Just How Easy is it for Illegal Immigrants to Marry Their Way to US Citizenship

I recently came across a very interesting article about a part of the immigration debate that I often felt was probably hugely misunderstood and misinterpreted, but hadn't really taken the time to investigate. The article was written by a woman named Celia Perez-Zeeb and is sarcastically titled "By the Time I Get to Cucaracha" and it comes headlong at the issue of immigration reform by presenting another perspective to that old idea about how so many illegal immigrants marry into citizenship so easily. Perez-Zeeb makes some very interesting observations regarding how this legal shortcut toward gaining US citizenship turns out to be much more trouble than most people think. What I liked best about it was how she introduced the topic by showing not only how it is used for easy laughs as convenient plotline but how a television show that was supposed to be about not judging people based on stereotypes itself so easily opted for convenience over principle. By taking this approach, she was able to make two points for the price of one article: illustrating both how legalities involved in this process is far more complex and unaccommodating than most of us think, and also showing how taking this legal maneuver and turning it into fodder for entertainment only deepens the stereotype of the good for nothing illegal immigrant whose sole purpose in coming to America is to bypass our laws in order take advantage of our laws.

One of the more interesting observations made in the article is how society seems to be more offended by cultural stereotypes as they apply to animals than to actual human beings. She points out how the use of a chihuahua to depict Mexicans in those old Taco Bell commercial causes a greater uproar than the racist dialogue directed toward an immigrant character in the TV show Will & Grace. She is also right on target when she observes that had the racist epithets been appropriately directed toward an African-American, there would have been a tremendous outpouring of outrage.