FEELING MY IMMIGRANT HERITAGE

The last couple of weeks as my health has kept me quiet and inside, I find myself contemplating the “Donald Trump” syndrome that I am reading and hearing about.  I ask myself, “What is it about his speeches and the discussion that he has brought to the political table that bothers me.?  Why do I cringe when I run into neighbors and friends who tell me what a great President he would make?”

How does a country, whose foundation is based on immigration, spout such ugly rhetoric toward the people who come here to become American.   I am reminded of conversations with my husband’s grandmother, whose family immigrated to American in 1903, from the Austrian/Hungarian Empire. They were a hardworking, close family, who told stories of having stones thrown at them during World War I and II because they had Germanic names and spoke some German with heavy accents.  It caused them to pull in ranks, stay close as a family, put their heads down, work hard, and live a quiet life in the community in which they lived.  It even caused my husband’s grandfather to change his last name to an American name…“Ford” instead of Jobb that he was born with.  “A good American name”, he said to Grammy when he returned from serving in the Calvary during World War I.  

On the other side of the family were the Irish immigrants who eventually settled in Philadelphia and like the Ford side of the family, their church, community organizations and family bond helped them pull in tight in order to withstand the slings and arrows that came their way just because they chose to come to America and start a new life. 

1896 anti-immigration cartoon

Being anti-immigration is nothing new to us.  Political cartoons sometimes played on Americans' fears of immigrants. This one, which appeared in an 1896 edition of the Ram's Horn, depicts an immigrant carrying his baggage of poverty, disease, anarchy and sabbath desecration, approaching Uncle Sam.

I grew up with ugly conversations towards those who lived and looked “different” from us.  As a child we lived on the “edge” of one neighborhood which put us in school with a very diverse group and in fact, in my elementary school time I was only one of four white students in my class.  I had friends in the class of both colors.  I would get invited over to my friends home, where treatment by them towards me was nothing but kind and giving from the adults in the household.

I would not bring anyone home, because my parents didn’t hold their tongue and their words so often embarrassed me (even as early as age 6, 7 or 8) so that early on in life I knew not to bring friends home.  But this did cause me to grow up and question very early in my life, the things my parents said about those who are “different”.

What I see happening today with the Donald Trump popularity makes me feel as uncomfortable as I did when my mother shouted at me asI walked into our home with my friend from class, “Who is that tramp and what is she doing here?”

I have not heard Donald Trump say anything concrete about what he would do to help our country grow and prosper.  I have heard him do a lot of name calling.  The fact that his ugly spewing of venomous language is so welcomed by so many burns my spirit.  I find myself feeling the same way I did when my mother would shout her ugly venomous language at me if  I dared bring someone different into our house.

I am left feeling embarrassed that the world sees us through Donald Trump’s eyes and sad that we are all letting it happen by supporting him.