I am yet to hear a justification for opposing illegal immigration that doesn't tie back into racism or racial prejudice, let alone a justification that actually makes sense if you take it apart.
Someone prove me wrong, and I'll change my mind.
this post was submitted on 26 Sep 2025
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It's not race based, but there are cultures that are less developed and may not blend well with other cultures.
This even happens with the likes of white American tourists in Japan... Or anywhere for that matter. Even in the UK and Ireland, where they are likely the same ethnicity (I know because they never bleedin shut up about it)
For example, in some places, if something is given out for free, it may be normal to take as much advantage of it as possible. Or honesty shops- it might be seen as justified to take advantage of the shop owner because they didn't properly put a guard up, in their eyes, so were "asking for it". The latter attitude can also at times happen towards women and how they dress.
If you have a society with robust social welfare systems - education, healthcare, social security, pensions, childcare, housing etc. etc., mass immigration becomes a massive problem.
Everything is taken care of via taxes, and those taxes come from a productive working population. Slow population growth (whether from births or immigration) allows social institutions to expand at a matching rate over the decades.
Rapid population increases from migration can overwhelm the systems in place and put society in a spot where it is no longer able to maintain them.
Furthermore, when it comes to illegal immigrants, it gets doubly bad. They can't hold down a legal job (at least in my country, and thus not pay taxes either), which inevitably pushes them towards crime or illegal jobs which brings a whole host of other issues.
Thanks for a thoughtful response. My thoughts:
- In most cases, illegal immigrants do not benefit from government welfare programs, but they do work and contribute to the economy positively.
- In cases where data has been collected, immigrant populations tend to put more into the economy than take through social programs, when compared with native populations. I can provide sources and data on this if you'd like.
- Illegal immigrants may often not pay income tax, but they do pay most other forms of taxes that still end up paying more into the system than they get back. I can also provide evidence on this if you'd like.
- If tax isn't being collected from someone, when they're willing to pay it, that is 100% the fault of anti-immigration policy, not an immigration issue.
Thanks for a well-written reply. Here's some quick responses:
1... as mentioned the primary costs here come from increased crime which is hard to document. In high trust societies (which social welfare countries usually are) this has a disproportionately negative impact on the economy. Also, in several Scandinavian countries everyone has a right to emergency healthcare, regardless of their immigration status.
2... I believe you're correct when it comes to countries with less social welfare such as the US, however, this isn't the case in countries with robust social welfare systems. As recently as 2023 Denmark assessed the net contribution of migrants and their descendants on the public finances and published the results. The sum total effect of migrants was negative (-19B DKK). Per capita the average Dane had an impact of (22k DKK) per year and the average migrant (-21k DKK). Some migrant/migrant descendant subgroups were better or worse than others (best 52k DKK, worst -109k).
3... Sure, I assume this accounts for other societal costs such as law enforcement and crime?
4... See the response to #2. The taxes don't cover the costs.
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The thing is, if they are there illegally, they won't be able to benefit from most of these welfare systems. And over straining welfare can also happen for a lot of different reasons (thank you neoliberalism)
I agree that there are legitimate reasons to manage immigration, but criminalizing the act is a complete no-go for me. There are other ways to manage immigration by creating incentives and disincentives that would make the criminalization of migrants unnecessary. I also believe that freedom of movement is a fundamental human right and that borders are nothing more than an authoritarian system of control. "Security" is only made necessary by the problems that nation-states create themselves by existing.
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Nothing makes you more racist than having a legal alibi to hide your racism.
This question reeks of asking if keeping slaves when they were "legal" racist? If it's legal, what's the big deal?
It's racist to use immigration law to maintain a racial underclass. For instance, many essential agricultural workers in the US do not have access to the courts or law enforcement to protect their rights. If a citizen assaults one of these workers, the worker cannot safely report the assault to law enforcement without being punished for doing so.
No, not on it's own, but it's rarely on its own. In the US opposition to illegal immigrants and racism tracks nearly one to one.
One could imagine a country where illegal immigration itself was a distinct problem, where the society was balanced in such a way that legal immigration was at an optimal rate and additional people coming into the country had downsides that outstripped the positives, when though, for example, the immigrants were of the same culture/class/standing as the existing citizens.
The US, on the other hand, is nowhere near an optimal legal immigration rate, even though we benefit pretty significantly from both legal and illegal immigration. Illegal immigrants, for example, contribute significantly to the economy while not drawing 'as many' benefits away. Overwhelmingly the actual arguments against illegal immigration are grounded in cultural differences and language and, to put it simply, the desire for one class to want a reason to consider themselves better than another class by an easily recognizable yardstick.
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I feel like if you're asking then you're searching for validation. A sort of way to not feel guilty about being racist. Tell me, what bothers you most about immigrants? This country wouldn't exist if it weren't for immigrants
What "this country"? Lemmy?
And I understand them searching for validation. It might be hard being anti-illegal-immigrant and everyone thinking you racist, even though your reasons are not racist nor xenophobic at all.
You just encountered US defaultism
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In the US and many other countries, immigration violations are not crimes. Therefore, those immigrants are not illegal. It is actually a civil infraction, like a parking ticket... So, your question reveals hidden xenophobic bias. That alone is immoral. Is it racist in itself? Probably. It is very difficult to be xenophobic without also being racist.
I think those are just semantics.
I get the feeling of not wanting to criminalize the existence of a person.
But it's common language to say that civil infractions are illegal.
You could totally say "It's illegal to park here" even if you would just get a ticket for that.
I get the feeling. But I don't think it is rational to think that anyone writing "illegal immigration" is racist.
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Yes.
Just ask yourself why there is even a barrier to entry in the first place. Prejudices and paranoia.
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Yes because this is all land stolen by illegals. Assuming you're in North America. Canada and United States both literally illegally migrated here. No excuse or logic that would make sense that others shouldnt do the same. The end.
It depends on why. Is it a blind obedence to law, i.e. any law breaking is considered immoral to you? I.e. you oppose speeding, jaywalking, hiding Ann Frank just as much. No, probally not. That is a different issue called Statism.
After that you'd have to get into the countries actual laws and what their intentions and effects are. Is it just a matter of getting documented and agreeing to follow laws and participate in society and people are bypassing that in order to shirk accountabilty? No thats not racist.
Is it because there is a quota based on country of origin in order to shape demographics and so people desperate to move cant do so legally? Yeah, that's probally racist (with current demographics of the world largly affected by a few centuries of racist policy, both colonial and domestic).
Swede here, absolutely not, around 2015 or so we got hit by the mass migration wave, there were plenty of documented cases of migrants throwing away or destroying their documents to try and claim refugee status when they clearly didn't need it, thus taking spots from actual refugees.
There were also real refugees who did this, they registered in Greece, Spain, Italy or other southern Europe country, but then they kept going north, trying to get to a better country. At that point you are no longer a refugee, but an economic migrant.
I 100% oppose these migrants.
The dumb thing is that the EU would distribute refugees throughout the union, just because you registered in Spain, didn't mean you had to stay there, you would stay for an interim period and be distributed to your proper host country.
I have zero issues with migrants/refugees who come the legal route, learn the language, work, and integrate in the culture.
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