Illegal immigrants should not be blamed or demonized for wanting to better themselves, nor should they to be treated as felons.
The bigger picture involves substantially more than acceptance of people from other cultures and countries. Racists and bigots may play the race card in this debate (and some may force it on others in order to prove a nonexistent point), but race/ethnicity is not the real issue. In fact, the insistence that those opposed to illegal immigration are by default, bigots, is a diversion from something far more sinister.
Aside from true-blue fascists and backwoods KKK supporters,
nobody is opposed to legal immigration to this country. Nobody. We are all immigrants in this nation.
In order to better understand why mass illegal immigration has steadily grown over the last 10 or so years and why this isn't necessarily a good thing for all countries involved, one must first look at the economies of the Americas & Canada. Specifically, how trade, or so-called "free trade" has adversely affected distribution of wealth between not only nations, but classes within nations.
The North America Free Trade Agreement signed in 1994 by the U.S., Canada, and Mexico immediately ended tariffs on some things and set gradual decreases of tariffs on others.
Corn is one of the affected products. In 1990 for instance, an estimated 3 million farmers in Mexico grew corn on small tracts of property. This corn was mostly used for their own families though some was traded abroad. During this time Mexico instated tariffs on imported grains, which created stability for Mexican small farmers.
Upon signing NAFTA, Mexico was required to lift their import tariffs on grain. This created downward pressure on the price of corn in Mexico and eventually led to the vast majority of farmers going out of business in Mexico. On the flip side, American agricorporations were given subsidies (corporate welfare) by the U.S. government which exacerbated the problem. Shortly after NAFTA took affect, Mexico's peso substantially dropped in value.
While the wealthy in Mexico were relatively immune to NAFTA, Mexico's poor and working class suffered greatly. With no jobs and no future, most saw crossing the northern border as not only a way out but a necessity. Some choose to negotiate our lawful immigration process. Obviously, most do (and did) not.
Corporations see NAFTA as a tool to drive down labor costs and increase profits.
Labor unions and workers rights groups see NAFTA as means for corporations to pay lower wages due to increased job competition.
Politicians see the resulting increase of illegal immigrants as potential voting capitol, from two different angles. Many politicians own or have interest in the corporations who stand to gain much from this continued source of cheap labor. Others see the illegal immigrants as cheap voting capitol.
NAFTA is one of many so-called "free trade" agreements & treaties supported and authored by global corporations. Some of these agreements result in increased outsourcing and offshoring, or insourcing via HIB visas. All of these agreements negatively impact the poor and middle class of the world. The World Trade Organization is the puppet master controlling the world's economies. It is the WTO who should be targeted. Not the individuals hurt by it's actions. If you read carefully, this is what many (including myself) have been saying all along.
Wherever the WTO meets people from many causes show up to show resistance. In Seattle at the 1999 meeting of the WTO, loggers marched alongside earth firsters; both knew that their own struggles pale in comparison to what the WTO has done and is planning for the global economy.
In the end, corporations make the WTO's actions possible.
Wal*Mart, for instance, lives off of neo-slave labor used to manufacture clothing and products sold in it's stores. As more Americans learn about the brooding, festering face behind the yellow mask, opposition grows toward the companies suspect policies (which include low-cost labor pools, low wages and sub-par benefits for retail employees, and commercial blackmail between counties and cities).
The reality is that a relatively small number of people in this world are shaping the global economy in a way that guts the middle class and creates a new, horribly skewed dichotomy of wealthy and poor.
To this end, illegal immigration in American furthers the destruction of the middle class by creating increased job competition and substantially lower wages for everyone. Allowing mass illegal migration may be the compassionate thing to do in the short run, but in the long run our entire nation will suffer due to the increased number of people living here, and decreased number of available jobs due to outsourcing, offshoring and automation.
Encouraging it is sinister, given the global reality being imposed on us by corporations and the wealthy elite.
As for the people themselves, the best thing Mexicanos (and Brazilians, and Argentinians, ect) could do is examine what occurred in Venezuela several years ago, and consider doing the same for themselves. They deserve better than having to risk life and limb to go to another country, because their own leaders have so badly screwed up their economy. Hugo Chavez' government came to power through popular revolution. People there were sick of the corruption and piss-poor living standards. Without the people Chavez' military coup would have failed, or never happened in the first place. Twelve million people is enough to make any corrupt government squeamish.
In short, I'm not satisfied with lowering the overall standard of living in one country because the inhabitants of another were not willing to address their own problems. Doing so makes America an enabler, at best. Mexico has wealth, but Vincente Fox and other Mexican leaders mishandles it's GNP and squanders the Mexican economy (in part by signing NAFTA).
Escaping to America is not the best solution to that problem, except where our removal from NAFTA is concerned. As far as I have seen, no attempt to change Mexicos's corrupt and failed economy have been made by the people of Mexico. Until that happens illegal immigrants don't have a foot to stand on.