https://heterodoxacademy.org/research-summary-race-and-the-race-for-the-white-house-on-social-research-in-the-age-of-trump/
As a progressive, I believe that even though not all conservatives or Republicans are racists, racism is the strongest motivating force among many conservatives, especially Donald Trump. And this is most obvious in regards to immigration.
Immigration is a complicated issue, and one with many misconceptions. As such, it is a good litmus test for racism and bigotry. Since not every Republican is a racist then it is necessary to separate the confused and uninformed from those who are genuinely bigoted. Here is a simple test. See how many of the following your raving, lunatic uncle agrees with the next time he comes over for Christmas dinner.
We are presenting this as a two part quizz. Here are the first four of eight questions.
You may be a racist, reactionary Republican if:
1) You believe that illegal immigrants come to the United States just to get welfare.
They don’t. In fact, many immigrants don’t even know what government welfare really is.
People from very poor countries grow up in societies in which there are few if any financial or other benefits available. Many countries are so poor that they don’t offer assistance because they just don’t have the money or infrastructure to do so. As a result, the people don’t have any real experience in signing up for cash assistance welfare, applying for educational grants, looking forward to food stamps or anything else. That is why they are so good at working. There is nothing else but work.
Reactionary conservatives will claim that once immigrants get to the U.S they learn how to master the welfare system and milk it for millions.
Right! Suppose you are an illegal immigrant, say, from the deserts of Sudan, or the mountainous areas of central Mexico. You know, or fear, that as an illegal, if you are caught you will be put in prison, you will be deported to your home country where you may have to face the same psychotic drug dealers and corrupt politicians who wanted to rob or kill you before and now will get a second chance. At the very least you lose your job, are unable to send badly needed money back to your family and may end up getting fellow illegals busted.
Even if you know what welfare is, and how it works, it is still hard to believe that many illegals will use the system often enough to get good at “milking it”. If you don’t remain quiet and keep your head down somebody will spot you - and then your gone. And remember, the more stuff you apply for the more ID you need and the more it is checked. Better just to make the day shift on time and keep your job.
And if an illegal does want to work the system then he better be good technologically. Applications for benefits of all kinds have moved to computer registration and smart phones. The poor starving farmer from central Mexico may not know how to even use a computer, or how to submit an application of any kind.
And of course an immigrant chiseler needs to be able to read the application forms. How many of them are semi-literate or completely so? Can’t do much without being able to read the instructions. And it may not even help to have someone just explain the instructions. If you are from some remote village in Guatemala and speak a language used by only a few local people in the mountains, you won’t be communicating with anybody around here.
2) You believe that illegal immigrants commit crimes but don’t acknowledge that crimes are committed against them.
The problem with being an illegal immigrant, or even a legal one, is that it is so easy for people to cheat, abuse, and kill or simply screw you. And it is hard to list all the ways that they can be done.
Unscrupulous employers easily take advantage of illegal immigrants: work them hard and then short them on their pay. Or don’t pay at all. Or pay them very little to do very dangerous jobs (cleaning up hazardous waste or working on dangerous sites without protective gear or engineered safety measures).
Employers, especially one in the industries where competition is tough and profit margins are thin, can hire illegals and get away without having workers’ compensation insurance. And even if there is workers’ comp there is no claim if the illegal worker is frightened away from filing one. And don’t even be worried at all about a wrongful termination or discrimination suit.
Who’s going to complain? “Go ahead, you’re nothing but a stinkin’ wetback! You complain and I’ll have immigration on your in a second. You’ll be deported.” Even if the illegal is badly hurt, or terribly cheated, it is better to move on and just find another job. Nobody’s going to believe you anyway. What’s the point. It can’t be helped. Don’t make a bad situation worse. You report it and they deport you. And Jose and Maria, who are still working there, are going to get it worse because of you.
3) If you are always claiming that we need a border wall because illegal immigrants are a threat to American but you don’t have any plan to deport the ones already here.
This one is aimed squarely at the Fox Fake and Phony New crowd. About every third show is a breathless, hysterical tirade about how good Americans are being killed by illegal aliens. In fact, every time there is a news story about an immigrant killing someone in this country (whether they are here legally or not) they grab onto it gleefully and use it as a club against anyone who shows any sympathy for immigrants.
These people are liars and hypocrites. If they are so convinced that illegal aliens are a real threat then the most urgent thing to do is to round them up and deport them as soon as possible. Never mind the illegals trying to sneak in by claiming asylum, never mind the wretches trying to walk across Texas scrub, never mind the ones smuggled into the country by being packed into metal shipping containers. These people are just potential mass murderers. It’s the ones who are already here, already situated in American communities, the ones who have already spotted good white American teenage girls to kill. These are the ones that you have got to get rid of first.
Except they won’t. To round up all three, ten or thirty million of them inside the country would be a huge, expensive, time consuming and difficult task. Moreover, it would imperil thousands of private companies that depend upon poorly paid exploited laborers, without whose sacrifice and labor those companies would be forced out of business
If you aren’t first willing to pony up the money and other resources to get rid of all the murderous illegal immigrants who are already here, and be willing to take the economic consequences of losing millions of illegal workers, but instead just jabber on about the need for Trump’s stupid wall to keep out the illegals (or asylum seekers) who are not yet here, then this is just a talking point for your guest appearance on Fox Fake and Phony New show.
4) If you believe that illegal immigrants really take jobs away from American workers.
Illegals rarely take jobs away from Americans. They take jobs that Americans don’t want because of bad pay, horrible working conditions and an absolute lack of career advancement.
https://www.google.com/search?q=Images+of+bad+working+conditions+in+American+slaughterhouses&rlz=1C1CHBF_enUS806US806&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjYrbKuwcTsAhV-HzQIHSFnBFUQ_AUoAXoECBUQAw&biw=1366&bih=568#imgrc=YMke_gd7fT4FcM
How about a nice job working in a slaughterhouse? A lot of immigrants (legal and illegal) work in them. You work five or six days a week to kill or cut up chickens or cows or pigs. It’s a very bloody and unappealing business. The line (there is always a line) is always moving and you are always standing in the same place trying to keep up with the cutting and slaughtering. You’re cutting, cutting, cutting. You are covered in blood and guts, and maybe feces and a lot of your own sweat. Accidents are common and, because you are working with sharp knives and large powerful pieces of equipment, those accidents can be deadly. Even if you don’t have any big accidents repetitive motion injuries are very common. Whoops, there goes your shoulder or your wrist or your back. And of course, there is always the odd slip and fall accident that can take you out.
And forget about career advancement. You start on the line you finish on the line. There are no junior executive training programs to help you move up the corporate ladder. And there is no sense in trying to make a lateral career move to another company to get more money or a better position - it’s just going to be another company and just another line.
But, at least you do get paid, right? Unfortunately, like many other businesses, meat processing is a very competitive business - cost must be controlled. The pay is going to be minimum wage or somewhat higher. But not too much higher, that could fatally cut into profits. And or course, there are no performance bonuses, stock options or deferred compensation. What you get is what you get after taxes (yeah, the employers do take out taxes because you don’t mess with the taxing authorities) and there is not much left.
And there is no prestige in these occupations. Nobody grows up wanting to work the chicken line at the local slaughterhouse.
https://www.tes.com/lessons/qWXtbEZQ7pnIqA/migrant-workers