Impact of Crimmigration on Immigrant Youth

When we write about "what the question should be," we either put that idea in the introduction or the conclusion. When we begin by proposing a change in question, we are inviting people who have disagreed with us to ask a new question and perhaps change their minds. When we conclude by stating what the question should be, we are appealing to those who agree with us and distributing talking points. Lawyers do both kinds of writing.

This draft is indeed of the latter kind. Rubi's comment strongly resonates with this very effective summons to differentiate from potential allies who are not speaking to the needs or situations of those on whose behalf your thinking is expressed.

I am not advising editorially that you should shift the question to the top, addressing those whose views about who should be protected are flatly different. Nativism, like so many other elements of the present "polarization," is a chronic disease in US social life, now mistreated into an acute condition, sweeping (as Know-Nothingism did in the US in the 1850s) a dying party system towards the dust-heap of history. Now as then, dialogue across these divides is barely possible.

But the management of alliances is a different matter. A draft of talking points that used "and" rather than "but" to deal with the admittedly class-stratified efforts for educational opportunity presented by other advocates down the block would be invaluable. In any social movement, in my experience, forms of policy and political initiative that counteract narcissism of minor differences are precious. Political scientists call it "coalition building," as do primatologists. From a humanities point of view, other conceptions are also fruitful. Differentiation doesn't have to imply opposition. It might be worth considering revisions along those lines, for—as it were—the practice.