Under the guise of photojournalism, the New York Times Sunday Review put in some more oozingly positive, photogenic coverage of sympathetic individuals riding with the famous migrant caravan. The paper devoted a full page to a short essay by proud illegal immigrant (but don’t you dare call him that!), former Washington Post journalist, and amnesty activist, Jose Antonio Vargas, “Portraits From a Caravan – Migrants escaping peril wait in Tijuana for their American dream.”
It’s interesting that the Times would admit (indirectly) that even in a country led by supposed anti-immigrant racist President Donald Trump, there’s still an “American dream” to be had. The brief essay was accompanied by photos by Russell Monk of the migrants in Tijuana.
Has any other word in 2018 been as responsible for so much as “caravan”?
By definition, a caravan is a company of people traveling through a hostile region. You travel in a caravan for protection. When you feel powerless, traveling in a group gives you some sense of power. But there is no protecting the caravan of migrants who have journeyed to Donald Trump’s America.
To President Trump and his supporters, a caravan is made up of invaders and criminals. A caravan carries drugs and diseases. A caravan must be stopped at all costs, even if it means shutting down the United States government.
Alleged journalist Vargas did some anti-journalistic violence to the English language, condemning normal words and phrases as dangerous because they risked portraying illegals as...illegals.
As a word, “caravan” is a politically expedient bludgeon, part of a decades-long project started by anti-immigrant groups (NumbersUSA, Center for Immigration Studies and Federation for American Immigration Reform, to name a few) using dehumanizing vocabulary to describe immigrants in nefarious, fear-inducing ways. “Illegal aliens” having “anchor babies” arriving in a “caravan.”...
Seriously? Alll of those terms are perfectly sound , both factually and journalistically. “Anchor babies” is a term for a child born in the United States to an immigrant (sometimes in so-called birth hotels) and who therefore automatically qualify as American citizens. Those children can eventually act as a sponsor for other family members, in a country like the U.S. with birthright citizenship. And the Times itself used “caravan” without quotation marks constantly when the issue was at its peak.
....as long as parents love their children, they will run toward anything that may, just may, give them a shot at a better life, even if it means hurting them.
“A better life” in America? That gets to a contradiction the pro-amnesty left rarely addresses and also fails to do here -- if America under Trump is really such a racist society (because what other kind of country would elect such a man?) why should one risk everthing for a chance to live here?
Vargas hosted a “white privilege” documentary on MTV in 2015, and has been hyped by the press for his bravery for years.
