As many of you know, people across the United States are rallying today to draw attention to the importance of immigrant workers to the American economy and to American society. Hundreds of thousands are marching in the country's major cities. Many people are boycotting stores, walking off the job, and staying out of school, the New York Times reports. Here in Berkeley, many university employees are staying off the job.
Being an "alien" in this country myself (albeit a "legal" one), I view these efforts with great sympathy. My friend and flatmate, a Korean pursuing a doctorate in law here, suggested that legal alien academics stage a day-long boycott too. I doubt this university could function even a day without us foreigners.
However, not everyone is happy about these protests. I just saw a plane fly by with a huge banner declaring that "America is Full!"
In the meantime, workers and wanna-be revolutionaries across the world are celebrating May 1 according to local custom, which may or may not include marching peacefully, playing the guitar, singing corny songs, throwing bricks at policemen, burning flags, and getting arrested (not necessarily in that order).
2 comments:
America is totally dependent on foreigners for research and development at the graduate level, specifically in science and engineering. There simply are not enough motivated engineering students in the US to fill these positions. Compared to the East, very few Americans study engineering. I guess we're a nation of too many history students, right boys?
too many blogsters
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