What it Means to be American

America is a nation that was created to thrive in greatness, from the day it was deemed a country they had one goal, to give freedom to those who don’t have it. People from Europe founded America because they wanted to say what they wanted, and believe what they wanted. That is the image that America has lived up to. To this day, people from all around the world come to America to be a part of that image, and to give a better life to their families, for themselves, to live the American dream.

More people hear about this new country, and soon there are millions of people sailing to America. As the years pass, more immigrants are moving into our country, often illegally, marrying Americans and having children. However, some people believe that immigrants shouldn’t come here. They believe that America will flourish if it only contains Americans. They are taking away the very reason why America was founded in the first place. They give hate and discrimination to those who only want a better life for themselves.

The author of the article “I am the Problem” is an illegal first generation college graduate named Marco Saavedra. He talks about his experience in an immigration prison. He spent two weeks there before he was set free. In his article, he states “Landing in jail was part of my attempt to draw attention to “dreamers” like me, immigrants who were brought here illegally as children by their parents and who want to become U.S. citizens because this is our home. We were protesting the more than two million people deported under President Obama. We are the problem.”

While there are good immigrants, there are also immigrants who want to come to harm America. They come to cause destruction, and to bring our great country into the ground. That is what happened on September 11, 2001, when the Twin Towers fell to the ground from airplanes crashing into them. That is what happened at the Boston marathon, where multiple were injured by a detonated bomb. Terrorists are slowly gaining power and Americans are afraid. America holds a reputation for being the “best country in the world.” While America does have freedom, that can be changed quickly. All it takes is one mistake, one wrong immigrant to be let into the country. Then our entire home can be reduced to shambles.

One fear that President Donald Trump has, he wants to protect America, he wants to make sure that America can stay the best country in the world. He is doing it the way he believes that can work, and that means deporting all illegal immigrants back into their own countries. I can understand the concern that the Americans show from letting immigrants back into the country. I also understand why President Trump wants to send all immigrants back into their countries. However, I believe that he is protecting America from the wrong people. I don’t think he is focusing on the main problems, he is sending back immigrants who genuinely want to be apart of American society. What a lot of Americans don’t realize is that the terrorists aren’t focusing on only America. Countries are being bombed as we speak and they can’t defend themselves because they don’t have the defense America has. Thousands of innocent people are killed from these attacks, and they have nowhere to go. They are forced to live in fear that they don’t get killed. They see America as their safety from these attacks. They want to bring themselves and their families away from harm, and into our salvation.

In the article I read, “The Ten Countries Most Affected By Terrorism” written by Dominic Dudley, the ten most affected countries include Libya, Egypt, Somalia, India, Yemen, Syria, Pakistan, Nigeria, Afghanistan, and Iraq. In another article “U.S. admits record number of Muslim refugees in 2016”, written by Phillip Connor, he states that 85,000 refugees entered the United States in 2016, only 38,901 of them were Muslim. We see them as terrorists, and yet, the reason why they are here is because their homes were destroyed by our same enemy. We share the same enemy, and yet, we shut them out because we are too afraid to let our guard down.

I believe that we should bond together to fight against our enemy. We shouldn’t shut off the other countries and take care of the entire thing ourselves. Our ancestors did not fight the World Wars by themselves, they formed alliances. They worked with other countries to get the job done, and a lot less lives were taken. I think President Trump is wrong in shutting down the countries that need our help, because we could use their help as well. The terrorists have more enemies than allies, and if we were to put aside our differences, we could defeat them and we would have one less enemy to fight.