By David Harsanyi
Wednesday, August 17, 2016
“Every immigrant
who comes here is ready to embrace American values.”
“Okay. Let’s ask
them about it.”
“Racist!”
I’m not exactly sure what Donald Trump’s “extreme
vetting” proposal or ideological tests for immigrants would entail — neither
does he, I imagine — but it’s been clarifying watching the Left’s histrionics
over the GOP nominee’s most innocuous suggestion.
The idea of a test is probably unrealistic because, of
course, would-be terrorists would lie about their intentions and beliefs.
Islamic terror in the United States has also frequently been committed by other
Americans. So Trump’s idea wouldn’t be effective even if Congress went along
with it.
The main critique from the Left, though, isn’t about the
plan’s practicality but rather its aims. Why is the notion of asking a
prospective American if they believe in pluralistic values so offensive to
Democrats? I can’t think of a more pertinent question — not economic status or
ethnicity or even race, if you can believe it.
The problem is that liberals assume ideological tests
would have a disproportionate affect on Islamic refugees — a de facto ban. If that’s true, and
Swedish, Chinese, and Indians could pass literacy tests that Pakistanis,
Saudis, and Iraqis could not, doesn’t it tell us something about Islam? We’re
talking about freedom of association and speech and religion. These aren’t
trick questions. Now, if the test skewed to those who comprehend the ideas of
Western liberalism, it’s only because that’s where our conceptions of liberty
were hatched and cultivated. Sorry.
If you believe in secular governance and personal
freedom, then welcome to America! It doesn’t matter what your complexion is. If
you believe religious law is preferable to secular governance — as the vast
majority of Muslims around the world do, according
Pew Research Center’s exhaustive study on the matter (and, for that matter,
every poll ever taken on the issue) — you’re still in luck. There are numerous
nations where the dream of political Islam is a reality.
Obviously, most American Muslims, to one extent or
another, adhere to religious traditions and live under American law. But that
doesn’t mean Islam isn’t unique among
the major faiths in its reticence to modernity.
“Would he bar conservative Christians/Jews who eschew
gender equality & gay rights?” MSNBC’s Joy Reid asks of Trump. Well, if
those Christians and Jews supported the supremacy of religious law, then yes,
they should be. Almost none do, though. That’s an important distinction
liberals are either too obtuse to make or can’t comprehend. It’s the reason why
Israel and nearly every Christian-majority nation in the world features a gay
pride parade, but almost no Islamic one does.
Or put it this way: Taking a position informed by faith —
against abortion or the death penalty, for example — is not the equivalent of
advocating that the pope’s decrees supersede the law of the land. Even if that
were the case, papists don’t typically end up shooting gay nightclub patrons,
just as Hasidic Jews do not bring down buildings. When we act like
twenty-first-century Islamic immigration is tantamount to Catholic and Jewish
immigration of the early twentieth century, we are doing reality and history a
disservice.
We already have an ideological citizenship test, by the
way, so the outrage was kind of ridiculous. Immigrants already swear allegiance
to “the principles of the Constitution of the United States,” although we
hardly press the matter. We also already have precedents that allow us to
inquire about the ideological affiliations of prospective citizens. If you were
associated with communism, for instance, you can be denied entry into the
United States. Few of us were horrified by the idea pressing people about their
philosophical positions before citizenship. Suddenly it’s distasteful.
Maybe that’s because our understanding of American values
has become so relativistic and malleable over the past few years that we can’t
agree what it means. “I bet Trump himself would fail his new immigration
screening test of American values” sneered a anti-Second Amendment advocate on
Twitter. Maybe Trump wouldn’t pass a test — I’ve certainly been highly critical
of his positions. The question is, would these liberals?
Here are a few questions, for instance, that immigrants
might do better on than progressives:
• Do you believe the state should be empowered to place a
citizen on a secret police list — without any due process or notice — and then
strip that person of his constitutionally guaranteed rights? You know, like
they do in those tyrannies immigrants are trying to escape?
• Do you believe the state should be empowered to ban
documentaries and books that focus negatively on a favored political candidate,
like they do in Russia?
• Do you believe it is okay for the state to force a
Muslim butcher to whip up some pork hors
d’oeuvre for a gay wedding reception if someone demands it of him?
Most honest liberals would have to answer “yes” to all
these queries. Democrats have unambiguously campaigned on two of them — in
overturning Citizens United and
trying to push laws under which millions of Americans would find themselves on
FBI terror and no-fly lists for owning firearms. The third question is exactly
the situation Christian bakers and florists finds themselves in thanks to
liberal activism. So should the same people who support “justice commissions”
to regulate thought crimes and cheer an administration that sues nuns and
businesses into abandoning their consciences be lecturing anyone on religious
freedom?
I’m a big proponent of immigration; a lot of it. But
immigration policy is collectively decided by the American people through
policy debates and legislation — even if the president sometimes decides to
ignore the law. We often disagree on what should be done, but we’ve never
proactively imported people who might have trouble with assimilation.
Certainly, we have no obligation to celebrate or embrace those who harbor
philosophies that perpetuate genuine misogyny and anti-Semitism, etc. The new
American idealist calls you a xenophobe for bringing it up.
And I’m not saying Syrian refugees are inherently
incapable of embracing American values — Muslims in America most often prove
the opposite. It’s certainly not a given, though. Liberals, for one, don’t seem
to believe Muslims would pass a test on constitutional ideals. If that’s the
case, there are plenty of impoverished and tormented people across the globe
who are just as worthy and ready to come here and assimilate. We might have
certain unalienable rights, but migrating here from Turkey is not one of them.
Not yet.
No comments:
Post a Comment