After reading the story, as well other classmates' blog entries, I'm not so sure I agree that this is necessarily a racist story. I would agree, that as a country, we tend to think of racism as an act toward African Americans and don't really associate other oppressed or previously oppressed minority groups since slavery has always been such a shame for America. However, thinking back to a story I read in a previous english class, "The Woman Warrior," a story about the struggle of a Chinese-American girl trying to find where she belongs, relates a lot to this short. So rather than it being a racist piece, I would have to say that to me it seemed to represent more of the hardships they had to endure (that's pretty obvious). The officials were merely just doing their job. And although the lawyer seemed to want to take as much money from them as he could, don't most do that regardless of race? I would have to say so.
I used to live in Ecuador as a girl, and my parents had to show proper documentation for me, so it just seems as though it's common sense.
So what does anyone else think? Do you guys think the officials and lawyer were way off base? Do you think they were trying to take advantage of them due to their race?
I get what you're saying. The story is a sad one, but maybe this is more a problem with bureaucracy/how immigration was organized than race? Even one of the officials had said that this was his least favorite part of his job. And I too read the Woman Warrior in another class, thanks for mentioning it, I had been trying to remember its title!
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