Oh man...you do NOT want to be an illegal immigrant in Mexico.

Just read some of the stories from the South and Central Americans who end up there. It’s a nightmare of sexual abuse, theft, and even murder.
The government does nothing to protect them and many just end up locked in prison

Quite simply - they’re using it as a tool to suppress people and prevent an Arab Spring-type uprising. The goal is to keep people focused on the sacrifices the religion requires them to make, so they don’t have the time or inclination or ability to protest the ruling class siphoning money from the oil in the ground.

The US ends up deporting a huge number of the undocumented immigrants. Obama has deported a record number of undocumented immigrants. Under his presidency he deported more than any other Presidents.

They’re called refugees. Venezuela, Honduras, and El Salvador have the highest murder rates in the world. We’ve sent people back to their deaths by denying their asylum. Not figuratively, as in we put them in danger, literally, as in they died after we sent them back.

I wasn’t commenting on the larger issues of immigration and migrant workers.I’m talking about women (and children) being treated like dangerous criminals for simply existing.

They tend to enter with VISA’s and over stay which isn’t criminally prosecutable and also means that they can disappear easily. There was I believe a dude from Norway who got busted trying to renter the US via the Canadian border (his mother raised him illegally here and once he got bounced he tried to return).

“Yeah, Stockton is crazy dangerous- gangs of every color, including white supremacists, Vietnamese, etc. And one wonders, why. It’s a town surrounded by beautiful green fruit fields, an hour’s drive from snow capped peaks.”

Yup. As I said to someone else, my mom’s family is from Arkansas and they moved out to Bakersfield (well, Taft but same thing, only shittier).

I’m 40 minutes (about 25 miles) east of the County. I'd never want to be caught down Keystone way by myself day or night, and I speak with the right accent. Between the Oxy and the meth you'll get killed for your car, or your phone, or just because you might have a smoke on you.

I grew up there, and can confirm that the Asian gangs were the scariest. Mostly because the stereotype is that they pick fights and all the other gangs won’t mess with you without reason (i.e. messing with their drugs or women). I was pretty sure I was driving to my death when I took a wrong turn in south Stockton and…

They might be from Oklahoma. but not from the Midwest, as duck said.

Nothing can compare to rural poverty. I live in a dicey urban neighborhood but the schools serve free breakfast and I’ve never seen a kid without a decent winter coat—-in the hinterlands kids lose their TEETH ‘cause their folks don’t have a car to drive them to the dentist.

I was there on Tuesday and can agree with this assessment! From the general description to the eerie feeling at the gas station to the geographical location and even why people move there.

There’s an interesting subtext here that doesn’t have to do with sport. WHY have major world religions become more conservative? Pre-revolutionary Iran was pretty secular, but the revolution brought in a conservative movement. About the same time, Reagan courted and won with the help of the religious right - very…