Immigrants are a breed apart

I was thinking thoughts like those posted below a couple of weeks ago when I attended a citizenship ceremony at the Auckland Town Hall to watch a close friend “get the operation,” as we say. (That’s the picture on the right.)

I’m not at all a fan of state ceremonies, but this one—held four times a year, for around 400 people—left me with a huge smile on my face for the reasons so well articulated below.

I thought of them again when I read John Key’s plans to save this nation of four-and-a-half million people from the tremendous dangers posed by a boatload or two of desperate and wretchedly poor brown people, in the unlikely event they ever reach here. (And I thought of Key and his fellow travellers with something akin to disgust when they characterised what are good, solid people yearning to breathe free—when the only words they can think of with which to describe them—is with the dismissive epithet ‘boat people.’)

So I thought of Jason Lockwood’s post a few times. So I figured I’d post an excerpt here, and commend all of it to your attention.

Those of us who choose to become immigrants are a breed apart. Not only do we uproot ourselves, leaving behind everything familiar and comfortable, but we do it with aplomb. We are adventurous souls in search of a better life, fully aware we may not find it, but fearless enough to light out anyway.
In the debates about immigration in Australia, [New Zealand] and America, the one thing left out of the discussion is actual immigrants and what they bring to their new countries. In Australia, [New Zealand] and America, immigrants are viewed as parasites at worst or unimportant at best.  ‘We don’t need more people,’ is the common refrain. Due to decades of welfare statism and environmentalist propaganda, immigrants are no longer welcomed as those who will enrich the societies they move to, but rather native-born locals view them with suspicion or, dare I say it, derision. It may be true that some immigrants are layabouts only seeking to live off of others, but I believe the vast majority are resourceful and hard working.
Think about it. To make the enormous effort to plan and then move to a new country, often without knowing much about the place he will call home, an immigrant must be more independent than the average person. When he arrives in the new country, he must begin the work of getting to know his way around, finding a place to live, meeting new friends, and the list goes on. The last thing on the mind of a new immigrant is how he can ‘game the system’ so he can sponge off of others. Even the dreaded ‘boat people’ (a term I find profoundly insulting to those who endure extreme hardship to find a better place to live) are far more virtuous than given credit…

Every person who came off the stage at the Town Hall was beaming. Everyone had come here by choice. Every one was, quite literally, consciously starting a new life.

As would be anyone so desperate as to struggle to these shores by boat.

John Key seems willing to demonise the non-problem of desperate people simply to divert attention from his government’s problems.

He is scum.