any U.S. citizen or legal immigrant who, in addition to English, also speaks Spanish, Russian, Chinese or any other foreign language and doesn’t feel any less American because of it.

Of course, as I’ve said before, anyone who lives in the United States should learn English. But here’s the key: They should do so for their own good and for the good of their children, and not to stay in the good graces of fellow Americans desperate to remain culturally relevant amid changing demographics.

Don’t confuse this with requiring that illegal immigrants learn English if they want a path to legal status. These people shouldn’t even be here in the first place, and so the United States has every right to set the conditions under which they can stay.

But what about the Puerto Rican in Connecticut who was a U.S. citizen at birth because Puerto Rico is a U.S. commonwealth, or the Cuban-American in Florida who came to the United States legally in accordance with the Cuban Adjustment Act, or the Mexican-American whose family has lived in Arizona for six generations? These people and their children have worked hard, paid taxes, gone to war and defended this country against enemies foreign and domestic. These people may speak both English and Spanish, but why should they be made to feel as if the only way to be authentically American is to speak only English and drop the Spanish?

Besides, what’s the point? The Senate vote was entirely symbolic. While declaring that government should “preserve and enhance” the role of English, the Senate did not do away with bilingual education or bilingual ballots. And the vote won’t have any effect on what really drives many Americans loco (if I can still say that)--namely, efforts by companies to advertise and otherwise communicate in Spanish in hope of getting their slice of more than $700 billion in annual spending power rattling around in the pockets of the nation’s 40 million Latinos. The vote was also cravenly political. It was red meat tossed to the radical fringe of the Republican Party to help make more palatable what the administration really wants: a comprehensive reform plan that combines enforcement with guest workers, with the possibility of legalization for at least some of the 11 million to 12 million illegal immigrants.

And yet, the Senate vote--and the public support for it--did serve a purpose. It proved once and for all that, despite the insistence by many Americans that their only concern is with illegal immigration, the truth is more complicated. We’d be more honest to admit that if there is one toxin that this country has never gotten out of its bloodstream, it’s a resentment of immigrants and foreigners regardless of their status.

The vote made clear that what worries many Americans is not just the fact that people are coming illegally, but the impact they’re having on the culture and the rest of society once they get here. After all, if the only issue is that people enter the country legally, what difference does it make what language they speak once they get here?

And last, senators confirmed the suspicions of many U.S.-born Latinos that they’re in the cultural crosshairs, that many of those who claim to only be anti-illegal immigrant are really anti-Latino and anti-Mexican, and that the immigration debate has become a proxy for an assault on the language and culture of a minority that is, in parts of the country, on its way to becoming a majority.

Like I said, the real motive behind all this is not pretty. But at least now it’s out in the open.