Its because conservatives are into family values. They want to know that when they get older they can move in with their children and they don't want any immigrants fucking it up by coming into the country and fixing the social security baby boomer bulge by changing the demographic balance of age. Why else do you think they want low taxes and high deficits? Cohabitation! When their kids finally have to pay for the shit they didn't wanna pay for way back when, they'll be glad to have grandpa and grandma living in with them and sharing the bills.

As a husband of a soon to be US citizen from another country who spent thousands of dollars just to bring her here LEGALLY and go through the citizenship process I can wholeheartedly say I have rather strong feelings towards illegal immigrants.

The argument against illegal immigration can't rest on "well, it is illegal", because you don't provide a moral argument for having the rules as it is now.  If you change the laws, is it suddenly ok to have the same influx of immigrants as we do now?

I also want to focus a bit back on the conservative side of things here. I do take issue with individuals delighting in individuals leaving because the economy is bad.  It is like there is thankfulness that jobs are hard to come by. 

Thanks for pointing it out. And I agree with your other reasons, they are logical.

Whilst I think that illegal immigrants can be problematic (certainly if they receive social benefits and/or don't pay tax), I can't be angry at them because I know what they do is often done out of desperation and the will to do anything for a better quality of life.

At the end of the day we all want to improve our quality of life, I can relate. But it just so happens that some of us were born on the side with the greener grass already.

As for jobs and social services, I can see the problem they pose to the system. For example if a state has to factor in bilingual education for the children of illegal immigrants, then the cost to educate students will sky rocket. If a person has been undercut in their job, then it will begin to cause many problems such as higher unemployment of legal citizens and unmonitored working conditions (which inevitably lead to poor working conditions) for illegal immigrants.

But again, I can't really be angry at these people in spite of this because I know that in many cases they illegally cross borders to increase their quality of life.

the moral agrument is to protect the national heritage. the networth of a country is what our fathers left us with, what they often died for, for us to have a good life.

Immigration in a small scale is natural and good for many reasons (cultural openness, genetic brassing...).

Immigration in a large scale justs degrades the quality of life in the country. Perfect example is the US... you go to a shop and the worker barely speaks english... it's your quality of life that is hurt, as you're gonna pay for the same service that you used to, but lose time, not get what your wanted because of language problems...

It's all nice to say people should share and the world is for everyone... but our nature is to want the best for ourselves, and migrating to an other richer country even if it decreases the quality of life of the others  is just this and jsut as much egoistic as not wanting to share.

Communism failed for a reason... human nature.

how about some of us where born where our ancestors made the grass greener with their sweat?

it's all nice to live of fishes on the beach... but oh look, the guys in the snow all year up there invented TVs... I need one too, so i'll just go and well get crowded up there cause they have TVs, it's better now up there.

Natural resources in many countries should give them way more wealth than what we have in europe with our dried out land. heck, look at the arab countries... shieks with zillions of oil that should be the state's, next to population in poverty. Our ancestors made revolutions for much less, in france it was because taxes on roads were too high and the main tax too (was 10%, now in our free country it's about 70%... yay).

So your ancestors were hard working individuals, hence you deserve a better life than someone whose ancestors were either unlucky, uneconomical or exploited.

Well I can extend that logic and say that each person has the right to secure a better life for their future descendants. If a person moves to a country to work hard and start a better life for themselves and their future family, then it's hard to draw a difference. It's exactly what your ancestors did, and it's exactly what this hypothetical immigrant is doing now.

I would never say that we should all move to the prosperous areas of the world to share success, that would be absurd. But I can't be angry at a person for going to great length to try and improve the quality of their life. The situation could also be helped (I guess) by taking action in their home countries for a better life too but oppression can make that difiicult task.

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As for those kinds of countries you mentioned. It's all too easy to say that countries with natural resources should be rich, but it just doesn't work like that.

Let's compare two countries, Ethiopia and Germany. On the surface they look pretty similar, both have a bout 80 million citizens, both have about the same amount of arable land, similar amount of resources, etc. Yet Ethiopia has a seriously lower quality of life than Germany. The short reason for why Ethiopia has such a low quality of life is corruption and exploitation of the workforce. Most of the money in Ethiopia comes from selling crops, such as coffee, which has been produced by farmers who earn just a few hundred dollars a year from international companies.

I'm not saying this to try and sound like a pompous holier than thou jackass, but it's not the fault of the Ethiopian that their quality of life is so poor. Basically what I'm saying is that you always have to have the "master and the slave" as it were, and someone is often on the bottom being treated unfairly. I can't blame those people for wanting what those in better off countries have.

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Your TV example was kind of silly too. Sorry, I have to say it. This isn't about something as trivial as TV.

This is about basic sanitation and access to decent healthcare. This is about famine and communities ran by drug cartels. The kind of situations that can make a person very desperate for a better life.

well the examples were silly and exagerated on purpose.

I never said we should be mad at immigrants or that they shouldn't thrive for this. I'm arguing that not wanting immigrants in your country (above a certain healty level, as I said before, for cultural expansion, genetic brassing....) is just as natural as them wanting to come and just as justified.

We had corruption too... heck european countries were based on feodality, a system where everyone is a slave to the lord, certainly far less freedom than what any country has right now.

We had exploitation too... people did revolutions.

If everyone that wants a better life leaves these countries, who is going to be left to do these essential steps in the betterment of life quality for these nations? it's like dropping your team halfway because they are losing and switching to the one in first place although you're slowing them down.

In all the point I want to make is for why people dislike immigrants. it is not relative to why immigrants want to come, their reasons as you pointed out are entirely different and legitimate in their own right... but why should we care realy, it's their lives not ours, all that affects ours is that they indeed come here and degrade the quality of our lives (talking about the excess migration there).

there you missed the difference between expressing opinions based on reflexion and this same reflexion taken as an excuse for violence. Norton might have both in mind, but the kids listening only see the reflexion and the violence they are led thowards.

The very reason why faschism is so dangerous, is because you cannot argue against its logic, this makes it even more attractive to followers, the only defence against it is to learn moderation, something not present in norton's speech. (sorry i don't know the character's name so I used the actor's).

I do believe that European states have made such a self incriminating reflexion since world war too, that they are showing too much compation for their own good.