Your point is exactly why people argue that borders are artificial and unjust.
No one chooses their country of birth. What moral right do we have to deny people life in a better society? What moral right does Mexico have to force people to live under their government without consent?
Your point is exactly why people argue that borders are artificial and unjust.
No one chooses their country of birth. What moral right do we have to deny people life in a better society? What moral right does Mexico have to force people to live under their government without consent?
I'm not saying that people should be forced to remain where they were born. But the "borders are artificial " argument tends to assume that the people living on one side of the border did nothing to make it a better place -- that it's all entirely down to the luck of geography.
It also assumes that the other side of the border is permanently a worse place and cannot possibly be made a better place -- and therefore the only solution is that everyone should go to the places that are now better places. But the places that are now better places simply cannot accommodate all the people who want to live there.
Just a quick comment about the claim that borders are artificial, I recall some documentary about the US before the Civil War, someone recounting how they crossed over the Ohio River from Cincinatti to Kentucky and how different it felt to be in a slave state, after being in a free state. The land isn't much different. It's the governance the people live under that made it different. Same with San Diego County and Tia Juana.
Your point is exactly why people argue that borders are artificial and unjust.
No one chooses their country of birth. What moral right do we have to deny people life in a better society? What moral right does Mexico have to force people to live under their government without consent?
I'm not saying that people should be forced to remain where they were born. But the "borders are artificial " argument tends to assume that the people living on one side of the border did nothing to make it a better place -- that it's all entirely down to the luck of geography.
It also assumes that the other side of the border is permanently a worse place and cannot possibly be made a better place -- and therefore the only solution is that everyone should go to the places that are now better places. But the places that are now better places simply cannot accommodate all the people who want to live there.
Just a quick comment about the claim that borders are artificial, I recall some documentary about the US before the Civil War, someone recounting how they crossed over the Ohio River from Cincinatti to Kentucky and how different it felt to be in a slave state, after being in a free state. The land isn't much different. It's the governance the people live under that made it different. Same with San Diego County and Tia Juana.
And when some of our government's policies (ex NAFTA) are what helped make their country a worse place, where and to whom do those immigrants turn?