Immigrant Love

In the pop-culture category of Funny If It Weren't So Sad, let's nominate the video trailer for a proposed reality show called "Who Wants to Marry a U.S. Citizen?" When I first saw it on the Web, I thought it was a come-on for a lawyer in Alabama who's got a link on the site. Matrimony is a time-honored way for immigrants to win green cards when attorneys run out of options. But the producer, one Adrian Martinez in Los Angeles, tells me he's serious about trying to sell it to cable. "We do not marry anyone, we do not give out green cards, we don't offer any advice on how to obtain citizenship, we don't encourage people to break the law," he says. "We are just a fun dating game show where contestants have multicultural backgrounds."

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Well, OK. Although crudely produced, the trailer (which can be seen here or at www.ImmigrantLove.com or www.HookACitizen.com) manages to make an explosive issue seem both benign and banal. "I'm honest. I'm hardworking. I don't have bad habits. I don't smoke. I drink very light," says one contestant. Another tells the would-be bride, gringa that she is, "I just have so much love for the world, and so much love to give to you."

Any antidote to demagoguery in this ugly immigrant-bashing election season, even such silliness as this, gets my vote. But such is the spittle-flecked rage in the United States right now, I don't hold out much hope for the show's future. The reader comments on my recent column "Urban Legends" suggest the tenor of the debate. "California has already been trashed," wrote one. "My only hope is when it is all over, the santa anna whinds [sic] and fire will exterminate that dried up God forsaken area, and those heathens can have it, without water or air."

What unleashed this apoplexy was reporting that first-generation immigrants help make big cities safer. Not only do many studies show striking correlations between rising immigrant populations and declining crime rates, the reasons have been documented for generations. New arrivals have always brought vital hope and energy to American shores, not to mention cheap labor, and that pattern continues whether we are talking about those who enter the country legally or those who do not. A poll released last week by Pew Research shows that almost eight out of 10 Hispanics in the United States think their children will have better jobs and more money than they do.

"What CRAP!" writes one reader, whose text I'm reproducing as it appeared. "Try living in Larado, Tx. and tell me about the low crime rate. The place is like Iraq wit opposing sides armed with machine guns and grenade launchers! Or come to one of the border states and watch as your schools, hospitals, jails, roads and every public place is over-run with non-English speaking, NON-PAYING, mobs!!!!! You are just another 'pointy headed liberal'!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"

I presume that this reader and another who wrote about violence in "Nuevo-Loredo" across the Rio Grande in Mexico do not live in either place, since they can't spell Laredo to begin with. But we'll get back to them in a moment.