For all the people who are so quick to call an immigrant a hyena, criminal, rapist, and so many other awful things, let me give you a glimpse of what it is like to enter an unknown country and be judged by people who are supposed to live in a “united” nation. Imagine sitting on a plane because you are forced to leave your country abruptly, leaving your family, friends, and honestly part of yourself behind to start a life in a new country that you did not want to be in in the first place. Then once you arrive, you feel like all eyes are on you, not eyes full of love or acceptance, but of hate and discrimination. People constantly asking you, “So what are you?” or “Are you legal here?” becomes the new hello to you. People are taking time to pick out what they find interesting about your culture, just to steal it from you and flaunt it as their own, without giving you no recognition, and when you decide to embrace your own culture, you receive backlash for it, even though the new “trend” originated from you.
Picture yourself going into a new school and people automatically assuming you aren’t smart enough to keep up with the other students because you aren’t from the same country. Picture teachers constantly speaking slower when speaking to you because they keep swearing you don’t understand them even though you spent tireless hours learning a new language to fit in better. Picture the students around you picking you last for group projects because they don’t think you are smart enough, since you weren’t born in the same country as them. Yet construction work, automation, and more jobs that require a lot of knowledge are given to Hispanic people over any other race.
Imagine living in a country that invites you in just to take away your culture, your pride, and to discard the individual who you created. You came here to start a new life, only to have ICE raid you home, rip your family apart, and hold you in cages where they beat, rape, and kill you. While they flaunt around the new hairstyles, clothes, and food that they stole as their own, they scream at you to “go back to your country.” If that’s the case, I would wish I had never come here.