As I look at these photos, I wonder about the people I see who have made it to America. I travel a lot and many immigrants work in the hotels where I stay.
They must think we are the most amoral people on earth. We live in such grand luxury compared to what they have endured; we are obsessed with meaningless trivialities. We don’t know this kind of suffering.
These photos are humbling. I am most grateful to have seen them.
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Many readers however, strangely are opposed to resettlement of refugees from Syria. They fear young children and women will commit terrorist acts and develop a drug trade. But that is what Trump fears refugees from central and South America will do.
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The USA needs these asylum seeking immigrant families. Our population is getting older and the baby boomers are retiring, these families will contribute to Social Security. These families are young, strong and determined to survive. They honestly will do the jobs that no one else want. Historically, the children of immigrants do very well in the fields that they choose.
We have only to look at migration to Miami, 50 years ago, to see where these cultures will be in 50 more years. The descendants of the Cuban boat people have become as “American” as anyone else in the nation and, as a whole, have done remarkably well. Miami is an exceptional US city because of the Cubans and their descendants.
We are all immigrants, except for Native Americans, and the people already here stressed over each set of newcomers. Welcome these Central American migrants and we all benefit.
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Thank you for this article and artful photographic essays by Mr. Ramos. I hope the Times publishes more of this, as it helps us understand what is happening at the border and why so many need to leave their South and Central American countries.
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The photographer missed the population explosion in Guatemala, where most of the migrants are from. In 1955, Guatemala had only 3,625,300 people. Today it has 17,577,842 with an average age of 21.
Here are comments made by Ray Suarez and those he interviewed for the 3/8/11 PBS Newshour segment titled "In Guatemala, Family Planning Clashes with Religion, Tradition”.
"Stories about the dangers of birth control are often linked to religion, where family-planning methods such as monthly pills, tubal ligation, and IUDs have long been against church teachings.”
"We will follow God's will. We believe this is natural law. And we have heard too many stories about birth control, like injections and pills that cause cancer.”
"Here, populations are overwhelmingly Mayan and overwhelmingly religious. Women typically have eight, nine, 10 children.”
Years ago, more children meant more hands to work the land. But generation after generation, farms are divided into smaller and smaller plots. There's less food to harvest. And with big families comes more mouths to feed. Nearly half the population of Guatemala suffers from chronic malnutrition.”
“ ...46 percent of children are stunted.”
"Malnourished children have 12 points less of I.Q. than a normal child. We will have a great majority of the population with diminished mental capacities.”
I wonder how much of Guatemala's problems are due to overpopulation.
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What is the disparity of wealth among the wealthiest and poorest? Is it true that large families in poor communities offer “social security” for elderly parents because their survival in old age depends upon their piecing together family meager incomes? How much of this wealth disparity rooted in its colonial history and European conquest? How did that history lead to the displacement of indigenous populations? How was ownership of lands and water resources wrested from the indigenous? How many generations of the the wealthy elites — descendants of conquistadors — used the poor to reap great fortunes for a privileged few? How has US and other European corporate interests gained huge profits from exploitation of natural resources? How are such corporate interests protected? Why has the US military often supported ruthless dictators? Why are the poor blamed?
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@ann I'll tell you how much. Zero. High birth rates are the universal and rational result of high infant morality and poverty. Birth rates invariably drop as nutrition improves and incomes increase. Until they were disrupted by the genocide, the agricultural practices of the highlands Mayans were highly productive; they are poor because they were pushed off their lands by corrupt elites eager to profit off of mines, palm oil plantations and other mega projects. These are the same elites who were installed by Washington in 1956 and propped up ever since.
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Great photos have traveled extensively in these lovely but troubled countries
Regardless of the crummy lives and corruption in Central America, the US cannot rescue all these people. They must resist the situation where they live. Bringing it here, the US, is unacceptable.
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@DENOTE MORDANT
The world’s wealthiest country, the U.S., can do more to help these countries so the need to leave is not so dire.
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@DENOTE MORDANT The United States' long and sordid history of interfering has had a role in shaping the unlivable conditions through much of Central America. So we own a part of this.
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@thomascarrigan
Fully agree. Most US citizens have no clue about this. Least of all the President of the US.
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How does one changes countries in which the executive, legislative and judicial branches are criminal and corrupt, criminal gangs rule daily life and any external impetus is likely to be countered by China, Cuba and Russia (as we see in Venezuela)?
The UN is toothless. Prisons (and police stations) are criminal universities. The only way to stop crime is by violating human rights (a la China).
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I wonder if Guatemala would have been better off had Arbenz not being overthrown? What followed Arbenz has by far not been progress and peace.
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It be nice if every American read Confessions of an Economic Hitman, just as basic background info on how the US treats rulers of "3rd world countries." The US has treated Central and South America as its private backyard for decades on end, its people and resources subject to their whim. When things backfire, they are quick to point the finger and deny any and all accountability.
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The complexities in these photos and words are so true. It’s beyond the MS13. It’s the corruption and the lack of representation from the governments. Rural Guatemalans get very little of education, water, sanitation, jobs, guarantee of land ownership from their government. Some see more aid and kindness from all of the gringo missions coming to build houses, do surgery, pray over them. Even if they are safe in the countryside from the gangs, there is no food, but going to the capital is too dangerous and precarious. Better to head north. This is survival.
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Great photojournalism by Fred Ramos. The gangs and the bloodshed are part of the usual narrative . But his documenting of the environmental decimation, while less sensational, will have longer lasting impact to those already ravaged countries.
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Every American should read this article, but do they want to know the truth?
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For many decades the US has routinely destabilized and planned or abetted coups in Latin America, always with the aim of benefiting US corporate interests, but most importantly, to destroy, if possible, any socialist oriented government.
Heaven forbid that any country might want to provide health care for all its citizens... It might make the US look bad.
In 2009, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton enabled a coup in Honduras. After the coup, activists and journalists were killed by the US supported government and violence spiked throughout the country.
You can thank Hillary for those Honduran families at the border seeking refugee status.
Ever since Daniel Ortega won the Nicaraguan election in 2006, as a Democratic Socialist the US has been working to destabilize Nicaragua... more refugees.
It is very unfortunate that the US uses its power to destroy countries, rather than working to bring out the best in countries.
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@Lucy Cooke
Read the article. Ortega is a worse dictator than Somoza was.
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GREAT WORK. I KNEW OF THE POLITICA, ECONOMIC, AND CLIMATE CHANGE EFFECT ON THE IMMIGRATION IN CENTRAL AMERICA BUT RARELY HAVE SEEN NEWS COVERING THE REAL STORY BEYOND DE GANGS NARRATIVE. THANK YOU.
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