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by jswelker 188 days ago
I'd actually entertain a ban on birthright citizenship _for all citizens_.

Imagine as a thought experiment that everyone in the US had to go through the immigration process to earn a place here. If you are born here, you have a green card for 20 years or so, and if you aren't the kind of desirable person we want in this country, you get a one way ticket somewhere else. We don't need freeloaders! Maybe every 10 years you can reapply if you are not accepted.

Imagine how different our education and child rearing processes would be if the stakes were made real.

Dystopian? Yes. But that is the dystopia we are already heading towards for many people who would otherwise be future citizens.
2 comments
RajT88 188 days ago
You may enjoy the book Starship Troopers.
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eesmith 188 days ago
Where might this somewhere else be?

We already see that the US needed to pay El Salvador to accept its prisoners, and the UK pay Rwanda to take asylum seekers. It's hard to think of a country which will accept people the US considers to be freeloaders, except by taking considerable compensation .. or by threat of military force, which is also expensive.

If you want a dystopian future, just kill them.

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jswelker 187 days ago
My friend, this is America. We already have so much experience relocating displaced undesirable native peoples into marginal lands where they can cosplay independence and autonomy. Oklahoma is pretty much taken, but I think we can spare Arkansas, Kentucky, and a few others.

I know a lot of people from high school for whom this would be a big step up in life actually.

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eesmith 187 days ago
So, send them to Coventry, set up a ghetto or Bantustan, or be glad there are a lot of islands as in Brave New World.

I misread your "else" in "you get a one way ticket somewhere else" as outside of the US, not partitioning the US.

Historically this means the US will still be spending a lot of money on these so-called freeloaders, not only for internal border control (people, smuggling) but also pollution emissions, water flow, and all the other boring crap usually handled by national law and interstate compacts.

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