A Day Without Immigrants was supposed to show all of us born here just how important immigrants are to this country as a way to protest President Trump’s immigration policies. At Wellesley College, the Davis Museum decided to remove all works by immigrants as part of the protest:
Curators have either removed or covered 120 works of art at the liberal arts college museum as part of the ‘Art-Less project’.
One of the main artworks missing is the portrait of George Washington which was created by Adolf Ulrik Wertmüller — an immigrant who came to the US in the 1790s.
The work was also donated to the Davis Museum by an immigrant family.
Museum Director Lisa Fischman says the project illustrates the kind of loss that we would feel without the gifts of immigrant artists and immigrant collectors.
The problem is, people like Wertmüller wouldn’t be affected by Trump’s three-month moratorium on people from certain nations with ties to terrorism. After all, he was born in Sweden, and there’s no new restrictions on Swedes or pretty much anyone else from Europe.
In fact, there are no new restrictions on immigration from the vast majority of the world. Just seven of 196 (counting Taiwan) nations were affected by the executive order, about 3.6 percent of the world’s nations.
A Day Without Immigrants and the museum’s efforts aren’t addressing the reality, just the false narrative they want to pin on Trump. They obfuscate the issue by pretending all immigrants are impacted, either now or in the future.
Unsurprisingly, the protests had a harsher impact on many immigrants than anything Trump has done since his inauguration. After all, being fired for not showing up to work sure feels harsh, and it had nothing to do with who was sitting in the Oval Office.
Look, I’m not a Trump fan, but I’m spending so much time defending him from this ridiculous argument that he’s “anti-immigrant” that it’s starting to look like I’m a cheerleader of his. I’m not. However, until the social justice brigade can muster arguments against what Trump has actually done, rather than what strawman Trump has done in the dark recesses of their own imagination, I don’t see any way I can do anything but defend the man.
Protest what he’s actually done rather than what you think he might do at some point in the future despite no evidence of him wanting to do any such thing, and maybe America could have an actual conversation sometime.
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