THE SUPPLY CHAIN
A Series on Immigration, Empire, and the Lie We Tell Ourselves
When an argument begins and ends with a sarcastic question, that already tells me there isn’t much of a counterargument underneath it. But I’ll answer you seriously anyway.
If I state your question generously, it’s this: Does the United States not have the right to protect its borders?
The simple answer is this: Of course it does.
But surface-level answers and underlying realities are two very different things. Every country makes decisions in the setting of its particular history and its current laws. If there is any immigration crisis, it isn’t this simple framing.
We have a country addicted to both racial and economic supremacy, at odds with itself because immigration exposes that conflict.
We have an immigration problem because immigrants solve a more fundamental problem: our addiction to low-wage labor.
We quite literally built an entire society around it and called it excellence.
I have several hobbies which influence my response to this question.
The first is that I’m a fiction writer, so I write a ton. And just like everything else, writing is a muscle — the more you do it, the cleaner and sharper your arguments become.
My second hobby is that I’m an amateur historian. So since you asked the question that so many ask — either not knowing or not caring about the history — I’m going to actually answer it for you.
And then I’m going to ask you the questions I think are actually the relevant ones underneath what you’re saying. Because your question assumes a frame. And the frame is the problem.
So yes — a country can protect its borders.
But if you’re going to leave a comment on my work — especially as an MD — at least make me work for it. I shouldn’t have to keep providing my own intellectual workout.
Yet again we demonstrate that supremacy makes its holders worse and the rest of us better — through intellectual necessity, through exercise, through the fact that someone has got to do the work.
What started as a response to a mindless comment has forced me to articulate a set of ideas I hadn’t yet been forced to combine. So thank you.
Because like it or not, we are here together in this great experiment. Not holding hands. More like slammed into a ring so tight that at some point the practical separation between your actions and their effect on me is irrelevant.
We are one and the same.
The rest of this series is the proof. ✊🏾
Coming in this series:
Part 2 — The Opening Question 🔍
Would you trust someone inferior with your children, your home, your food, your nation? No. So explain to me why you did.
Part 3 — The Origin Document 📜
Slavery is not a metaphor for immigration. It is immigration policy. The first imported labor force. No wages, no citizenship, no path to permanence. And what happened when the paperwork changed but the system didn’t.
Part 4 — The Pattern 📊
144 years. Chinese, Irish, Italian, Mexican, Central American. The same play. Different cast. The Bracero Program as America’s confession. The 11 employers prosecuted per year versus 125,000 workers. The numbers that make the argument for you.
Part 5 — The Current Theater 🎭
The farm raid pause that revealed everything. The $150 billion enforcement bill with zero E-Verify. The private prison stocks up 42% on election night. The border deal killed to preserve the crisis.
Part 6 — The Exhaustion 🕯️
We built this together. All of us. By every measure of history, data, and common sense. And they are putting it up for sale — for a smaller, more violent, less stable version of itself. You don’t need a crystal ball. You just need eyes. And a mind not addled by the intellectually numbing effect of believing your own mythology. This is why Black people are so tired. Not from the hatred. From the obviousness of it.
Dr. Yamicia Connor, MD, PhD, MPH
Founder & CEO, Diosa Ara | Creator & Editor-in-Chief, The Labora Collective
The Labora Collective publishes at the intersection of clinical care, policy, and innovation — because only 10% of your health outcomes come from the exam room. The other 90% is what we cover.
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