Comment on Is there any point for current US-based "skilled immigrants" to stay in the US?
southsamurai@sh.itjust.works 4 weeks agoHell, the native Americans are immigrants too, they’re just the descendants of the first ones to get here.
I’m not saying this to detract from the point of the land being stolen by invaders from Europe, I’m saying it to point out that every nation in North, South, and Central America was populated by groups moving here looking for a good place to live. It’s the single most fundamental fact of the continents that we are all, all linked by something; we’re all one big, extended family.
TachyonTele@lemm.ee 4 weeks ago
I wouldn’t go that far. Might as well say anyone outside of Africa is an immigrant.
Acernum@lemmy.world 4 weeks ago
Go back even further, we’re all immigrants from the ocean
TachyonTele@lemm.ee 4 weeks ago
We migrated from the stars.
southsamurai@sh.itjust.works 4 weeks ago
Well, yeah, that’s the point. I didn’t bring Europe and Asia into it since the original thing was about the U.S., but it applies there too. It applies everywhere.
We aren’t some magically unique group because of where we live. There’s no inherent barrier between people just because someone got somewhere first.
I’m not saying that there’s no point in borders, or that nations don’t/can’t have rules about such things.
I’m just saying that when it comes to the U.S. and the rhetoric around immigration and immigrants, there’s a lot less differences between everyone over on these continents than differences.
Letme@lemmy.world 4 weeks ago
Natives are pre-colonization, by definition
southsamurai@sh.itjust.works 4 weeks ago
Well, yes and no.
Wherever the first humans existed are fully native, if the people there descend from the first humans in a relatively straight line. Which, we all come from them, but anyone that moved away and their descendants came back, it would be hard guy else descendants in particular to claim to be natives there.
Anyone and everyone else had ancestors that colonized somewhere. Like, the mayans were descendants of colonists, just not European colonists. Same for Cherokee, Cree, Inca, Hopi, whoever. Their ancestors got here first for sure, and they colonized these continents. So, they’re native, but not pre-colonization because nobody was here until they came here from somewhere else.
So, yeah, in one context, if you only refer to the people that came after whoever got there first as colonists and pretend that that’s the only meaning of colonization, then that definition fits. But it isn’t the only definition, and it’s not the one under discussion here.
To give a different view on it, what would we call the first humans to go to Mars and stay there? Colonists, right? We’d have a colony on mars.
You can use the word native to mean the people born on mars, and that’s what you were saying, that the people born in a place are native to that place, and any further waves are called something that. But with other definitions of native, it’s impossible for there to ever be human natives on mars at all, because nobody evolved on mars that we know of.
And that’s what I’m getting at. Here in the U.S. in specific, and across the Americas in general, everyone came from somewhere else originally, regardless of how long ago that was.
Which is why I personally prefer the way Canada refers to the people that were here first, as First Nations. They conquered and colonized this side of the planet first. The rest of us need to respect that, but we also need to recognize and respect that being an immigrant isn’t a bad thing at all because everyone here is either an immigrant or the descendants of immigrants. We’re connected in that way, and should treat each other more as neighbors and family than insiders and outsiders.