Extra Credit

Extra credit

            In the NY times article “Letters, coming out illegal” Leslie is an undocumented American dependant on US Society who is struggling through activism to attain rights of citizenship through the “Dream Act” legislation. The dream act is a law that enables undocumented Americans benefits to gain residency and financial benefits to those who have a GED or high school diploma and are currently students in advanced education.

Leslie is A Student from UCLA who expresses the struggles of the many undocumented students. In one form supporting her plight by activism Leslie chooses to wear a sweater labeled “Imp Undocumented” while on the university campus. The intention is to gain attention to those in the community of her cause. Leslie also attends campus rallies for activism to spread the dream act as many other like her, who are mainly female, also attend universities while being denied many benefits because of their illegal status. Despite living almost all their lives in the US, these undocumented Americans cannot have driver licenses, financial aid or any other forms of public assistance food stamps and public housing.

Many undocumented students have the fear of the state laws that work against them; they can easily be deported against their will despite living almost all of their lives in the U.S. to a country they left when they were children. In support of the struggles of undocumented students Leslie an others in an organizination called IDEAS provide sanctuary by offering places with housing and food as well as advisement or counseling, As many undocumented students fears of arrests prevents most and (almost all males) from attempting to protest it is a great hindrance to the plight in activism to gain support to pass the dream act.

The struggle of undocumented immigrants involves supporting the dream act bill.  The organizations, have an organization with resources and experienced activists information and databases on web sites, support groups hold rallies. The support and activism for the dream act bill in backing politicians increases the attention to the plight of the undocumented Americans. One tactic very influential in the civil rights era was the sit in.

 In one case a sit-in at Dream Act opposition politician john McCain gained nationwide and international notoriety. On the anniversary of Brown Vs the board of Ed, Five dream act student supporters dressed in graduation gowns while sitting under US flags sat in his office for at least 5 hours until they were all arrested. However in this case the immigration procedures of deportation towards theses activists were postponed most likely due to consequences, which would probably increase the controversy of injustices of their struggles, which was obviously the intention of the sit-in. Activists also campaign for Obama in his support to efforts in helping pass the dream act. The growing influence of expanding grassroots movements such as ideas and dream alliance (dream act support group) provide an effective foundation to support the injustices and obstacles faced by undocumented Americans.

 First hand experiences in understanding the seriousness of this issue is with a friend of mine who came to the United States from Peru when he was 5 years old. As an adult at 28 he finally got his citizenship and decided to travel to Peru; his experience was much like mine of being in a totally foreign land with distant relatives and speaking horrible Spanish and knowing basically nothing else about the country. I cant imagine how he would survive if he was deported or even worse where cases include parents of US born citizens being deported without their children. These cases are an injustice and great double standard because of the lack of common sense towards humanity and their civil rights as dictated in the U.S. constitution where all are supposed to be considered equal (somethinng like that).

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The Black panthers had 10 points,

the Young lords had 13 pts,
but, I Wor Kuen has 12 pts!
http://www.wengewang.org/read.php?tid=20417

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