The embassy also wants people to set their social media profiles to public.
Haven't these guys heard of the "reciprocity principle"?
When I went to Brazil a few years ago, the basic price for a tourist visa was like $25 and could be done online. But, if you were a US citizen, it cost $150 and you had to schedule an attend an interview in person -- because, those were the costs and burdens placed on Brazilian citizens to apply for a US visa.
Does the US want other countries inspecting our citizens' social media posts for the last five years?
ED: Fix spelling mistake
In this case, what has Ireland done to US citizens that this reciprocates? Ireland has a special deal for US citizens - no visa is required for visits up to 90 days - you just turn up and show your passport.
I'm not convinced that this is truly about actually protecting the US from terrorism or foreign attack since all major terrorist acts that I can recall over the last few decades were perpetrated by native-born US citizens and not by visitors on visas.
It seems more about catching people who might have, for example, expressed an opinion that doesn't align with "they deserve it" with respect to Palestinians in Gaza - which currently seems sufficient to be branded "a threat to the US" and grounds for detention and expulsion.
You don't seem to have understood their post at all by asking what Ireland did that this is reciprocating. They're saying other countries should reciprocate this upon Americans. The point you make about the purpose from the American pov is valid and correct + clearly meant to be expanded upon or abused in the future, but not their point.
Sorry. Yes you’re correct - I misread the parent comment.
9/11, which most people would put in the past few decades and a major terrorist act, was exclusively done by people on visas.
Meanwhile, I think the post you are responding to was pointing out that other countries are likely to reciprocate similar rules for US visitors to their countries.
I’d guess this administration draws its power from voters who don’t have a passport and power brokers whose staff handle visas. (Or at least it operates as if it believes it does.)
That any US citizen doesn't have a passport is mind blowing, sad, and also indicative.
$18/yr for access to most of the world.
Yet people say "No thanks. I'm sure the US is great."
For all but a tiny fraction of Americans, the cost of a passport is a tiny, rounding error expense compared to actually leaving the country. This isn't Europe, where you take a wrong turn and end up in a different country. Here in California, there's a highway you can drive on for 750 miles and not even have left the state (like driving from Paris to Warsaw). And we're just one state of 50. On the diagonal, crossing the continental US is like driving from London to Tel-Aviv.
Nearby, we've got Canada and Mexico, and up until pretty recently, you could cross over those borders with a driver's license. And both those countries are big. On the other sides we have oceans. So for most Americans, the minimum cost of an international flight is the same as the cost for a European to fly to the US ($500-$1000), and a full day's travel each way. Here on HN, we might forget that most of the population makes fucking peanuts, so keep in mind that means that for most Americans, $1000 is a lot of money. Most Americans also don't get a lot of time off, so those 2 days of travel are a significant cost in of themselves.
All told, the lack of passports amongst Americans isn't indicative of some isolationist mindset. It's just that they have no need of a passport, because they aren't taking the kinds of extremely far-flung vacations that would need one, and they know if they need one, they can just get one before their trip.
If you go from Paris to Warsaw, you still won't need a passport, just a basic ID
Schengen area
travelling around Europe as European is not much more hassle than moving on the US from one state to the other.
Huh, TIL. I had assumed that you needed a passport, they just didn't do border checks.
In europe we have a kind of mini passport, called person id. Which only works in your own country and other shengen countries. It’s nearly the same cost as a passport (at least in my municipality)
You are required to have a passport (or id) with you (as in, that’s what the law says). Even in your own country. But in your own country a drivers license is usually also sufficient.
But in practice you will almost never be asked to show any of those. In your own country, nor abroad.
That depends on country, in Poland you don't need to carry any ID on you anymore (you're then required to remember PESEL number, and recite it to police if asked; 11 digits, six of those are birthday).
Access that costs thousands of dollars for a short trip that most people simply don't have the spare money for. The median US income is <40k/year, and healthcare + housing costs dominate most workers' lives.
Also, it's not $18/year like a subscription, it's $165 upfront -- money that could be spent on gas, food, medical bills, desperately saved up for emergencies, etc. and won't provide any benefit whatsoever to their lives unless they're taking a vacation they probably don't feel they can afford financially or in their <2 weeks of vacation time.
Fewer than half of Americans have passports. Many have probably never left their home state, and there are probably a significant number who have never left a 100 mile radius around their homes.
People who regularly travel internationally are not a large or powerful voter base. They can be shit on without hurting a politician's career.
The US isn't insanely backwards. France hovers at 50-60% of citizens with passports. The UK has similar rates to the US. Italy is slightly higher at 60%. Japan and China have far lower rates.
I think you just overestimate how common passports are.
I wish it happened more in different countries. Your country demands that you are forbidden to bring any items, regardless of how dangerous they are, in the embassy? Apply the same rule to the citizens of that country and only for them. I'm sure they will appreciate being openly discriminated in front of the applicants from the other parts of the world. Your country demands 150-200 dollars for a shitty single time entry tourist visa (yes, I'm looking at you UK)? Charge the citizens of that country the same sum for their visas. Etc. And in reverse - if they are easing or removing absurd restrictions, then reciprocate and ease restrictions in return.
> Haven't these guys heard of the "reprocity principle"?
Did you see the trade war started recently with every country in the world? I don't think anything is being thoroughly planned or thought out in this administration. They're all about power and not governance.
I don't think the current US administration cares about this. Most people who voted for it probably don't care about travelling abroad either.
The xenophobes making these decisions don't care if they create problems for US citizens traveling abroad.
They probably also don't want Americans abroad and able to see how much better things are in so many places.
Bolivia also has a reciprocity visa charge of $160 for US citizens. Many years ago we were very close to the Bolivian border but the visa cost for a day trip just didn't make it worth it.
I don't understand what these things are good for.
If you want to enter the country illegally, overstay your visa, or perform some sort of attack, then it's trivial to lie on the forms.
It's just making it inconvenient for honest, harmless travellers. Is that the goal?
The goal is to provide an excuse.
Very few people will be able to provide a list of 100% of the accounts they used. This means every visitor will technically be lying on their forms.
You're more than happy to visit - until you do something the regime doesn't like, like criticizing the recent attack on Iran, or making fun of the military parade. Then they have a ready-made reason to deport and ban you.
He didn't mention it, but I think he meant to extend it to "and how would they check/prove it?".
The practice of creating pretextual laws is well established in places like Russia, but a necessary component is proof. In fact that's the entire purpose of a pretextual law, to have something (as ridiculous as it may be) to pin on someone. I can't see any way they could prove I have this handle on Hacker News, for example.
You can call yourself lucky if you're "just" deported, and not sent to (and forgotten in) some unnamed prison abroad in a random exotic country.
Are there any instances where the US has refused to repatriate a foreign citizen whose government was willing to take them back?
In the interest of truthfulness, I believe all(?) of the CECOT deportations weren't accepted by their own country.
Which doesn't make it right, but does change the situation.
At a minimum you get locked in a damp basement for an unknown amount of time while they book a flight for you, which happened to an Australian journalist recently.
The general vibe I'm hearing in Australia is that people are afraid to travel to the US right now if they have any reason at all to raise suspicion (being trans, having posted political comments, etc).
The goal is to have leverage over everyone, and to occasionally execute overt performative acts for the media, like refusing entry to famous ideological opponents.
Vote for clowns, live in a circus.
Not exactly - they're guaranteeing that if you do lie on the form then they've got a nailed-on route to expel you even if nothing else sticks, because lying on an immigration form is an offence.
They don't want people in the US to travel outside the US so they probably see it as a positive if other countries put up more deterrents.
to play the devil's advocate, if more people wanted to visit the US than the other way around, then it's not "disadvantageous" for the US to do this.
This kind of adversarial nonsensical thinking is the problem.
It's disadvantageous for the US if their citizens have to go through more bullshit whenever they are visiting another country. Regardless of how much they subject people going to the US, or how many people travel either way.
It's a lose lose pissing contest. The reason reciprocity is exercised is to discourage this kind of thing in the first place.
I don't think the people in support of such things are travelling very much.
> to play the devil's advocate, if more people wanted to visit the US than the other way around, then it's not "disadvantageous" for the US to do this.
That would only be true if the per capita advantage to the US of doing it is at least as large as the per capita disadvantage of having it done to US citizens. Which it isn't. The value of doing it is negligible and the cost of having it done to you is significant.
Why's that? Doesn't tourism and business coming into the US benefit the country?
Take student visas. Sure, you could have a student come to the US, finish their education, and go back to their home country, "stealing" knowledge from the US to benefit their own country. Or they could find a job in the US and/or start the next trillion dollar company since the opportunities in the US are better. Satya Nadella traveled to the US for a university degree and ended up at Microsoft, where he led business units bringing in tens of billions, and under his CEO-ness he increased the value of the MS stock from around $40 when he became CEO in 2014 to $477 today, making it one of the first trillion dollar companies in the US.
But that wouldn't have happened if he didn't get a visa. Neither would Tesla (Elon Musk, migrated from South Africa on a student visa), netiher would Google (Sergey Brin migrated in from Russia, Sundar Pichai migrated on a student visa from India), etc.
I just don't understand it.
Stocks going up doesn't actually improve things for anyone. To use Microsoft as a specific example: that stock price increase corresponds directly to a reduction in quality of life for many people.
This is, of course, immaterial to your main point: we can point to many actual contributions from migrants, such as maintaining infrastructure, providing food and education, and technological advancements.
> Stocks going up doesn't actually improve things for anyone
Yes, it does, it’s called the wealth effect. This is beyond firm effects that stem from lower costs of capital.
Until you realize that tourism industry is a multi-billion dollar industry and the US used to be one of the biggest tourist destination of the world (only behind France and Spain).
Looks like the new requirement is only for F, M, and J student and exchange visas that already need more paperwork, not for B-1/B-2 tourism and business visas.
Well, other countries want US tourists money.US doens't need it as much.
US isn’t nearly as important to world tourism as it thinks it is. Maybe Mexico or Canada since they are so close, but otherwise Chinese tourist dollars are sought after more than American.
Reciprocation is going to be more of the norm than not.
From what I can see, China, Germany, and USA are the big three. So it's probably pretty important to make it easy for citizens of these countries to get a visa if you care about tourism. Also, there are places in China where it's very hard to get a visa to travel.
China opened up no visa needed for western European and many Asian countries, so…they have the right idea.
No one is really interested in catering to the US tourist market right now. It’s not even clear if Americans are welcome in many countries, or if they have to pretend being Canadians again.
> China opened up no visa needed for western European and many Asian countries, so…they have the right idea.
Here are a couple of examples of the challenges in traveling to certain parts of China: https://www.reddit.com/r/bicycletouring/comments/1bdbsh5/
https://www.the-sun.com/travel/14418546/little-known-law-chi...
I've been to Beijiang and the parts of traditional Tibet that are in Sichuan so I know some of the restrictions. Yes, it sucks waiting in the van when everyone else in your group is enjoying the border with Kazakistan, and it doesn't seem reasonable, but it isn't a huge deal breaker either.
> No one is really interested in catering to the US tourist market right now.
I don't think this is true, at least where I live (Ireland). I'm pretty sure that the economy of half the coastal towns would collapse without US tourists.
> Does the US want other countries inspecting our citizens' social media posts for the last five years?
Do you really think the US government cares that much about how Americans are treated outside of the US, or even considers that when setting up these policies? Based on some quick searching and skimming, it seems like only half the population even have passports in the first place.
It seems to me one of the methods of control in oppressive States is to have a multitude of rules, which are impractical to actually adhere to, where failure to adhere provides leverage to State - a "justification" for State to then do whatever it is it decides to do with you (such as deportation without due process).
IMHO the new administration is aiming for full control, they don't need pretext to deny visa. Maybe they will iron out the process on foreign enemies before start chasing the enemies from within. IIRC they want to profile everyone and Palantir will handle that.
Exactly. Another case where this happens is with credit/point based systems for things like settlement/citizenship that effectively allows governments to discriminate freely based on vague criteria.
I think point based systems are the most fair and not arbitrary, since points are usually awarded for things like age, degree, language proficiency. That's the least discriminating way to steer immigration.
From what I've read - but have not myself looked into - Australia has been using this system for some time, and wants very much to move on from it, as it has not worked well in practice.
They're called "pretextual laws", and are prevalent in places like Russia and China. They always require proof though, since the whole point is an easy case in court.
I can't see an easy way to prove someone supplied an incomplete list of online handles though. It would be trivial for me to look up all the places I've supplied my real e-mail address and make sure to include them in the list, and good luck finding my handles otherwise.
> I can't see an easy way to prove someone supplied an incomplete list of online handles though.
1. it doesn't matter - it's immigration, them simply asserting you lied is enough for them to decline your visa, and as of January 2025, enough for them to have masked goons kidnap you on the street and imprison you without charge or trial and/or deport you to some random country
2. the easy way is to just ask American Big Tech to rat you out - Elon obviously would do it for a kind glance, the rest will do it because they either support the actual end of democracy in the US or because they think it'll increase shareholder value
You're describing more or less every legal system in existence for at least the last few centuries. It is often close to impossible to go through a day without breaking at least one law, usually a multitude of them. Such infractions are not acted upon until some power-that-be deems it necessary to get a handle on a person.
As to the sudden insistence on due process when it comes to deportation of illegals I do wonder why this was not an issue when the previous regime let in millions of people without any regard for the laws of the land - i.e. due process. Is it the intention to make it impossible to correct this flagrant violation of migration laws by suddenly insisting on having every single individual go though a lengthy legal process, clogging up the courts?
What you say may be true with respect to breaking laws. But illegal immigration is one of those relatively small infractions, and only now is there some sudden insistence to prosecute all of them and deport them. So this is a self-made problem.
All of the evidence available to us shows us that migrants, on average, commit less crime than U.S. citizens. The evidence shows us that they pay into social programs without reaping almost any benefit. The evidence shows us that they take jobs that the average American isn't interested in. An evidence-based political program would not target migrants as a first priority, except to provide some more straightforward way to become documented and legal.
The other issue is -- the U.S. has 300 million+ citizens. This argument that migrants will "clog up" the courts seems ridiculous if you also believe U.S. citizens deserve due process. If your court system can't handle a relatively small percentage of your residents committing the crimes you have on the books, then maybe those crimes aren't really serious crimes are they? Or else not funding the courts appropriately to satisfy the political program is purposeful. The goal is to avoid due process and accountability, for citizens and non-citizens alike.
That's not what due process means.
Play the devil's advocate with me for a bit.
Say you let someone in who suicide bombs himself and takes out several Americans. Then a reporter asks the DHS spokesperson how they let someone in the country that had "Death to America" posts all over their social media out in the open for everyone to see but they didn't. Nobody would forgive the government for such a grave oversight.
At the airport you already let them check your luggage and pockets to make sure you're not a threat to the crew and passengers. How's it different to be checking your social media before entering to make sure you're not a threat to the citizens?
Which do you think is more important to the electorate, the safety of the citizens, or the privacy inconveniences of immigrants, which doesn't exist anyway?
If the authorities weren't already aware of the identity of the person who posted that, what's stopping somebody with terrorist intentions from simply omitting that account while applying for a visa?
To me, this seems like a grave transgression of privacy with little to no actual safety benefits.
The point isn't that they'll provide it. The point is that a bunch of useless people buried in the bureaucracy can say "well, he wasn't on our radar and his social media came back clean" and act like that constitutes doing their jobs.
It's no different than your local government that's probably happy to permit all sorts of absurd invasive development as long as some engineer puts a stamp on it but if a homeowner wants to build a retaining wall he gets told to f-off and come back with $20k of engineered plans that make the project not worth it.
It's not about the end result. It's about dodging accountability.
It's a little dumb to just ignore it.
People on Visas are guests, it makes sense to ask questions like this that wouldn't ask ordinary citizens. We have been way too relaxed with it and it's nice to see some changes.
How many of those are there really? How much are you willing to sacrifice to prevent this hypothetical? Because there is no end to this sort of argument. Why should it stop with foreigners, wouldn't a suicide bomb by a local cause just as much damage? "We have to monitor every web page and every email, text, and word spoken of every person at all times to 'prevent a tragedy'" You want to prevent a tragedy don't you? You don't have anything to hide right? The fact that these kinds of powers have always been abused by those who have them is not something you should be concerned about. It won't happen to you. They will only go after the bad guys, and you're good, right? Now show us your papers.
>How much are you willing to sacrifice to prevent this hypothetical?
Citizens don't sacrifice anything. The rules applies to those who request visas.
Everything else you wrote after that is so much more delulu, it's not even worth addressing.
> Say you let someone in who suicide bombs himself and takes out several Americans. Then a reporter asks the DHS spokesperson how they let someone in the country that had "Death to America" posts all over their social media out in the open for everyone to see but they didn't. Nobody would forgive the government for such a grave oversight.
Everything is partisan now.
If something bad happens, every media outlet will blame the party they don't like for it somehow. It doesn't matter what that party actually did, therefore there is no value in doing harmful stuff for CYA purposes because deploying the CYA tactics will not stop you from being blamed for it by the outlets that don't like you, and also will not stop the outlets that do you like you from blaming the other party instead of you.
>Everything is partisan now.
You're making it partisan, I wasn't.
>If something bad happens, every media outlet will blame the party they don't like for it somehow
Ignore the media. If a loved one of yours would be killed by a visa holder who wasn't vetted properly even though his social media profile had all the red flags, who would YOU blame ?
> You're making it partisan, I wasn't.
It isn't you or I who decides that, it's media outlets. And they've decided to be partisan.
> If a loved one of yours would be killed by a visa holder who wasn't vetted properly even though his social media profile had all the red flags, who would YOU blame?
The visa holder.
Also, those kinds of social media posts are public, so what does it have to do with immigration? If you want to blame law enforcement for not investigating the nutters who post on the internet then maybe they should start with the ones posting crazy stuff and investigate who they are, instead of starting with random innocent people and unmasking them with no justification.
But the terrorist isn’t going to provide that particular username, nor will he check the “I am intending to harm people” box in the visa process.
So this only provides the government means to oppress and intimidate regular people while having no effect on crime and terror.
"takes out several Americans" is a Tuesday in the US right now [1]. The main people attacking Americans on American soil are...other Americans. The US has decided to do almost nothing to address the issue.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_mass_shootings_in_the_...
Motive matters.
It's materially different in my opinion.
I will submit to inspection of the things I bring into a country, but I will not submit to a review of everything I've written that I haven't made public.
It's like asking me to bring decades of letters and personal journals to be judged by. It's unreasonable. If this required of me I won't go.
>If this required of me I won't go.
Do you think the US will see you not going there as a huge loss?
>How's it different to be checking your social media before entering to make sure you're not a threat to the citizens
Since the leading sentence with the devil's advocate, it's hard to presume the post is mostly sarcastic. If not - the inability to see the difference is rather staggering.
Why would a suicide bomber provide the government links to their death to America posts?
Why do thieves post pics of themselves on Facebook with the stuff they stole? Because some criminals will always be stupid.
“Trinitro-something. That’s this heart attack drug, right? And what are those units? 40 … grain? You must have a serious heart condition then. Well, all fine, you’re good to go, Sir.”
This is just intellectually dishonest. Its like you have never heard of US surveillance programs.
US Intelligence agencies collect a lot of data about people. Especially the ones who write about "Death to America" on their social media. If we follow your logic and it doesn't happen today then there are bigger problems than the made up issues DHS will have in your imagined future.
Building a profile on someone doesn't require their social media profiles. This is just a bogeyman. As some has pointed out, this is purely to build a case if and when people protest against the government.
While your perspective bias undermines your point, this form of government (i.e. vague laws, the highly selective application of them, and the use of the justice system regardless of guilt as a weapon to suppress dissent by middle classes (e.g. threat of bankruptcy, threats of long term pre-trial detention, etc.) has existed for quite some time.
It goes by different names depending on your bias, but it exists. The right side of the political spectrum would call it anarcho-tyranny.
> The embassy also wants people to set their social media profiles to public.
Good thing I have no interest in visiting the land of the "free" anytime soon.
I was thinking about presenting at a conference in the USA in november, but the risks and abuse associated with entrance are now so high, it's out of the question. The world can no longer center on the USA.
The tr*mp administration seems to think they are inviolable, that they can solve every problem with the military. They'll be caught with their pants down. A $400 drone can now take out a $2B piece of equipment. That waters the mouth of any adversary. A great humbling is coming.
> A $400 drone can now take out a $2B piece of equipment. That waters the mouth of any adversary.
Aren’t you actually arguing for these kind of enhanced vetting measures with this realization?
If anti-US sentiment is high and if the barrier to sabotaging a $2B system is a meager $400…why wouldn’t you do everything you could to prevent people who might be inclined, supportive, or even publicly indifferent to doing your country harm from entering with your blessing?
These "enhanced" vetting measures don't actually provide any protection against these kinds of attacks. All they do is increase the anti-US sentiment, which increases the number of people interested in attacking us.
Sure, it may increase anti-us sentiment, but I don’t think you can confidently say that “enhanced vetting measures don’t actually provide any protection” because there is simply no way to know or measure what didn’t happen if you didn’t have foreknowledge of the planned attack that you foiled by your vetting.
My attitude is, if you try to get in to the US you must want to be here for some reason. If that reason is to create some form of chaos, I don’t give a shit if you are made more irritated by the process. If your reason is peaceful and this discourages you…I’m sorry, it’s unfortunate, but we have folks that wish us harm and we want to protect everyone best we can…including you, Traveler.
If just being inconvenienced makes you want to harm us, well you are exactly the type of person that should probably be vetted out—and hopefully you were.
Mass immigration has been a fake specter used by the right to get votes for decades now. How did it impact you, or even those close to you personally negatively?
I can tell you some positive impacts:
- Most western countries are concerned about economic cliffs around retirement benefits due to falling population. The US is not because so many people, used to(?), want to move here.
- Our food is subsidized by those willing to work awful hours at awful wages. As a humanitarian I hate this but I suspect most people would be upset to have to eat food picked at wages white Americans are willing to work.
- Most studies show more people equals more production equals more economic prosperity.
The solution to an illegal immigration problem is to loosen immigration rules and create pathways to citizenship.
You're a bit wrong here, aren't you?
- US is special because it is by far the richest and most entrepreneurial (big) country in the world; it gets the creme of the crop of the world, and corresponding economic growth, which no other Western country can replicate; many people want to move to all Western countries (e.g. Europe is experiencing an immigration crisis) but unfiltered (low-skill) immigration doesn't result in economic growth
- illegal (slave?) labour on farms is simply delaying automation, which is ultimately detrimental to economic growth [1]
- in fact, recent studies (and public data) show that non-Western immigrants are not net taxpayers, therefore they result in the opposite of economic prosperity (see graph in [2])
> Without freedom of association people stop socializing when you get a plurality population, you can see this everywhere in the US.
Can you elaborate on this? To me, again just being honest and genuine, it reads as a racist dog whistle which says “without a shared cultural baseline this country will collapse”.
I’ve worked with local immigrant advocate groups and have multiple immigrants living on the same street as me. They largely want nothing more than to be part of American society. Is this a range? Absolutely. Different people want to be part of society to different extents. But it’s very rare to find people who won’t be kind and welcoming to you if you are kind and welcoming to them.
On housing that’s obviously true. There are two solutions there. Reduce the demand, or increase the supply. Given that the demand is “humans wanting shelter” any attempt to reduce demand is clearly immoral. So the answer there is to up the supply.
I also genuinely want immigrants. At a minimum they bring delicious food I get to enjoy.
This person believes in the (white) replacement conspiracy theory and is trying to articulate its tenets without referencing or naming it: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Replacement_conspiracy_t...
I'm fine with naming it although I think there are legitimate practical problems beyond just that.
Why is it wrong to not want to be made a minority in your own country? Most of the time when that's been done to other people it's been strongly condemned for good reasons. Why when it's done to some of the most productive (and I would argue just) people in history is it considered a good thing?
Why is it surprising that people prefer to be around other people like them and don't function as well with people who don't behave the same way?
Why does race matter at all? Why would you become a minority? We’re defining minority here as racial and that’s totally arbitrary. It’s so arbitrary that if you look at the early 1900s you’ll see that Italians and Irish weren’t considered white and would be considered a minority.
Cultural differences are already massive across the US even amongst long time Americans. If you meet 10th generation Americans in New England, The South, The Midwest, and California their cultural differences are already at the size of a different country. There is no majority that’s being replaced. I know this because I’ve lived in those places and in Europe and Asia. The US has always been a place where cultures mix and change.
I’m sorry that makes you anxious. Harming others isn’t the way to resolve that anxiety though.
Why does anything matter if you can just define it to not be a problem?
If you cannot provide evidence which cannot be defined away then yes it’s not a problem. That is generally how problems work.
I can simply define racism to not be a problem and ignore you then.
Except that you can point to deaths, loss of productively, loss of revenue, etc caused by racist attitudes. And you can point to benefits caused by immigration.
I still have yet to hear an answer from my initial question about why any of this is a genuine problem aside from housing which I agree with but disagree on the solution.
To make progress concrete things need to exist for discussion around them to happen.
Deaths is an odd one to pick considering racial homicide statistics, so there's another problem for you to chew on.
I think the real fundamental problem we're running into is that we don't have a shared set of moral axioms. You've probably chosen international/interracial cooperation as one and I have not.
I have to admit I am quite intrigued by your ideology and feelings: it seems that you are acknowledging to hold racist beliefs but at the same time it bothers you to be called racist? May I ask why?
When did I say I'm bothered by being called racist? That sounds like an assumption you've made.
The reality is that I get called racist regardless of what I do so I've accepted it.
I guess I misunderstood what you meant here:
> you should have tried to have this conversation with us years ago instead of just calling us racist.
My complaint was the lack of productive conversation, not the name calling.
That is to say "instead of working with us to find a solution you simply dismissed our ideas (by labeling them racist and refusing to think further.)"
Why would that be a problem? Are minorities treated badly in America?
1) Minorities are going to have a worse experience anywhere just for practical reasons and additionally because of how human socialization naturally works. That's why we're so concerned about how they're treated and constantly do our best to help them.
2) The plurality or majority that replaces us will not be us and will not share our ideas (liberal democracy, market economies are two notable examples) which naturally we're going to prefer to theirs.
3) Globally people have been exceptionally unkind to minorities compared to how we've treated them. If they replicate that behavior here (and when they've been given the opportunity to they have) that absolutely is a problem.
> Without freedom of association people stop socializing when you get a plurality population, you can see this everywhere in the US.
What does this mean? Why would people stop socializing?
> If the immigrants were a net benefit things like housing would be getting cheaper since we otherwise would have shrinking population. Because of the effect I mentioned the opposite is happening.
Of all the issues with housing, you think immigrants are the primary force driving prices up? That a farm worker is causing houses in my neighborhood to be $1M+? Once all the constructing workers are driven away, we're about to see a real supply shock likely to drive prices higher.
> Plus just replacing the population doesn't actually help them.
Help who? Fewer Americans are having kids. The US economic system is built on growth and that also means population growth. An aging and shrinking US is a dying US.
> None of us need or want more immigrants.
Why not, and be specific. More so than anywhere else in the world, the US was built on immigration. Even with all the problems in the US, its ability to attract people who want to work hard and create a better life has been its superpower. This mixing pot of ideas and cultures is one of the keys that turned the US into the economic powerhouse it is today. Unfortunately, Trump is doing his best to dismantle the institutions that made America great.
Yes, immigration needs to be fixed. The people already in the US need to be given straightforward paths to be legal. And people outside the US should be given straightforward ways to come live and work and contribute to the US.
>Help who? Fewer Americans are having kids
Oh so we don't need the help?
>The people already in the US need to be given straightforward paths to be legal.
No? You don't have a right to live somewhere just because you break in and camp there for a few years. If I broke into Mexico that way they'd evict me. Doing anything else is completely insane.
I no longer have any interest in talking or negotiating with any of you people, but I’m happy to take personal measures to exclude you from polite society in any way I can.
What problems are you talking about? Be specific.
>What problems are you talking about? Be specific.
The one where these people don't have work papers, so they can't work the kind of above the table jobs you need to work to fully support yourself so they wind up being a drain on our social safety nets.
The average working American in my state can't even afford "good" healthcare but we're happy to let these people in sign these people up for state healthcare and benefits (at least in my blue state, perhaps the red states have stringent criteria that makes them ineligible) and doll out millions of dollars of contracts to all sorts of entities that facilitate this process. It's absolutely nonsensical policy. And this is without even examining the effects on supply and demand of labor, cheap housing, etc, which I'm sure aren't great.
I don't hate the immigrants. They're mostly fine people. But I would enact the most unspeakable horrors upon the people who actively created this situation were I given the opportunity.
And the people who really ought to be pissed are the people who are in favor of adjacent political policy (broad safety nets, permissive legal immigration policies, etc) because the peddlers of the illegal immigration situation cast shade upon all them.
Edit: Some of you really need to re-read that second to last sentence.
> The one where these people don't have work papers, so they can't work the kind of above the table jobs you need to work to fully support yourself so they wind up being a drain on our social safety nets.
Legal immigrants and many undocumented workers without employment authorization pay Social Security taxes, analyses show. Some undocumented immigrants use fake Social Security numbers or ones they may have had before their work permits lapsed.
In 2022, for example, undocumented immigrants paid nearly $100 billion in federal, state and local income taxes, including nearly $26 billion in Social Security taxes and $6.4 billion in Medicare taxes, according to the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy, a left-leaning think tank. (The report takes into account both employer and employee contributions to Social Security and Medicare taxes.)
But they are not eligible to receive Social Security benefits if they are not lawfully in the US.
https://edition.cnn.com/2025/05/01/politics/undocumented-imm...
> The average working American in my state can't afford "good" healthcare
You're going to blame the complete lack of affordable healthcare in the US on...immigrants? Ok.
> The average working American in my state can't afford "good" healthcare but we're happy to let these people in sign these people up for state healthcare and benefits (at least in my blue state, perhaps the red states have stringent criteria that makes them ineligible) and doll out millions of dollars of contracts to all sorts of entities that facilitate this process. It's absolutely nonsensical policy. And this is without even examining the effects on supply and demand of labor, cheap housing, etc, which I'm sure aren't great.
You're blaming the wrong people for this. Illegal immigrants are not to blame for shit healthcare and if anything, they make things cheaper for you. No one in your state wants to work farms for less than minimum wage.
> I don't hate the immigrants. They're mostly fine people. But I would enact the most unspeakable horrors upon the people who actively created this situation were I given the opportunity.
The most conservative voices are the ones who hire illegal immigrants under the table including the current POTUS. Illegal immigration is a solvable issue and if you look closely at Texas government you'll see that. You will occasionally get a Republican who puts forth a real solution for illegal immigration and other Texas Republicans tank it because they like to campaign on the issue. You can't campaign on illegal immigrants if you fix the problem.
I think it speaks volumes to either your reading comprehension or moral character (more likely the latter IMO) that you took my comment which is to the tune of "this is the effect of group A, I blame group B" and then strawman me as blaming group A. My statement as to the scope of group B who I do blame was intentionally vague so as to include the many varieties of people within it.
I'm not taking your comment as you blaming Democrats or Republicans. I'm pointing out that the people who are largely anti-immigration are the ones perpetuating the problem and if people want to really solve the problem, we can solve it. You just have to not get distracted by false narratives.
>I'm pointing out that the people who are largely anti-immigration are the ones perpetuating the problem
You need to separate the politicians from the people. There is always someone willing to say anything to get elected. Of course they never really solve the issues, so long as not solving the issue harms their chances of reelection less than solving it does.
The root cause is the hordes of people who are unable to think several steps ahead, think about then 2nd through Nth consequences of policy and yet still vote, many of them in these comments. Because at the end of the day that's who elects the politicians. And on the other side of the equation are voters who don't actually demand results. You can blame media and whatnot but those are small factors, not the dominating factor of the equation.
>You just have to not get distracted by false narratives
I'm not getting distracted by false narratives. I've witnessed the degradation of my own states safety net services as they became inundated over the past ~5 yr as a result of federal policy. It wasn't like this under Obama or Bush. I'd happily go back to whatever that was.
> You need to separate the politicians from the people. There is always someone willing to say anything to get elected. Of course they never really solve the issues, so long as not solving the issue harms their chances of reelection less than solving it does.
This is the fault of the people putting them in those positions and what I mean by getting distracted by false narratives. If you keep voting for the people who fail to solve the issue then this is what you get.
> I've witnessed the degradation of my own states safety net services as they became inundated over the past ~5 yr as a result of federal policy. It wasn't like this under Obama or Bush. I'd happily go back to whatever that was.
I would love to know your state because I can promise your social programs are not degrading because of immigrants and are degrading because of tax cuts to the rich.
>I would love to know your state because I can promise your social programs are not degrading because of immigrants and are degrading because of tax cuts to the rich.
Run the numbers on the five bluest states. No matter what definition of "bluest" you use you'll get mine in there somewhere.
You'll never see the issue unless you actually look at nation of origin stats, which are not collected by much of anybody. These people have all been issued state IDs and are state residents as far as the state government cares. But ask any social worker, any administrator, and they will tell you that the demographics being served have changed hugely over the years.
I have people that work for these agencies in my household. I'm not shooting from the hip here.
I also know people who work in these agencies. I'm not saying these people don't exist. I'm saying these people aren't a "drain" as you put it. They pax taxes towards these programs and pay social security that they can't claim. The problem is happening at a different part of the funnel.
The problem isn't whether they pay taxes. The problem is that we've effectively increased the number of poor people in the country, or at the very least my state, on a whim. And that imperils all the social safety net programs or at the very least degrades them for the populations that they were intentionally envisioned to serve (which also imperils them, but politically instead of financially).
You've misunderstood my point with mentioning that they pax taxes. If more people are paying taxes then more money should be flowing into these programs, doubly so if more people are using them. If that isn't happening then your problem is with funding.
It doesn't matter if they "pay taxes" if they cost more than they put in.
If I make $36k/yr doing the kind of string together mcjobs you do at that income level, pay $0 in effective income taxes, pay 10k of consumption taxes and I cost the taxpayer $20k in benefits then the state is $10k in the hole per person who lives that way. You multiply these people and the result is obvious.
Well I had a plan to do some museum/nature trip there and slowly gathered resources for it. But I don’t know if I want full visa+border control experience. I guess Iceland and Adriatic Sea countries will get my vacation budget instead.
Yeah that country is toast, better look elsewhere.
