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Comment by toomuchtodo | Hacker News Reader

Citizenship is membership. If you don't like it, start your own country. But that's how the current system works.

I don't care the color of your skin, I expect you to follow the same rules everyone does to apply for citizenship.

Which rules did you follow in order to attain membership?

Life is not fair, nor a meritocracy. I'd love U.K. Or Canadian citizenship. Even as a US citizen, I need to get in line like everyone else.

The question is which rules should those be.

The rules created by a democratic process of course. As voted on by the citizens of a country.

That's how sovereignty works. Or are you advocating for removal of sovereignty for the economic benefit of citizens of other countries because "that's more moral"? Hardly.

Yes. And as citizens (of various countries), that's what we're arguing. Just because citizens set the rules doesn't mean whatever they decide is necessarily just.

EDIT: In reply to your edit, I have no idea why you'd bring up "removal of sovereignty". I don't see anyone here even hinting at that.

I don't know precisely what "removal of sovereignty" means, but I suspect it means that undocumented immigrants undermine USA laws, by routinely breaking them. Even from the outside that seems different than debating (and voting) what the laws should be... One suspects you'd be more sensitive to this difference if the laws in question were those that you strongly support.

The questioning of my support of sovereignty came in reply to my post saying the question is what the laws/rules should be. If the sovereignty worry is about illegal immigration, then the reply makes no sense in the context of my post.

Citizens in the US voted for Jim Crow and it was only overturned via non-democratic means. Were these laws moral at the time?

To take a modern example, will Maharashtra's proposed law against Biharis driving autos be moral if it has popular support? (Background: Marathi nationalists have - this year - proposed Jim Crow type laws against non Marathis driving taxis/auto rickshaws.)

The Jim Crow laws were most certainly overturned through democratic means, namely the 1964 Civil Rights Act (an act of the elected legislature) invoking the Commerce Clause (part of the Constitution) and 1965 Voting Rights Act. If you mean they were not repealed through by referendum or plebiscite, that is true, but neither were they enacted through direct voting. This is the case with most laws in the US.

I'm guessing by 'non-democratic' means, he was referring to Brown v. Board of Education (1954).

I actually misremembered which was ended by law and which by judicial fiat. Regardless, the moral question of whether they were justified when democratically popular remains.

You can debate what the rules "should be" but in the mean time it would be nice if people obey the rules that are currently in place.

If you're waiting for people to stop breaking the law altogether to make reforms, you'll never reform a law in your life. Sounds like an excuse to do nothing.

That sounds like you're advocating civil disobedience. But what exactly are illegal immigrants willing to work in shitty conditions, below minimum wage, without paying taxes fighting for?

No, please re-read my post, I meant what I wrote and nothing else.

Whatever the law, some people will always be breaking it. Should we wait for murders to stop happening before we reform the laws regarding it? We'd still have crucifixions and stonings! That doesn't mean one supports murders, just that it's not a justification for inaction.

I'm not waiting for anyone to stop breaking the law, I'm waiting for someone to start enforcing the law. I'm not sure if I'm arguing or agreeing ;-)

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