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Stephanie Garcia

Professor Huerta

English 1T

19 March 2018

The Never Ending Violence

Before the United States established immigration people could move in and out of the

country as they wished. When immigration was established it only allowed certain people to

enter the country rather, only granted certain groups of people the permission to stay in the

United States. Since then immigration in this country has become one of the biggest ongoing

political issue. Immigration laws throughout the history of the United States has continued to

exclude certain groups of people when its population in the United States has overgrown. In the

book ​Tell Me How It Ends:An Essay in 40 Questions, ​by Valeria Luiselli talks about the

immigration issues involving the humanitarian crisis of unaccompanied migrant children

migrating from Central America to the U.S. border. She writes this book in response to this issue

to encourage “us” Americas to see that in order to help these children “we” need to change the

language of how “we” refer to these children as immigrants to refugees. Through her work as an

interpreter for these children to help immigration lawyers interpret their stories and being an

immigrant herself, she felt compelled to write about both the children’s stories and her story to

change the language of the conversation in which wrongly categories these children as

immigrants instead of refugees. Although the majority of the population in the U.S. believes that

the issue in helping unaccompanied minors is not “our” problem, they fail to see the involvement
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of the United States in causing these children to have to flee their countries and, therefore they

should be granted asylum.

Even though immigration laws have evolved, it still continues to belittle certain groups of

people depending on how much the U.S. can benefit from them. Nativatism is idealism of

protecting the interests of native-born or to establishes inhabitants against those that migrate.

Immigration laws have changed from its racist limitation to writing immigration laws based on

the idealism of nativatism. Nativism is the main reason why immigrants are denied the right to

be in the country or to utilize it’s resource because they are seen to be undeserving and, defined

as criminal or “illegal”. The change in the language used in immigration laws is used to deny the

right to all people that are not born in the US to be excluded from ever being truly apart of what

an “American” is. In the article “The Unwanted: Immigration and Nativism in America”, by

Peter Schrag explains the impact that nativism has on who it let in the country and why they let

them in.​“at times vigorously seeking newcomers from abroad, at other times shutting them out

and/or deporting them—is deeply entangled both in economic cycles and in the uncertainties of

our vision of ourselves as a nation”(schrag). The essence of schrag’s argument is that American

nativism picks and chooses who it let's come in the country depending on how it will benefit

from them economical or if it further helps the nation look predominantly white.

The revolving door of deportations and the continuous money and guns given to mexico by the

U.S. government, continues to affect the children which furthermore, encourages their decision

to migrate to the U.S. With the United States providing these countries with money, warfare

supplies, and imposing on economic distractions, makes the problem worse rather than better for

the citizen living in the these countries. In the 1980’s the United States funded the civil war in
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EL Salvador by give the Salvadoran government money, weapons, and soldiers to help fight

against their citizens. Because of this action made by the United States, Salvadoran citizens have

been forced out of their country through violent crimes made against them. Luiselli says,“There

is little said, for example, of the arms being trafficked from the United States into Mexico or

Central America, legally….”(85). Luiselli’s point is that America has issues with their

contribution of sending weapon and economical help to both encourage the violence in Mexico

or in central america, but has a issue the children that this same violence that the U.S has

engrougae has pushed children out of their home countries.

One of the biggest misconceptions of why these unaccompanied minors flee their

countries is to pursue the American Dream or to live off of the taxpayers’ money. However, the

main reason why these children flee their countries, leaving behind everything they know is to

escape the day to day violence that continues to terrorize them or has even killed their families.

In the article the teens trapped between a gang and the law by Jonathan Blitzer talks about the

violence that undocumented teens faced even after fleeing their home countries and trying to live

in the united states. “After juliana's mother ramona, testified against the killer, a member of

MS-13 tried to stab her at a soccer game “(Blitzer 1-2). In other words Blitzer is saying that ,

both children and adults that migrate are leaving their lives behind and begin their journey to the

United States is not a spontaneous decision made. Many children plan their trip to the U.Sin

matter in fact girls start to take some sort of birth control prior to beginning their trip because

they know they will experience the some sort of sexual harassment (Luiselli 27). Despite these

facts, these children still chose to embark this journey to the United States because fleeing

anywhere else is not an option. None of this violence would occur on their way to the U.S in
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their seek of asylum, if the U.S would grant children the right to enter the country simply

because they are humans seeking for help.

Although the United States continues to contribute in the Northern Triangle war it denies

to be apart of the high rates of unaccompanied minors arriving to its border. ​In 2014 the

executive order under the Obama administration signed to require unaccompanied migrant

children to acquire a lawyer in twenty-one days instead of the one year they were granted prior.

Luiselli states, “the priority juvenile docket was the government’s coldest, cruelest answer...In

legal terms, it was a kind of backdoor escape route to avoid dealing with the impending

reality..“(Luiselli 41). Luiselli explains that on the government's wrongly response to rather

deport millions of children seeking asylum, than coming up with other options to help refugee

children truly escape violence created by the U.S in the first place. ​However the sped up time on

children to attain a legal attorney was not place to help them quicker but, to give migrant

children no time to attain a lawyer and throw their cases out deporting them at a quicker rate.

Not only did this endanger these children, but it also means that their violent experiences on their

way to the U.S could have been for nothing.

There are those who will argue that allowing unaccompanied minors to enter the United

States will probably argue that these children are not our problem. They say that by allowing

these children to enter the United states we are allowing these children to bring violence

endangering our children. and overcrowding our school. This argument stems from the belief

that all Central American migrants are gang members of MS-13, and or create violence in low

income communities. And that they only continue to overcrowd schools not because they want to
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learn but to bully other students into their gang, putting to waste the money of taxpayer’s put

towards public education.

Although it is true that MS-13 has committed violent crimes against innocent people, the

migrants migrating to the U.S. are fleeing their home countries to escape the violence that

terrorize them everyday. By not allowing these children to enter the country with asylum,and

deporting them will be like sending them back to die. Placing this children in detentions has

continued to terrorize and dehumanize them further than the war they have escaped. To say it in

other words, image that these children are your children, being subjected to inhumane situations

that will scar them for the rest of their lives. Aside from this, those that argue that these children

will overcrowded schools and waste reasons provided for them, fail to see that even if these

children get to stay in the country they do not receive the proper treatment to help them through

their trama which can result in cause them to lash out towards other. Not because they want to

create violence because it is the only way they can cope with their fears.

Mental health is one of the biggest effect of violence among migrant children. Two out of

every three children experience ​post-traumatic stress disorder​(PTSD) from both the violence

they fled or from the inhumane treatment in the detentions they were placed in. Even then if

these children are granted the right to stay in the U.S with asylum, these children do not get the

right treatment to help them cope with their trauma. In a research conducted by the Unitarian

Universalist Service Committee by O’Connor, Thomas-Duckwitz, and Nuñez-Mchiri ,“No safe

haven: Mental health assessment on women and children held in U.S. immigration detention,

highlights the hidden truth on what women and children are subjected to in their stay in

detentions. “ Women reported that their children cried a lot because they were so cold. Families
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were separated at this initial point, with mothers sometimes not knowing where their children

were and fathers sent to different detention centers across the country or deported”(8). This shed

light on the trauma that children are exposed to even further when they arrive to detentions.

Children are forced to cope with their trama alone in a cold cell with their loved ones either on

the other side of the building or across the country. The violence that children flee seems to

continue to follow them to the U.S. border.

Violence that these children flee continue to hunt them even when they across the U.S.

border. The violence that these children are as tramiratic as the ones that they face when they are

picked up my Immigration and Customs Enforcement (I.C.E). Blitzer himself writers, “​Y​ou hand

yourself of and you know what’s going to happen. You’re going to experience the hielera,” she

told me, referring to the cold cells, called “refrigerators” by migrants, in borderland detentions

centers”( 2). Many of these children are left in the “Hielera” (ice box) as they refer to because it

is cold are separated from their parents in these detentions. These detentions are set up like jails

where both children and adults are subjected to little food and unsanitary conditions. These

detentions are a further way to dehumanize migrants even more than just by simply referring to

them as “illegal aliens”. To put it in another way, people are supposed to stay in these detentions

for only up to two weeks however,many stay for over one month. In these two weeks or more

children are exposed to see and experience inhumane treatment by the officers. If the children are

brought to the “Hielera” with their families, children and adults are put in seperate

cells(O’Connor, Thomas-Duckwitz, & Nuñez-Mchiri 22). This affects the children even more

because it doesn’t allow they to get any sort of comfort to help with just the traumatic experience
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of being detained in a detention. It also establishes that children are not considered to be

welcomed and to fear authority of any kind.

All in all, the issue of unaccompanied minors is a complex issue it is important to change

the language used when referring to them to refugees rather than immigrants. In order to come to

a solution there is a need to humanize the children by telling their stories because their voices are

lost in the debate and therefore people don’t fully understand the depth of their experiences.

However, before all of that it is essential that the United states admitted contribute to the war that

these children are flee so that we can ensure that these children get the proper treatment that they

deserve because after all they are humans.

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Works cited

Blitzer, Jonathan. “The Teens Trapped Between a Gang and the Law.” ​The New Yorker​, The New

Yorker, 26 Dec. 2017,

www.newyorker.com/magazine/2018/01/01/the-teens-trapped-between-a-gang-and-the-law.

Luiselli , valeria . ​Tell Me How It Ends: An Essay in 40 Questions:

O'Connor, Kathleen, et al. ​No safe haven here: mental health of women and children held in

immigration detention​.

“The Unwanted: Immigration and Nativism in America.” ​American Immigration Council​, 9 Aug.

2016,

www.americanimmigrationcouncil.org/research/unwanted-immigration-and-nativism-america.