Who did YCT Offend this week?
By Byron LaMasters
It's always someone...
This week, it was Hispanics and Immigrants (pictures here)! Via The Daily Texican, the North Texas Daily reports:
Numerous NT students exchanged heated arguments Wednesday during the "Capture the Illegal Immigrant Game," put on by NT's chapter of the Young Conservatives of Texas. The purpose of the game was to show the organization's opposition to President Bush's temporary worker plan.
Around 30 students, mostly Hispanic, began engaging members of the organization in a debate because they felt all the facts were not being properly presented. "We want to know! We want to know!" the group chanted. "You shouldn't make a game of these people who suffer for their families," Kristy Cisneros, Carrolton senior, said. "It's a mockery"
Three Young Conservatives members walked around campus wearing bright orange t-shirts with the words "Illegal Immigrant" on the front and "Catch me if u can" on the back for the game. People were encouraged to find these members and ask them why the organization does not support Bush's plan.
So what exactly is their point? That ordinary citizens should go up and approach people that look like they might be illegal immigrants, form a vigilante police force and perform a citizen's arrest?
The broader concern here is the tone of YCT. Illegal immigration, and immigration policy is not a "game". Pete Sessions probably thinks it's a game (since he believes the war on terror to be one), but most rational adults take the issue a bit more seriously. It's great that YCT's want to have a debate about immigration policy, but their tactics (just as their "racist bake sale" tactics) seek to offend rather than engage in reasoned debate. That's not very productive.
Posted by Byron LaMasters at February 1, 2005 12:06 AM
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I live and work in Denton and here's have my take on that picture. YCT at UNT has a reputation for pulling offensive stunts like these on an annual basis. Only a bunch of silly white kids from the 'burbs could sit around and say "hey, wouldn't it be AWESOME if we highlighted the issue of illegal immigration by having a tactless display like 'cath the illegal immigrant'?"
I would love to see more open debate between the various ideological and political groups at UNT on issues like illegal immigration. I don't think that shutting down stupid displays like this (like SMU did last year with their YCT bake sale) is the right way to handle it; YCT at UNT did more to bring themselves into disrepute and ridicule by going ahead with this than anyone could have heaped on them otherwise. Having the school shut them down only reinforces their Michigan Militia gun-nut conspiracy theories that all of us who see the poverty and bigotry of their ideas are out to stifle their freedom of speech.
They are their own worst enemies. Let them speak. It's the best way to marginalize them.
I think the YCT game should be like Pokemon ("gotta catch 'em all"), except that the pasty agitators should be first transported to East Austin and the captors should be able to beat the shit out of them.
Also, I'm waiting for minority students to run a "legacy bake sale," where cookies and cakes are not sold to someone whose grandfather didn't go to the university.
