In the same debate I was having about 'Hispanics and immigrants getting special treatment', the same Trump supporter came out with this claim.
Here is what I said: (I have removed his username)
The bottom line is that immigrants do drain resources and break the law.
So do all humans.
As for the claim that they are a small part of the work force I'd scoff at any cite claiming that, come to Texas and tell me they're a small part of the work force.
8,000,000 is not a small number, so of course, you will probably see them around. They grew by 32.7% in that state.
Also you did admit that immigrants were released correct? They should be deported not released as they're here illegally.
How much does it cost to send them back, detain them etc? The catch and release for those particular categories has taken that cost into account.
I also have to point out that statistics can be manipulated and lied about, one paper can say those cities have low crime rates while others say other wise (He had given a link to some Daily Mail and Fox Sources)
The link you gave from Fox of all sources, is misleading. Violent crimes did rise, but that doesn't mean it was illegal immigrants who did it, there's no source to support their implied assertion - I found the 10% rise to be true, but there are no demographics.
The sources I gave you show how illegal migration actually shows a decrease in crime.
The idea for the $10 million fund was announced by Mayor Eric Garcetti in December, with $3 million coming from Los Angeles County and $5 million from the private sector.
LA has a budget for this of $6 billion, if they can afford $10 million, they should go for it. Los Angeles City Councilman Curren Price Wednesday announced a plan to create a $1 million fund aimed at helping immigrants with naturalization applications and other services, including deportation defense help.
So they would be able to become legal with the help available here, I know these numbers look really high to everyday people, I find sharing these numbers doesn't do much for people to make sense of things, but in the context of how large budgets are, it's nothing, plus, $5 million of it isn't coming from LA, it's coming from the private sector, so at the moment, only $1 million has been laid down and with the private sector deduction, it's only $5 million or so coming from the city.
It doesn't mean they will get legal defence funds for commiting crimes of a violent nature and the catch and release policy does not apply to these types of migrant criminals.
Also I'd like to say it's not that they release those guys because it's a waste of resources, it's likely a political move as I stated earlier.
Based on previous analysis from the Center for American Progress, a mass deportation strategy would cost an average of $10,070 per person, for a total of $114 billion to remove 11.3 million people. So I disagree, based on these figures that it was a political move and not a cost vs. benefits judgement. It costs $1450~ to naturalise a citizen.
Also, capitalist neoliberal economies keep unemployment high to keep inflation down, if you removed that 5% of workers, you woud have massive inflation, then there's the problems with Trumps' taxation policy.
One last point I actually know people who come here just to have anchor babies, just because they're not criminals does this mean they should be allowed to be here as many of them have taken advantage of Medicare etc fir their kids?
3.8 trillion is the US budget - migrants cost around $113 billion a year. That leaves $3.6 trillion - hardly put a dent in it.
Military spending however, which is the most risky investment the US has blundered over the years and is the main reason (apart from outsourcing and China's growing economy) the USA is no longer the hegemon, is $611 billion, which still leaves 3.19 trillion. It's this spending on the military that is causing the influx of refugee migrants by the way. The two policies of anti-immigration and pro-overseas military intervention are incompatible.
$3 trillion was the amount the US paid out to the bank after the 2008 crisis.
We live in a globalised world, these people are doing what anyone would do to survive. That's a personal acceptence of this phenomenon on my part, I don't see the need for borders at all, nationalism is an outdated concept in its death throws - especially if Trump tries all out protectionism - the US will enter trade death.
The problems are at the top, jumping a border is not a crime, as you admitted -
just because they're not criminals
Compared to the damage capitalism is doing to the countries of these people who migrate, immigrants are the victims and require understanding. There's enough to go around for everyone, it's just neoliberal economics that has destroyed opportunities for everyone.
The numbers in this link are the same as the ones I have seen, so as regards your earlier quote:
I also have to point out that statistics can be manipulated and lied about, one paper can say those cities have low crime rates while others say other wise
This has no relevance to our discussion, apart from how Fox blew an already disclosed piece of information out of proportion, with racist implications.
Also the rate of foreign workers has increased, the reason for this is because even in America a big corporation can pay them lower wages. Why do you think Filipino and Indian workers are brought in?
Yes, to keep inflation down. You are angry at the free market, not immigrants.
Because they're more competent or will happily take the lower wages.
Because they have no choice - capitalism is really taking off over in their countries and they have been enclosed the same way we were 200-300 years ago during the industrial revolution. Forced away from simpler, more sustainable ways of living that were locally operated, because of enclosure and land grabs.
It's the same principle behind opening a factory in Mexico rather then in the USA. A USA worker will get paid maybe 30 dollars an hourwhile a Mexican will get paid three dollars an hour. I assume this influx of foreign workers has also caused minimum wage to remain at an all time low.
Yes, so the problem is outsourcing and consumer capitalism, debt markets etc - not immigration. The problems are at the top - the capitalists are the real criminals, not migrants. It's all exploitation and immigrants are being scapegoated - the facts are in the figures.
I haven't read the post carefully yet, but I live in North America, in Canada, which feels in between the U.S. and U.K. and has some of the immigrant fuss involved too. Plus I grew up in the United States and dealt with various kinds of immigrant individuals and populations living in Florida, Minnesota, and Hawaii, as well as traveling throughout the U.S. and now Canada where immigrants are the majority one sees and deals with daily.
Immigrant fuss is big news right now everywhere, and in this area it is likely the actions of T, then stuff going on in the U.K. taking precedent over the comparatively minimal or possibly covered up immigrant stuff here, which seems not nearly as mouth watering for the sensationalist news, amd the news here doesn't seem as hungry for wild chaos as the Two U places, whuch combined would make a UU, a W and upside down McDonald's symbol representing "West".
So, on the one hand, these bureaucratic issues have been an irritant and I think all open lands should be free and I should be left alone because I don't like or want to be bossed around or bothered by anyone ever.
On the other hand, Japan has been allowed to strictly control the demographics and assimilation in its territory (which kay or may not be true, I have not even looked into it much to verify the reality of such assumptions), but other places seem to be a free for all full of un-assimilated populations ghettoized and in some cases gangsterized with a fully derelict seeming ideal last brought up in the 80s but referring to something more formed seeming in the 50s, right after WWII, as the Model Western Ideal, largely created by and promoted by America and through American Advertising as post-war uses for former propagandists perhaps, though it likely existed in just about the same form before that interlude and was taking pretty hard hits even by the mid and definitely the late 60s. When it was "resurrected" in the 80s by the relics from when that seemed the pinnacle, so many tumors had formed that there was no going back, the Western Ideal had become Joe Merrick.
Immigration and more specifically Immigrant Obnoxiousness had been a complaint long before and throughout the history of America and Europe, even as the ruling class in each place had apparently often been an invader and colonizing group themselves, invasive and more than likely obnoxious immigrants that had made life a lot worse for whatever group they ended up overtaking.
Now the former immigrants had more or less become assimilated after an unnecessarily long seeming indoctrination, pushed further towards that by new waves of different immigrants that then made the former immigrants seem less alien in comparison. Western and Southern Europeans, people from former commonwealth places and colonies, and then from the far flung places of the Earth relative to where they are arriving, with probably the most alien of all being the "dark" African people, and then certain obscure South East Asians, but the "mongrel" hordes of uncivilized newcomers differ per nation. Meanwhile, the neglected lower classes having lived in areas seem to go feral from neglect, looking physically unclean and rabid with unattended to mental illness, possibly even in-bred due to poverty and the inconvenience of finding far flung mates or mixing with the sometimes also reclusive, defensive, and closed off newcomers, who beyond trying to maintain certain things about their identities have also sometimes dealt with or have seen or heard of examples of others dealing with hostilities which further makes their salvic function as new companions and mates to pull out populations from becoming completely mutant muck through exaggeration of all their genetic and recessive flaws becoming dominant through what is now so popularly promoted as fantasy in p*rnography.
So, do they drain resources? I was reading about the appalling amount of water that certain cows drink in comparison to humans. I was also thinking how annoying it is that a population sweeps up the available shelters, while everything is made unreasonably unaffordable, like how wealthy people from China are who people are waiting to hit the jackpot with concerning sales of their properties at prices no normal people with average means could ever hope to afford even working a lifetime at normal or middle class jobs. The majority of homeless people here are to varying degrees the ones who seem to have had a background in Canada the longest, the Native people and the Caucasians from Western Europe who had first arrived here, while everyone in the homes seem to be immigrants, even first generation immigrants who had accumulated wealth elsewhere somehow or come from well off families and could freely move to Canada to invest here.
There has been no apparent effort in anymore trying to maintain what Canada and the people of Canada should ideally look and act like, except the universally agreed upon "Not Muslims!", and so it seems like an ultimately pretty libertarian free for all based only on how much literal wealth you can bring into the country even if everyone else already here is completely ignored and ends up being pushed towards crime and drastic means to survive.
So more than immigrants, the real scum seem to be the politicians who are controlled by the wealthy corporate leaders and who really seem to exclusively work for those people who will let the whole country fall into utter ruin with their policies that think of nothing but what helps that class of business people and theor businesses, even if it is not sensible or sustainable at all. Vile lobbyists and plants working for corporations and closely allied corporate blocs have seized control of governments and public policy making everywhere, seemingly across most of the world and especially the major Western Powers and English Speaking nations, and things have gotten worse daily with this group gaming the system and having every advantage to always plant their agents in power with little to no hope for grassroots type people or true and simple representatives when politics have become a celebrity game requiring constant funding and propaganda to prop up actors in place of boring accountants and farmer issues advocates like they are supposed to be.
So they are the true mismanagers draining and squandering the resources, which even now could be corrected without any further deporting.
Each of these countries need a full stop, and closing all changes, and working on fixing the picture as it is before constantly making more problems to deal with piled on top of an overwhelmed system with criminals having taken it over and bribery legalized and institutionalized.
Any number of non-predatory, random people who ideally have the least interest in representation of the populace and policy making for the populace could make for better true representatives than the specific types of people who pursue "playing the game" to position themselves wherever they can abuse power the most and make their toxic effect known most potently.
Nothing short of a complete, and more than likely (as has occurred numerous times already) less than peaceful complete revision would be necessary, only to be corrupted by the same sort of wicked, soulless, gigolos whoring themselves into making a system appropriate to their kind yet again.
People are gradually going to be pushed to increasing violence, with or without immigrant involvement or distraction, as they are just the first bunch that the powers that be like to direct people's frustration towards to avoid knocks at their doors after decades and centuries, if they get their way, of ignored letters and phone calls.
Anyway, that being said, I don't like or want immigrants or newcomers when I can't get my issues dealt with, and it especially annoys me when they are seemingly attended to with more services and concern than me! I don't care about much more than the fact that I was born here and want to be treated first, and not strangers newly introduced being cared for at my expense and resources and services and funds being diverted to them instead of me, even if they are brought in to help with constructing apartments and homes I can never afford or enter, belonging to people I'll never even know who are from totally different parts of the world I can't easily get involved with as they also keep to themselves and their own and sometimes barely feel comfortable speaking English, and othereise building and working at malls with things I can't afford, I mean what the hell is this but totally cutting me out and alienating me and making less space even that I can participate in, like taking up huge physical spaces with apartments I can't enter so they are just giant obstructions where I'm not supposed to be! They are caging me in, so f*ck them!
So, one thing that might be nice to see, is an end to those who "know" in any way how to carry, continue, and reproduce the spread of the modernist industrialist virus, which some call "capitalism". Whoever "knows" how to "run" that "system", whoever possesses that knowledge, possibly even finally also "the good ones" who know about it but are against it. If they were all somehow cut out, so that such "knowledge" would have to start from scratch again and might take some time if the knowledge was thoroughly purged, one could at least imagine what might be left or occur among those thoroughly ignorant of any real form of such understandings. I don't believe that small business owners really are the same in their computing always as big groups at the most advanced levels of economic meddling which they have left as a convoluted mystery for the ordinary masses who have no real understanding of their alien bird language spoken in ivory towers over tickers clicking over the groaning and churning furnace wheel that for us only burns our hands and faces as we are commanded to push or die until we die.
Immigrants do EVERYTHING in America Immigrant farmers play a crucial role in U.S. agriculture More than 50 percent of Farmhands are immigrants
WHO IS THE CLEANING LADY WHO CLEANS YOUR HOUSE? WHO FARMS FRUITS, VEGGIES, TOBACCO FOR YOU? WHO WORKS AT MEATPACKING PLANTS? WHO MAKES YOUR FAST FOOD? WHO WORKS FOR LESS THAN MINIMUM WAGE?
Fine, deport them all. See what happens to your economy, moron
After slave labor was inconveniently made illegal, the United States economy now relies heavily upon varieties of the "next best thing", laborers who are afraid and who don't need to be given the same pay, rights, or benefits that full citizens had fought for through unionization and protests. The other thing that corporations do is outsource work to laborers who are not given good pay or treatment in other countries outside of the U.S.
They also use extremely cheap and practically free labor from a jail system that re-enslaved ethnic populations that had only just advanced slightly regarding being released from bondage and indentured servitude and slave labor and slowly won civil rights victories to be ghettoized and criminalized and with gangs and intoxicants pumped into their society and an artificial "culture" funded and promoted to encourage everything that will increase their chances of entering the legal system to become enslaved again and forced to labor in penitentiary systems.
The immigrants should NOT continue to assist this slave state and slave economy, but should run headlong from this demonic enslaving Empire that uses taxes to fund and arm ethnic cleaning operations across the world.
So if Trump is accidentally messing up this supposedly smoothly running criminal operation, I'm hoping it may lead to improvements rather than the status quo which was a lot of people getting lower pay, not able to get normal medical attention for injuries, not having the same rights or benefits as other people who basically cost these evil corporations much more to have as workers so they avoid hiring such people altogether and opt, when they can get away with it, for the people they might not even put on their files who are forced to survive on a pittance and not given costly medical coverage or insured in the same way as they would legally be required to be or could otherwise demand were they not living in terror and serving the demonic State.
So no way am I on the side of the "democrats" either in this case, who had quietly been allowing this travesty to go on to prevent the collapse of the economy by letting this new next to slave labor evilness and abuse occur.
These people were, in their desperation and hope for more money than they might have made elsewhere, ending up helping to prop up a bunch of totally vile b*stards who are destroying the whole planet, even being the direct laborers slaving away at destructive activities commanded of them by their overlords.
No. They should run, even be forced to run, and this f*cking demonic government system terrorizing the world and destroying the planet should be ruined and replaced with something that never again falls for the tricks of these "two sides" of the same coin.
If Trump is causing problems, may he be helped in every way in creating as much disruptive havoc to the demon entity as he possibly can, whatever his intentions may be, this slave system needs to be destroyed, the prison game needs to be destroyed too, the corrupt court system where some judges are linked to profiting from incarcerating people by having ties to the big prisons they send people to as forced laborers, this is pure corruption and a conflict of interest, the politicians are legally allowed to be bribed because of people like Bolton getting an evil thing passed that says Corporations are People too! So now they can give political contributions to people who are pandering to them but who are also from the get go theor employees and agents.
Biden was a demonic monster who absolutely knew how the game works and that it is a masked slavery, and why the people on both sides are saying Trump is so foolish for interfering with the game and not seeming to understand how it works by pressuring desperate people to do all the slavish tasks instead of the people who would be much more capable of fighting for better rights for themselves and in their jobs by being citizens who further organize and then wield the power of their service or withholding it for better, where there is barely any negotiating power for desperate people who have a gun held to their head that they could be reported and deported if they refuse anything or even reveal misconduct in facilities or personal injuries, and corporations prefer those people, who they can also effortlessly replace with other desperate people, the only issue being when training is involved so that they might lose knowledgeable workers (slaves) who did their work better. Boo Hoo though. The people are being misled, yet again, and made to rally foolishly for maintaining a completely evil thing that was quietly going on all this time.
I think these nations are mismanaging everything and are not taking care of the people who are here currently at all or the situations and infrastructure, and then want to burden it more when people can barely find jobs to survive?
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So you want people to get exploited to do the jobs that no one else wants to due to extreme desperation and being in a vulnerable position, practically like the new sl*ve labor force?
The country and the politicians are mismanaging everything, not taking care of the people here, neglecting the infrastructure, and ignoring all kinds of serious situations, but people want that more people are invited in to this mismanaged hellscape in order to further burden a corrupt and broken system, when very many people are complaining that they can't even find work in order to survive?
No, I don't think every "Trump is doing something so we have to be opposite" thing is necessarily looking at what was actually happening.
These undocumented people were being exploited and could not even get proper medical care while doing jobs where injuries might even be common, they were living in such a way as to not be able to function with the same rights and protections of citizens. Obviously the nicest thing to do was to give them their full documentation and make them equal and treated equally so that they are not living in hiding and are vulnerable to abuse and exploitation, but it is not a bad thing to stop this secret sl*very that had been going on for such a long time and was keeping the nation up artificially and improperly.
The people who have their legal right to be here should be the first priority, and the burden on the system should not be made greater by inviting lots of people in, even fully legally, when the system is so broken and can barely handle anything we've got going on. All the focus should be inward and making the country much more functional, and people should not be coming to such a terrible place with such evilness and corruption and broken roads and drugged out zombies roaming everywhere. The people here now need as much help as possible, instead of spending money on harming people elsewhere in the world, all the funds have to go to making the place functional and making ways for the people legally here to be able to function and survive first.
People try to make that sound controversial? The secret exploitation of desperate people in hiding being pressured into compromised situations where they are made to do jobs no one will do without proper rights and protections is nothing at all to cheer for, it was just another way for this sl*ver hell hole to persist in its old, malicious, exploitative, cruel ways. There should be a mass exodus out, which would take off a lot of pressure from these totally broken and mismanaged areas covering the entire nation.
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Being really rough and violently displacing people and uprooting their lives isn't a nice way of going about it, but it does hopefully totally damage the secret evil that was going on.
So, I saw a very disturbing comments section full of blatant racism like I've never seen before, it is really nuts to see how bots and agents and trolls have pushed things and made it seem like the pendulum has swung back to a place where it may never have been on such a scale and so brazenly due to the way so many people can seemingly anonymously say whatever. The video above is not that video, but talks about some disturbing things people say in their also racist silliness in defending certain things causing pretty easy to calculate pressures and issues when populations more willing to be abused without saying much about it are causing an entire generation of other people to be totally overlooked while still requiring those people to survive within a system where they have no skills and things like hunting and survival in other ways in often not allowed, besides being very difficult. The squeeze is tremendous, and it is very easy to calculate how things will go and to use that as a way to manipulate population groups and to leave few options overall.
The majority of people probably do not have a very strong opinion on anything going on besides not wanting problems and trouble, and also wanting more culturally embedded and assimilated populations to get first roghts, almost like the respect an eldest child might have felt they deserve just by the order of their birth.
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This is what the "right" is saying about an incident that occurred very near where the inciting incident for the Black Lives Matter movement occurred.
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Pompey’s forces were strategically strong, but tactically weak. He had numbers and he had popular support. But his army lacked experience and coherence. His legions were newly raised. The veterans who had answered his call and returned to the colours were relatively old, and they had not had time to train, discipline, and harden the fresh recruits who made up the bulk of the rank-and-file.
As for his Eastern allies, they were a hodge-podge of variable quality who could not readily be integrated into a coherent military force. The Greek historian Appian gives a strong sense of the unmanageably polyglot nature of much of Pompey’s vast host:
Apart from Greeks, there were contingents from nearly all the peoples as you go in a circle along the coast towards the east: Thracians, Hellespontines, Bithynians, Phrygians, and Ionians; Lydians, Pamphylians, Pisidians, and Paphlagonians; the people of Cilicia, Syria, and Phoenicia; the J and the neighbouring Arabs; Cypriots, Rhodians, Cretan slingers, and various other islanders.
He also mentions the various client kings – of Galatians, Cappadocians, Armenians, and others – who came with their contingents.
This was less an army than a pageant, a durbar, a display of political power. And it is notable that when the time for battle came, most of this host of Eastern allies were excluded from the main battle-line – where their infirmity could only have weakened it wherever they took station.
Nor was this the only problem. Pompey’s camp was full of senators, most of them men of little military experience, but many with the arrogance of blue-blooded aristocrats born to wealth and power.
What they saw was Pompey’s great numbers, Caesar’s relatively few, and an enemy in flight after defeat at Dyrrhachium. So Pompey found himself accused of cowardice, or premature old age, or a desire to cling to the trappings of power, when he refused battle. Pompey eventually succumbed to this pressure, and, against his better judgement, committed himself to the very battle that was Caesar’s only chance.
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Pirates operated throughout the Mediterranean, while their fleets often formed temporary alliances with enemies of Rome, including Sertorius and Mithridates. Their power and range had increased over the past fifty years, partly because of the decline of traditional naval powers like Rhodes, while previous attempts to subdue them had been unsuccessful.[56] However, Romans routinely referred to their opponents as "pirates" or "brigands", and some historians argue it is more accurate to see them as a conventional enemy, rather than disorganised outlaws.[57]
Principally based in Cilicia, in 68 BC they raided as far as Ostia, Rome's port, and kidnapped two senators, to general outrage.[58][59] Prompted by Pompey, Aulus Gabinius, tribune of the plebs in 67 BC, proposed the Lex Gabinia de piratis persequendis, giving him a mandate for their suppression. It granted him proconsular authority for three years in any province within 50 miles of the Mediterranean, along with the power to appoint legates and significant financial resources.[60] Concerned by one man holding such wide-ranging powers, the Senate opposed the law but it was passed by the people.[61] Most of the difficulties Pompey faced came from officials who resented his authority. In Gaul, Piso hampered his recruitment efforts, while in Crete, Quintus Metellus refused to comply with his instructions.[62]
Pompey spread his forces throughout the Mediterranean to prevent the pirates escaping a Roman fleet by moving elsewhere.[63] Fifteen legates were given specific areas to patrol, while he secured the grain route to Rome. These measures won him control of the western Mediterranean in just 40 days, after which his fleets moved to the east, forcing the pirates back to their bases in Cilicia. Pompey led the decisive assault on their stronghold in Coracaesium, winning the Battle of Korakesion and concluding the war in only three months.[64]
Most of his opponents surrendered without fighting, thanks to Pompey's reputation for clemency.[48] They were granted lands in cities devastated during the Mithridatic War, notably Soli, renamed Pompeiopolis, and Dyme in Greece, with others sent to towns in Libya and Calabria. These communities retained a strong attachment to both Rome and Pompey.[65][66]
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Plutarch reports that by the end of the First Mithridatic War, pirate ships had increased to over 1,000 and had sacked or occupied at least 400 cities.[4] Below is how Appian describes them:
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In the beginning [the pirates] roamed around with a couple of small boats, worrying the inhabitants of the area as [they were] thieves. As the war went on, they became more and more numerous and built larger ships. Having big gains, they did not stop [engaging in piracy] when Mithridates was defeated and called for peace, and then withdrew [from the conquered territories]. Having lost both their livelihood and their country due to the war, having fallen into extreme misery, they used the sea instead of land-holding; at first using vessels such as the pinnaces and the hemiolias, then with biremi and triremi, which sailed in actual squads under pirate leaders who were like the generals of an army. They occupied an unfortified city. They tore down the walls of the others, captured after a regular siege, looting them. They then took the wealthiest citizens away to their hidden headquarters, holding them hostage and demanding their ransom. They scorned the appellation of thieves, describing their spoils as war prizes. They had chained artisans to do work for them, and continually bringing them materials of wood, brass and iron.
— Appian of Alexandria, Mithridatic Wars, 92.
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Fueled by their easy successes, the pirates chose not to abandon their way of life after the war; instead, they began to see themselves as kings, tyrants, and formidable armies. They believed that their unity rendered them invincible and thus embarked on constructing ships and weapons to bolster their strength. The pirates established their headquarters at Cragus in Cilicia (modern-day Coracesium), which they selected as their main anchorage and encampment. They fortified their position with towers and built fortresses, claiming control over various islands throughout the Mediterranean. The rugged coastline of Cilicia, characterized by sheer cliffs and few safe mooring points, served as an ideal base for their operations. This geographical reality led to the collective label of "Cilicians" for the pirates, despite the fact that some hailed from regions such as Syria, Cyprus, Pamphylia, Pontus, and other eastern territories.[52] Over time, their numbers swelled into the tens of thousands, spreading throughout the Mediterranean as far as the Pillars of Hercules.[18]
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Initially, he focused on the western pirate strongholds, completely subduing them within just forty days.[50] This successful campaign encompassed the Tyrrhenian Sea, Libyan Sea, Sea of Sardinia, Sea of Corsica, and the of Sicily, a feat accomplished through his relentless energy and the dedication of his lieutenants.[50][53] After concluding these initial operations, Pompey made a brief stop in Rome before heading to Brindisi. He then turned his attention to the eastern pirate strongholds, which were significantly larger in terms of numbers, ships, and armaments, indicating a more formidable challenge ahead.[50]
Some of the bands of pirates who were still free but asked for forgiveness were treated humanely [by Pompey], so much so that after their ships were seized and people handed over, no further harm was done to them; the others then had hope of being forgiven, tried to escape from the other commanders, and went to Pompey with their wives and children, surrendering to him. All these were spared, and through their help all those who were still free in their hiding places were tracked down, seized, and punished, as they knew they had committed unforgivable crimes.
— Plutarch, Life of Pompey, 27.4.
The most numerous and powerful bands of pirates had sought refuge with their families and treasures in fortified fortresses and citadels near the Taurus Mountains. They awaited Pompey's impending attack near the promontory of Coracesium in Cilicia (modern Alanya), where they initially faced defeat in battle before being besieged. Ultimately, the pirates opted to send ambassadors to the Roman proconsul, leading to their surrender along with the rebellious cities and islands under their control, which had often proven difficult to capture.[50][54] The campaign against piracy concluded in less than three months, resulting in the surrender of all pirate ships—71 captured and 306 surrendered—some of which had brass bows.[5] Over 20,000 pirates were taken prisoner, with an additional 10,000 killed during the conflict.[5] Rather than executing the captured pirates, Pompey chose to detain them, recognizing that allowing them to go free could lead to the reformation of disorganized and belligerent bands, posing a significant threat for the future.[5][7][55]
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Dang, it deleted this chunk due to an accidental click off when the keyboard suddenly and unexpectedly disappeared.
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With the destruction of Carthage, the demise of the Seleucid Empire, and Ptolemaic Egypt on the wane, there was no strong naval power left in the Mediterranean. Rome was the only major Mediterranean power left, but, being land-based, it had a reduced navy at that time and relied on hiring ships as needed. Rome protected the Tyrrhenian and Adriatic seas, on account of their proximity, with expeditions sent against the pirate bases on the Ligurian and Illyrian coast.
As a result, the pirates became consolidated and organized. The smaller communities of the Greek and African waters were left to make their own arrangements. Communities unable to fend off the pirate incursions were forced to come to an understanding with the pirates, and thus became havens.
Crete was still independent. Civil wars had devastated the land, and much of the population turned to piracy. Crete became a major haven for pirates, with its strategic position in the midst of the Mediterranean and because it did not fall under the control of any of the Mediterranean empires.
Cilicia was the other major pirate refuge. Like Crete, Cilicia enjoyed excellent natural harbours which geography rendered easily defensible. The Seleucids, who ruled over most of Cilicia, were too weak to suppress them, and Diodotus Tryphon, king of the Seleucid Empire from 142–138 BC, actually supported them, in order to strengthen his position.
Around 140 BC, Rome sent Scipio Aemilianus to assess the situation. He reported that the governments of the region were too weak or unwilling to settle the issue. Rome at this time was unwilling to spend the effort needed to reduce the Cilician pirates, perhaps because of the benefits piracy afforded the Romans (the pirates supplied the Romans with cheap slaves – captured during their raids).
Consequently, the pirates remained the only considerable naval power in the Eastern Mediterranean. They eventually had bases throughout the Mediterranean.
The piracy problem in the Mediterranean increased over the decades: A large network of pirates coordinated operations over wide areas, with large fleets. According to Cassius Dio, many years of war contributed to this. Many war fugitives joined them. Pirates were more difficult to catch or break up than bandits. The pirates pillaged coastal fields and towns. Rome was affected through shortages of imports such as grain, but the Romans did not pay proper attention to the problem. They sent out fleets when ‘they were stirred by individual reports’ and these did not achieve anything. Cassius Dio wrote that these operations caused greater distress for Rome's allies. It was thought that a war against the pirates would be big and expensive and that it was impossible to attack all the pirates at once or to drive them back everywhere. As not much was done against them, some towns were turned into pirate winter quarters and raids further inland were carried out. Many pirates settled on land in various places and relied on an informal network of mutual assistance. Towns in Italy were also attacked, including Ostia, the port of Rome: ships were burnt and there was pillaging. The pirates seized important Romans and demanded large ransoms.[1]
Plutarch also linked the worsening of the piracy problem to war and did so in more specific terms. The Third Mithridatic War (73–63 BC) against king Mithridates VI of Pontus (in modern northern Turkey) played a part in giving the pirates boldness because piracy lent itself to Mithridates’ service. This suggested that Mithridates fostered piracy as a means to weaken the Romans. Plutarch also thought that with the civil wars in Rome the Romans left the sea unguarded, which gave the pirates the confidence to lay waste islands and coastal cities in addition to attacking ships at sea. Piracy spread from its original base in Cilicia (on the southern coast of modern Turkey). The pirates also seized and ransomed some towns. Men of distinction also got involved in piracy. Plutarch claimed that pirates had more than 1,000 ships, that they captured 400 towns and plundered temples in Greece and sacred and inviolable sanctuaries, listing fourteen of them. He cited the praetors Sextilius and Bellinus and the daughter of Antonius among the important Romans who were seized for a ransom. The pirates also mocked their captives if they were Romans. Piracy spread over the whole of the Mediterranean, making it unnavigable and closed to trade. This caused scarcity of provisions.[2]
Appian attributed the escalation of piracy to Mithridates plundering the Roman province of Asia extensively in 88 BC and the rest of the First Mithridatic War (89–85 BC). The destitute people who lost their livelihood became pirates. At first, they scoured the sea with a few small boats. As the war dragged on they became more numerous and used larger ships. When the war ended piracy continued. They sailed in squadrons, besieged towns or took them by storm and plundered them, and kidnapped rich people for ransom. The ragged part of the Cilician coast became their main area for anchorage and encampment and the Crags of Cilicia (the promontory of Coracesium) became their main base. It also attracted men from Pamphylia, Pontus, Cyprus, Syria and elsewhere in the east. There were soon tens of thousands of pirates and they dominated the whole Mediterranean. They defeated some Roman naval commanders, even off the coast of Sicily. The sea became unsafe. This disrupted trade and some lands remained untilled, leading to food shortages and hunger in Rome. Eliminating such a scattered and large force from no particular country and of an intangible and lawless nature seemed a difficult task. In Appian's opinion Lucius Licinius Murena and his successor Publius Servilius Vatia Isauricus (78–74 BC) did not accomplish anything against them.[3]
Cilicia had been a haven for pirates for a long time. It was divided into two parts, Cilicia Trachaea (rugged Cilicia), a mountainous area in the west, and Cilicia Pedias (flat Cilicia) in the east by the Limonlu River. The first Roman campaign against the pirates was led by Marcus Antonius in 102 BC. Parts of Cilicia Pedias became Roman territory. Only a small part of that area became a Roman province. Publius Servilius Vatia Isauricus was given the command of fighting piracy in Cilicia in 78–74 BC. He won several naval victories off Cilicia and occupied the coasts of nearby Lycia and Pamphylia. He received his agnomen of Isaurus because he defeated the Isauri who lived in the core of the Taurus Mountains, which bordered on Cilicia. He incorporated Isauria into the province of Cilicia Pedias. However, much of Cilicia Pedias belonged to the kingdom of Armenia. Cilicia Trachea was still under the control of the pirates.[4][full citation needed]
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One of the pirates' main sources of income was slavery. Rome's economy had become dependent on slaves as Roman landowners held large plantations worked by them. Sicily was particularly notorious for its large Roman estates worked by slaves from all over the Mediterranean. When the Republic was not at war, it needed an alternative supply and so it turned to the pirates, who were Rome's most consistent supplier. That had the additional effect of powerful interest groups in Rome (mainly the business class) who lobbied for inactivity.[5]
The island of Delos became the centre of the Mediterranean slave market; other markets included those of Rhodes and Alexandria. In its heyday, 10,000 slaves passed through Delos' markets in a single day.[5] With the plantations came a harsher system of slavery and greater demand. Western Asia was the main supply and was reduced by piracy and Roman tax farmers.
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Plutarch recounts a particular custom of the Cilician pirates. When one of their prisoners called out that he was Roman, the pirates would pretend to be scared and beg for mercy. If the prisoner took the pirates' mockery in earnest, they would dress him in Greek athletic shoes and a toga so that they might not repeat the mistake. After they were satisfied mocking him, they would lower a ladder into the sea and, wishing him a fortuitous journey, invite him to step off. If the man would not go of his own accord, they would push him overboard.[13]
According to Plutarch, the Cilician pirates were the first to celebrate the mysteries of Mithras.[14] When some of them were resettled in Apulia by Pompey, they might have brought the religion with them, thus sowing the seeds of what would in the latter part of the 1st century AD blossom into Roman Mithraism.[15]
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Spanish resistance continued for some years after the English conquest, in some cases with the help of the Jamaican Maroons, but Spain never succeeded in retaking the island. The English established their main coastal town at Port Royal. Under early English rule, Jamaica became a haven of privateers, buccaneers, and occasionally outright pirates: Christopher Myngs, Edward Mansvelt, and most famously, Henry Morgan.[26]
In addition to being unable to retake their land, Spain was no longer able to provide their colonies in the New World with manufactured goods on a regular basis. The progressive irregularity of annual Spanish fleets, combined with an increasing desperation by colonies for manufactured goods, allowed Port Royal to flourish and by 1659, two hundred houses, shops, and warehouses surrounded the fort. Merchants and privateers worked together in what is now referred to as "forced trade." Merchants would sponsor trading endeavors with the Spanish while sponsoring privateers to attack Spanish ships and rob Spanish coastal towns.[27]
While the merchants most certainly had the upper hand, the privateers were an integral part of the operation. Nuala Zahedieh, a lecturer at the University of Edinburgh, wrote, "Both opponents and advocates of so-called 'forced trade' declared the town’s fortune had the dubious distinction of being founded entirely on the servicing of the privateers' needs and highly lucrative trade in prize commodities."[27] She added, "A report that the 300 men who accompanied Henry Morgan to Portobello in 1668 returned to the town with a prize to spend of at least £60 each (two or three times the usual annual plantation wage) leaves little doubt that they were right".[27]
The forced trade became almost a way of life in Port Royal. Michael Pawson and David Busseret wrote "...one way or the other nearly all the propertied inhabitants of Port Royal seem to have an interest in privateering."[28] Forced trade was rapidly making Port Royal one of the wealthiest communities in the English territories of North America, far surpassing any profit made from the production of sugarcane. Zahedieh wrote, "The Portobello raid [in 1668] alone produced plunder worth £75,000, more than seven times the annual value of the island’s sugar exports, which at Port Royal prices did not exceed £10,000 at this time."[27]
However, many successful privateers and buccaneers became integrally involved in the growing sugar industry, human trafficking, and the acquisition of large numbers of enslaved Africans. In the 1670s and 1680s, in his capacity as an owner of a large population of humans he kept enslaved, Morgan led three campaigns against the Jamaican Maroons of Juan de Serras. Morgan achieved some success against the Maroons, who withdrew further into the Blue Mountains, where they were able to stay out of the reach of Morgan and his forces.[29]
On 7 June 1692, a violent earthquake struck Port Royal. Two-thirds of the town sank into the sea immediately after the main shock.[31] According to Robert Renny in his 'An History of Jamaica' (1807): "All the wharves sunk at once, and in the space of two minutes, nine-tenths of the city were covered with water, which was raised to such a height, that it entered the uppermost rooms of the few houses which were left standing. The tops of the highest houses, were visible in the water, and surrounded by the masts of vessels, which had been sunk along with them."[32] Before the earthquake, the town consisted of 6,500 inhabitants living in about 2,000 buildings, many constructed of brick and with more than one storey, and all built on loose sand. During the shaking, the sand liquefied and the buildings, along with their occupants, appeared to flow into the sea.[33]
In the immediate aftermath of the earthquake, it was common to ascribe the destruction to divine retribution on the people of Port Royal for their sinful ways. Members of the Jamaica Council declared: "We are become by this an instance of God Almighty's severe judgement."[33] This view of the disaster was not confined to Jamaica; in Boston, the Reverend Cotton Mather said in a letter to his uncle: "Behold, an accident speaking to all our English America." After the earthquake, the town was partially rebuilt. But the colonial government was relocated to Spanish Town, which had been the capital under Spanish rule. Port Royal was devastated by a fire in 1703 and a hurricane in 1722. Most of the sea trade moved to Kingston. By the late 18th century, Port Royal was largely abandoned.[34]
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Evidence of contacts with the civilizations of Classical Antiquity—primarily with the Roman Empire, but sometimes also with other contemporaneous cultures—have been based on isolated archaeological finds in American sites that originated in the Old World. For example, the Bay of Jars in Brazil has been yielding ancient clay storage jars that resemble Roman amphorae[123] for over 150 years. It has been proposed that the origin of these jars is a Roman shipwreck, although it has also been suggested that they could be 15th- or 16th-century Spanish olive oil jars.
Archaeologist Romeo Hristov argues that a Roman ship, or the drifting of such a shipwreck to American shores, is a possible explanation for the alleged discovery of artifacts that are apparently ancient Roman in origin (such as the Tecaxic-Calixtlahuaca bearded head) in America. Hristov claims that the possibility of such an event has been made more likely by the discovery of evidence of travels by Romans to Tenerife and Lanzarote in the Canary Islands, and of a Roman settlement (from the 1st century BCE to the 4th century CE) on Lanzarote.[124]
In 1950, an Italian botanist, Domenico Casella, suggested that a depiction of a pineapple (a fruit native to the New World tropics) was represented among wall paintings of Mediterranean fruits at Pompeii. According to Wilhelmina Feemster Jashemski, this interpretation has been challenged by other botanists, who identify it as a pine cone from the umbrella pine tree, which is native to the Mediterranean area.[125] The leaves shown in the depiction (as with stone carvings from Nineveh)[126] make the pine cone identification problematic.
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Roman and other European coins have been found in the United States.[127] Jeremiah Epstein, an American anthropologist, rejected the suggestion that these coins can be cited as evidence of Pre-Columbian contact between Europe and the Americas, pointing out the lack of any pre-Columbian archaeological contexts relating to these finds, the lack of detail concerning the discoveries, and the possibility of forgery (at least two were clearly forgeries).[128]
A possible explanation for many of the ancient European coins found in the Americas is that they were carried over by modern ships, mixed in with solid ballast. Ships leaving European harbors would often take aboard sand and gravel dug from the shoreline in order to add weight and stability in the absence of cargo. Upon arrival at New World ports, these ships would dump the ballast and load up on trade goods. It is likely that this ballast, dug from the shores of ancient centers of commerce, contained small artifacts such as coins.[129]
A small terracotta sculpture of a head, with a beard and European-like features, was found in 1933 in the Toluca Valley, 72 kilometres (45 mi) southwest of Mexico City, in a burial offering under three intact floors of a pre-colonial building dated to between 1476 and 1510. The artifact has been studied by Roman art authority Bernard Andreae, director emeritus of the German Institute of Archaeology in Rome, Italy, and Austrian anthropologist Robert von Heine-Geldern, both of whom stated that the style of the artifact was compatible with small Roman sculptures of the 2nd century. If genuine and if not placed there after 1492 (the pottery found with it dates to between 1476 and 1510),[130] the find provides evidence for at least a one-time contact between the Old and New Worlds.[131]
According to Arizona State University's Michael E. Smith, a leading Mesoamerican scholar named John Paddock used to tell his classes in the years before he died that the artifact was planted as a joke by Hugo Moedano, a student who originally worked on the site. Despite speaking with individuals who knew the original discoverer (García Payón), and Moedano, Smith says he has been unable to confirm or reject this claim. Though he remains skeptical, Smith concedes he cannot rule out the possibility that the head was a genuinely buried post-Classic offering at Calixtlahuaca.[132]
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Traces of coca and nicotine which are found in some Egyptian mummies have led to speculation that Ancient Egyptians may have had contact with the New World. The initial discovery was made by a German toxicologist Svetlana Balabanova after examining the mummy of a priestess named Henut Taui. Follow-up tests on the hair shaft, which were performed in order to rule out the possibility of contamination, revealed the same results.[158]
A television show reported that examinations of numerous Sudanese mummies which were also undertaken by Balabanova mirrored what was found in the mummy of Henut Taui.[159] Balabanova suggested that the tobacco may be accounted for since it may have also been known in China and Europe, as indicated by analyses run on human remains from those respective regions. Balabanova proposed that such plants native to the general area may have developed independently, but have since gone extinct.[159] Other explanations include fraud, though curator Alfred Grimm of the Egyptian Museum in Munich disputes this.[159] Skeptical of Balabanova's findings, Rosalie David, Keeper of Egyptology at the Manchester Museum, had similar tests performed on samples which were taken from the Manchester mummy collection and she reported that two of the tissue samples and one hair sample tested positive for the presence of nicotine.[159]
However, mainstream scholars remain skeptical, and they do not see the results of these tests as proof of ancient contact between Africa and the Americas, especially because there could be Old World sources of cocaine and nicotine.[160][161] Two attempts to replicate Balabanova's findings of cocaine failed, suggesting "that either Balabanova and her associates are misinterpreting their results or that the samples of mummies tested by them have been mysteriously exposed to cocaine".[162]
A re-examination of the mummy of Ramesses II in the 1970s revealed the presence of fragments of tobacco leaves in its abdomen. This finding became a popular topic in fringe literature and the media and it was seen as proof of contact between Ancient Egypt and the New World. The investigator Maurice Bucaille noted that when the mummy was unwrapped in 1886 the abdomen was left open and "it was no longer possible to attach any importance to the presence inside the abdominal cavity of whatever material was found there, since the material could have come from the surrounding environment."[163] Following the renewed discussion of tobacco sparked by Balabanova's research and its mention in a 2000 publication by Rosalie David, a study in the journal Antiquity suggested that reports of both tobacco and cocaine in mummies "ignored their post-excavation histories" and pointed out that the mummy of Ramesses II had been moved five times between 1883 and 1975.[161]
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Pomponius Mela writes,[164] and is copied by Pliny the Elder,[165] that Quintus Caecilius Metellus Celer (died 59 BCE), proconsul in Gaul, received "several Indians" (Indi) who had been driven by a storm to the coasts of Germania as a present from a foreign king, listed by Mela, in different manuscripts, as rege Boorum/Boiorum/Botorum[166] and usually identified in recent scholarship as king of the Boii,[166][167][168] though Tausend (1999) argued that it might be corrupted name of the Goths;[169] Pliny identifies the king as the ruler of the Suebi instead:
Ultra Caspium sinum quidnam esset, ambiguum aliquamdiu fuit, idemne Oceanus an tellus infesta frigoribus sine ambitu ac sine fine proiecta. Sed praeter physicos Homerumque qui universum orbem mari circumfusum esse dixerunt, Cornelius Nepos ut recentior, auctoritate sic certior; testem autem rei Quintum Metellum Celerem adicit, eumque ita rettulisse commemorat: cum Galliae pro consule praeesset, Indos quosdam a rege Boiorum dono sibi datos; unde in eas terras devenissent requirendo cognosse, vi tempestatium ex Indicis aequoribus abreptos, emensosque quae intererant, tandem in Germaniae litora exisse. Restat ergo pelagus, sed reliqua lateris eiusdem adsiduo gelu durantur et ideo deserta sunt.[167]
For a long time it was doubtful what there was beyond the Caspian bay: whether the same Ocean, or a land infested with cold, spreading out without circumference and boundless. But, in addition to the natural Philosophers and Homer, who have said that the whole universe was surrounded by sea, Cornelius Nepos, as more recent in authority and hence more certain, is available. Moreover he adds Quintus Metellus Celer as a witness to the fact, and asserts that he related this account: that while he was in charge of the Gauls as proconsul, certain Indians were given to him by a king of the Boii as a gift; and that in inquiring whence they had arrived into these regions, he learned that, driven from Indian waters by the violence of tempests, they had passed over the seas which intervened and finally had come through onto the shores of Germany. Therefore, there remains the sea, but the remaining places of this same side are held in the grip of continual cold and hence are deserted.[164]
Both Mela and Pliny listed this incident as evidence supporting the notion that all lands of the world, including northern parts of Europe and Asia, are surrounded by Oceanus, and that it is theoretically possible to sail from India to Europe through a northern passage.[166][167]
Since Metellus Celer died just after his consulship, before he ever got to Transalpine Gaul (in the area of present-day southern France),[170] the authors accepting the historicity of the incident either date it to 62 BCE, when Celer was governing Cisalpine Gaul (in the area of present-day northern Italy),[171][166][167] or interpret texts of Mela and Pliny as garbled accounts of Celer's encounter with some Indians at an earlier date, when he served as Pompey's legate in Asia.[172][173]
Richard Hennig suggested that the castaways mentioned by Mela and Pliny were possibly American Indians.[174] Other interpretations of the incident were also proposed. Bengtson (1954), McLaughlin (2016) and Lerner (2020) argued that Celer might have encountered actual merchants from India, who reached Europe from Phasis on the Black Sea coast.[175][176][167] Other authors interpret supposed Indians as misidentified speakers of Finno-Ugric languages originating from the areas east of the Bothnian Bay[169] or Baltic Veneti.[166] An article in the Journal of the American Geographical Society of New York published in 1891 suggests that the word "Indos" is so indefinite as to be subject to speculation, and that copyist errors may have changed "Jernos" (Irish) or "Iberos" (Spaniards) to Indos.[177]
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In 2010, Sigríður Sunna Ebenesersdóttir published a genetic study showing that over 350 living Icelanders carried mitochondrial DNA of a new type, C1e, belonging to the C1 clade which was until then known only from Native American and East Asian populations. Using the deCODE genetics database, Sigríður Sunna determined that the DNA entered the Icelandic population not later than 1700, and likely several centuries earlier. However Sigríður Sunna also states that "while a Native American origin seems most likely for [this new haplogroup], an Asian or European origin cannot be ruled out".[178]
In 2014, a study discovered a new mtDNA subclade C1f from the remains of three people found in north-western Russia and dated to 7,500 years ago. It has not been detected in modern populations. The study proposed the hypothesis that the sister C1e and C1f subclades had split early from the most recent common ancestor of the C1 clade and had evolved independently, and that subclade C1e had a northern European origin. Iceland was settled by the Vikings in the 9th century and they had raided heavily into western Russia, where the sister subclade C1f is now known to have resided. They proposed that both subclades were brought to Iceland through the Vikings, and that C1e went extinct on mainland northern Europe due to population turnover and its small representation, and subclade C1f went extinct completely.[179]
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Peruvian historian José Antonio del Busto Duthurburu popularized the theory that Inca ruler Topa Inca Yupanqui may have led a maritime exploration voyage across the Pacific Ocean around 1465, eventually reaching French Polynesia and Rapa Nui (Easter Island). Different Spanish chroniclers of the 16th century recount stories told to them by Inca peoples, in which Yupanqui embarked on a sea voyage, eventually reaching two islands referred to as Nina Chumpi ("fire belt") and Hawa Chumpi ("outer belt", also spelled Avachumpi, Hahua chumpi). According to the stories, Yupanqui returned from the expedition bringing back with him black-skinned people, gold, a chair made of brass, and the skin of a horse or an animal similar to a horse. Del Busto speculated the "black-skinned people" may have been Melanesians, while the animal skin may have belonged to a Polynesian wild boar that was misidentified.[185] Critics have pointed out that Yupanqui's expedition—assuming it ever took place—could have reached the Galápagos Islands or some other part of the Americas instead of Oceania.[186]
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This video is the latest on the chaos regarding immigration and deportation in the American Empire.
Added in 3 days 18 hours 32 minutes 24 seconds:
Not all that people drain.
Added in 1 day 5 hours 30 minutes 15 seconds:
They attack people who film them too, and notice the accent on the agent, the majority of them, over half or at least a large percentage of immigration officers in all departments are Latino and Hispanic themselves, and are used to terrorize everyone, even before any of this and before Trump was ever President the first time.
