We Are All Alabama When Laws Target The Best Of Us

By Dustin Mendus

It all began when the kids stopped showing up to school. Hundreds of Latino kids disappeared from school when Alabama began enforcing it’s brutal immigration law, HB 56 Strangely enough, this was just a month ago, and only one single state.

One state gone crazy, right?

Being up in Pennsylvania and away from the insanity down south, I didn’t think there was much to do about it other than shake my head — you can’t change state law if it isn’t your own state. However, undocumented Latinos around the country have come out of the shadows to protest these laws, and have ended up in jail for it.

DreamActivist.org, a resource website for undocumented students, posted up a list of 13 undocumented protestors who are currently seeking bail. They include men and women from across the country, ages ranging from 55 to 18, from California, Ohio, Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Indiana.

The courage to come out of the shadows and security of anonymity and say “enough” is inspiring. What options do “illegal” immigrants have? Come out and risk deportation in the hopes that you won’t end up in ICE custody? Sure it’d allow you the opportunity to go to college and to participate in the U.S. with all of it’s benefits, but what’s the point if you end up deported? Or, the other option… Hide. Hide and carry the stigma of being “illegal.” No way to rise up and get out of squalor and improve life for oneself or one’s family.

These people might not go home after their arrest. Imagine that! They could lose everything that they or their parents have worked for. Listen to Fernanda and Cesar Marroquin speak about their arrest below, then think for a moment on the words of Alabama governor Robert Bentley on this law: “This law was never designed to hurt fellow human beings.”

This law is definitely not designed to hurt people — unless deportation is a painless process. Fernanda and Cesar totally will be fine if they get shipped off and sent away to a country with whose culture they are not familiar and don’t identify. What about the other 11 rounded up today? I guess they can just “toughen up” and deal with it, since they came and stole our jobs, and are (of course) actively trying to steal “our” country.

But I think we know better. There are human beings here who are being hurt by HB 56. Imagine the fear they felt yesterday, November 16, when they were arrested. Imagine trying to sleep in jail with fear of never seeing your family again. To donate to provide bail for the 13 men and women in jail or for more information visit dreamactivist.org.

Dustin Mendus is an undergraduate student at Indiana University of Pennsylvania. He focuses on cultural geography.