...I'm saying.
Words.
"If Arizona's Republican legislators weren't so dumb, they'd be dangerous. Or maybe they're dangerous because they're dumb.
Either way, once they stop celebrating the passage of what should be dubbed the "We really, really, really don't like illegal aliens" bill , they're going to have to figure out how law enforcement is supposed to identify the culprits.
...Did you catch the part about "reasonable suspicion"? How is a cop going to know by sight who is or isn't legal? What about a person will elicit suspicion?
Opponents of the measure argue that the open-ended nature of "reasonable suspicion" will lead to widespread racial profiling of all Latinos. They're probably overstating their case. Something tells me someone who looks like, say, blond Mexican pop singer Paulina Rubio won't be stopped.
The truth is that Mexicans are hard to racially profile. Five hundred years of racial mixture has given many Mexican families a decidedly kaleidoscopic racial quality. To wit: Not everyone with Mexican ancestry shares the same skin color.
The law's proponents say that it's not about race anyway, it's about legality, but that isn't entirely true either. Presumably, certain physiognomic features will stand out. And presumably so will class signifiers and certain ethno-cultural accoutrements.
We can safely assume that most illegal immigrants in Arizona are of humble origins, right? So, should the police "reasonably suspect" people with darker faces? What about fair-skinned Mexicans? Are work boots or jeans a dead giveaway? Would someone draw more suspicion driving a truck or an Audi? Do those "Yo heart Jalisco" bumpers scream "illegal alien"?
And what about accents? Is there a marked difference between the accents of a legal and an illegal immigrant? Should a legal immigrant refrain from blasting ranchera music from his Toyota for fear of being "reasonably suspicious"? It's easy to imagine this law creating a climate in which both foreign- and native-born legal residents try to avoid being targeted by suppressing any outward signs of ethnicity.
...I'm not saying the new law won't help catch and deport some illegal immigrants. But at the very least, the "reasonable suspicion" clause suggests that the process will be hit or miss, and that plenty of legal residents could be wrongly suspectedand generally harassed. Proponents might say that that's a reasonable risk to run, but I'm pretty certain that most of them won't be subjected to the indignities of having their right to be in this country questioned..."
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