xocobra forwarded this e-mail to me curious about my thoughts on it.  This post is my response.  Note that I’ve not written a STFU entry in quite some time and welcome the opportunity to reinvigorate a forgotten practice.

While I have not spoken out regarding the immigration hoopla taking place throughout the country, this e-mail calls for a response on that topic as well as the other idiotic premises it encompasses.  Let’s start with the e-mail sent to xocobra (note that I have not editorially marked up the e-mail as I normally would; it was too full of mistakes):

ALL,

Wal-Mart is one of my favorite shopping places but I feel offended. This email is the result.

With the latest political nuttiness about giving amnesty to the illegal Mexican aliens, I wanted a simple ball cap with an American Flag on it to show my support for maintaining our American ideals and way of life.

To my surprise, Wal-Mart had NO such caps.  Caps with Mexican flags, Irish and English Flags, but NO caps with American Flags.

I was ‘exercised”, to put it mildly.  I called for a manager and explained that since they chose NOT to carry caps with American flags while carrying the others they were discriminating against US, the proud and rightful citizens of this country.

She said: “Whoops!” and indicated that she understood exactly my point.

I would like each of you to forward this to everyone on your mailing list.  We are actively being discriminated against when we can not buy patriotic apparel such as this.

We still outnumber these interlopers, at least at the present.

Please ask everyone you feel appropriate to complain to a MANAGER, not a lower level personage, about this situation.

Ed

Let me start with the most obvious response: I HATE CHAIN E-MAILS!  Anything that comes to my inbox with the telling “please forward to everyone…” directive generally gets deleted immediately.  If you find it’s necessary to ask people to share your little piece of garbage, it’s probably not worth sharing on its own merits.  This is just such a work.  If I feel something will be of interest to those I know, I’ll forward it of my own volition but refuse do so because the sender or author felt compelled to ask it of me.  That’s just a pet peeve of mine.

But let’s really address his complaints, shall we?

First, Ed, you can feel offended all you want.  There is no law against someone offending you, and no one deserves protection from being offended.  If you must wear your feelings on your sleeve and take offense at every little thing that does not fit within your narrow view of how the world should be, perhaps you might consider living somewhere else, perhaps a country where the laws prohibit contradictory views and thoughts and expressions.  Iran comes to mind.

You see, those American ideals you claim to cherish and uphold are precisely what is at issue here.  You really only support them when they work in your favor.  When they don’t, you take offense and demand action.  You don’t really support freedom and equality; you only support freedom and equality for those who agree with you.

Second, the “rightful citizens of this country” are the great many American Indians who settlers displaced, killed, subjugated, stole the land from in the first place, and eventually marginalized to small reservations as cheap compensation for the massive territory taken from them.  You are not one of those people, I assure you, and you technically have no claim whatsoever to this land.  The offense you claim is a shallow representation of your own lack of understanding about how America came to be.  You are essentially saying that only the original thieves and their descendants have any claim to this country.  In truth, you offend those who rightfully own this land.

Third, the pride you speak of is nothing of the sort.  What you suffer from is called radical nationalism: excessive and fanatical patriotism that is intolerant.  America is a melting pot of peoples from all over the planet.  Our citizens represent every nation of the world.  A true patriot would demonstrate pride in this country by celebrating its diversity.  That would include NOT taking offense at a store carrying baseball caps with the flags of other nations on them.  Those flags represent a significant portion of our citizenry and are not indicative of enemies of the state, as you would have us believe.  In fact, those flags represent our nation’s allies, so you are expressing outrage at the thought of showing solidarity with friends.

Fourth, discrimination is defined as the intentional mistreatment of those who are different by way of prejudice.  A company that does not carry a product you want is not practicing discrimination.  On the contrary, they are practicing capitalism, the very foundation of America’s economy.  Businesses like Wal-Mart want to make a profit, not cater to the whims of every minority buyer.  Had it occurred to you that they might have simply been out of caps with the American flag on them?  Had it occurred to you that they do not carry them because they do not sell at that particular location?  Had it occurred to you that there might simply have been none on the floor for purchase because they were not yet restocked?  I can not tell from your e-mail whether you addressed any of these obvious questions, but I suspect you did not.  Instead, to demonstrate your radical patriotism, you immediately declare yourself a victim of discrimination.

When you go to Taco Bell and order a good ol’ American hamburger, do you immediately assume it’s discrimination because they only sell the sorriest attempt at Mexican food?  Their restaurants are in America, so they should sell American foods, right?  And what of import businesses?  Are they discriminatory because they do not sell products made in America?  What about the Vietnamese food store at the corner?  Again, are they discriminating because they do not sell American foodstuffs?

In addition to the laughably atrocious discrimination argument, another consideration is that chain stores often do not carry the same merchandise at each location.  Instead, they carry what will sell in that specific local market.  Did you stop to consider perhaps that particular Wal-Mart was not successful at selling caps with American flags on them because of the neighborhood it’s in?  Such caps might be found at another Wal-Mart that has had success in selling them to its clientele.  Of course, a man as smart and patriotic as you would understand the capitalistic concept of supply and demand, so I must assume you asked the manager if perhaps there was another Wal-Mart location within close proximity that carried the product for which you were looking.

Finally, to address your apparent dislike of illegal immigrants, most especially Mexicans, let me address that entire question.  I agree they are in this country by violating the law.  Let me remind you, however, that we stole this country from its original inhabitants, Native Americans, and we did so in violation of their law and of general morality.  Are you also offended by that?  Somehow I doubt it.

Given that so many illegal immigrants are here to work, and they do so many of the jobs we haughty Americans are unwilling to do lest we sully our hands or break a sweat, is it so far fetched to consider granting them amnesty and citizenship?  Many of them are hard working people who simply want a better life for themselves.  They are already here.  What harm is there in making them legal tax-paying citizens?

You see, the cost of locating and expelling them is at minimum in the hundreds of millions of dollars, a price we can ill afford to pay given the enormous deficit our government has seen fit to inflict upon us.  We are talking about 10-12 million individuals.  Is it not a better idea to make them legal and have them contribute to our economy — including paying down the enormous debt heaped upon us — instead of spending more money trying to oust them?  Better yet, since they are already here performing the work that our fellow citizens will not do, what do you plan on doing about all of those empty jobs they will leave behind?  That is a significant amount of work that will be left undone should your mentality win this debate.

And how do you intend to keep them from coming back?  Should we build a wall around the country?  And who will pay for and guard such a thing?  Instead of being a xenophobic isolationist, it might be prudent to consider the entire situation and the implications of such a policy.  It might also be wise to look beyond your own racial superiority complex to see that the world is becoming a global marketplace that must adapt.

Oh, and set your prejudice against Mexicans aside for a moment.  We are not just talking about “illegal Mexican aliens” as you claim.  Anyone who has been paying attention to the massive demonstrations throughout the country will have noticed that such a limited racial profile fails to match the demographics of all those in this country already who simply want a chance to do legally what they have been doing illegally for such a long time already.

The next time you want to inflict your version of patriotism on others, do us all a favor and don’t.  Fanatics like you give the rest of us Americans a very bad name.  We do not share your radical view of obliging companies to fulfill our every wistful dream even when it is not profitable or otherwise possible.  Wal-Mart is welcome to carry whatever products they see fit and can sell in each location.  If one does not have what you want, go to another, or try another reseller altogether.  It is your right not to shop at Wal-Mart if you are so small-minded as to take offense from something so trivial as the kinds of baseball caps they have available at the time you go into the store.  It is also your right to practice some common sense and find out the details of why they don’t have them, if they intend to carry them, and where you might buy one.  I assure you that there is a Wal-Mart store that carries them — many of them, in fact — if you’re willing to get off your lazy duff and look.  Just because one outlet doesn’t have them doesn’t mean the company is discriminating against egotistical cretins like you who can’t see beyond their own selfish and racially intolerant tendencies to understand capitalist market mechanics, inventory, supply and demand, and common decency.

You, sir, offend me.  So, Ed, in closing: shut the fuck up!

[UPDATE 4/11/2006 @ 3:27 PM CDT]: A very important example of the illegal-to-legal transition that bore fruit for America from beginning to end.