May 2006 | Letters to the Editor
Reporting on Seattle’s Immigration Protest
Local author and Seattle Conscious Choice contributor Paul Rogat Loeb sent this email about our city’s version of the recent immigration protests around the country. Loeb’s latest book, The Impossible Will Take a Little While: A Citizen’s Guide to Hope in a Time of Fear , was named the No. 3 political book of 2004 by the History Channel and the American Book Association. It was winner of the Nautilus Award for best social change book of the year.
People marched because families and futures were at stake. Seattle didn’t have a half million marching for immigrant rights, like Los Angeles or Dallas, or 300,000 like Chicago, But 25,000 marched for fifteen blocks through the heart of our city, packing the streets.
“I heard it on the radio,” people said. “I heard it at my church.” “I heard it from a friend.” Students came on chartered buses from farm towns 40 miles away. One family drove 90 miles after hearing on the nightly news that a march was going to happen and traffic might be swamped.
Except for some students passing the word through MySpace and scattered social justice listservs, this march didn’t rely on the on-line networks that have become the activist standard. It built on more intimate networks, and as coverage rippled out, people came and brought others, affirming that this was now their country too, and they wanted to be treated with dignity and respect.
“It moved me to tears to see people coming out of the shadows to find their voice,” said my friend Jay Sauceda, a community activist who grew up poor in South Texas. “There are so many people in this situation,” he said. “They’ve been so quiet. Now they’re marching.”
“We’re hard workers, not criminals,” said the signs. “We aren’t terrorists.” “Don’t separate us from our families.” They proclaimed “Liberty, Equality and Dignity” and showed pictures of crops that they picked.
There’s been a lot of flag brandishing for blind patriotism these days. The sea of American flags here were part political strategy—a more salable image than a sea of Mexican flags. But they also felt proud and celebratory. People carried them high, waved them again and again to say that they were Americans too and ask that this country honor promises of refuge and hope. The flags felt so far from the “we’re number one” belligerence of sealed-off Bush rallies.
Immigration politics are complicated-- flooding this or any country with cheap labor can and will drive down wages, especially when unions are being busted and undocumented workers live in fear of deportation. If we don’t create enough global justice so desperate people don’t continue leaving their homes in search of a glimmer of hope, then all but the wealthiest will succumb to the worldwide race to the bottom. But as the signs at the march reminded us, we’re all children of immigrants, except for the Native Americans, who had two local leaders leading a blessing before the march began.
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