The idea of the foreigner—the outsider, the stranger—has been with us since we gathered in clans and huddled around campfires, guarding what was ours against others who wanted to take it from us.
The passport, however, is a modern innovation, an invention of nation-states designed, along with citizenship papers and work visas, to control where people may live and work.
Why should an accident of birth determine these things for me? So long as I keep the peace and behave properly, so long as I can support myself financially, I should be able to go where I like. These controls, I maintain, constitute a conspiracy by the nations of the world to deprive me of my human rights.
Of course, if all controls were lifted, rich countries would be inundated by people from poor countries seeking better living and working conditions, overloading local schools and hospitals, taking low-paying jobs while legitimate citizens can’t find work . . . oh, wait: the public thinks that’s already happening. [h/t to ontheleftcoast for revision]
So what would happen, actually, if immigration were decriminalized, if we had ‘free labour’ agreements, not just ‘free trade’ agreements?
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