The problem I have with Day Without Immigrants

So here it is. Thursday, Feb. 16, 2017. Also known as Day Without Immigrants. Activists are urging all immigrants to skip work today, to keep their children home from school today, to basically not participate in society today. It's all in reaction to what's going on in our country and the Trump administration wanting to get tougher on immigration and illegal immigrants.

The problem I have with this is the activists are encouraging all immigrants, whether they are here legally or not, to join the protest. If we are now going to lump together those who came here through legal channels and waited their turn and did things properly with those who skirted the law, overstayed visas, or sneaked across borders, then we have a bigger problem than I thought.

Those of use who have an issue with illegal immigrants are made out to be bigots. So unfair to claim we are against people who are different from us rather than telling the truth that we are simply against people who violate the law. It was ridiculous enough to drop the use of the term illegal from style books in newsrooms and choose instead undocumented. Now we are supposed to not even differentiate between legal immigrants and those who cheated their way here? That's just not fair. That's not dealing with reality.

No one who has a problem with illegals would say they don't appreciate immigrants in general. We know this is a nation of immigrants. Whether first generation or going back to your great-great-great-great-great-great-great grandparents, unless you're a Native American we all are or came from immigrants. So to say immigrants are not appreciated in the United States is absurd. If you want to turn a blind eye to people being in the country illegally, that's up to you. But I'm not going to sit here on Day Without Immigrants and pretend legal immigrants are just the same as criminals.

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