Secure the border
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Secure the border is an American euphemism, often used in a racist context for "we hate smelly Mexicans Latin Americans.[1]" This can be most widely evidenced due to the fact that while xenophobes clamor for a secure border between the United States and Mexico, they seem little concerned for the far larger, undefended border between the U.S. and Canada. And this explanation doesn't even consider the United States' largest border; that being the combined borders with various major bodies of water. After all, you never know when the whales will seek their revenge!
It is also a euphemism for such security theater as: national ID cards, massive surveillance, mandatory pre-employment background checks, adding biometric features to Social Security cards, "smart chips" or RFID chips in passports, requiring passports to enter or leave the U.S. from Canada, etc. These will probably make some government contractors rich. What they have to do with "the border" is anyone's guess, although John Tanton, the Michigan activist behind much of the anti-immigration movement, considers these Really Important.
It should be noted that there are some legitimate reasons to strengthening America's land borders. Both the northern and southern borders largely run across vast areas of remote wilderness; as a result, smugglers can often find their way across it relatively unchallenged. Guns and money can flow south while drugs and violence goes north. There is also a concern that if smugglers can sneak large quantities of drugs into the United States it is possible that they could also sneak in something much worse. Unfortunately, most of these larger concerns seem to get lost in the hubub over illegal immigration.
[edit] See also
- Know Nothing Party
- Minutemen
- REAL ID Act
- Moral panic
- Immigration myths and facts
- VDARE
- Britain is full