It is now and has been for a while, a period of considerable duress for modern day America--where our greatest threat lies no longer in Kim Jong Un’s wavering temper and throne of nukes that he so adorns himself on, but rather lies closer to home. A domestic threat that requires widespread call to action. A clean water crisis that disproportionately affects one of Michigan’s largest black communities? Global climate change that had rendered half the country too cold to step outside for more than ten minutes? The spiraling gun violence problem, where on average, 47 teens and children every day are shot in murders, assaults and police intervention (“Gun Violence Statistics” par. 1)? While these are some reasonable guesses, the media’s lack of coverage on these issues have only rendered them flittering memories of the average American’s consciousness, resulting in little to no opportunity for real change.

I would rather like to direct your attention to the mainstream media. Where news is delivered in a succinct yet entertaining way in the form of clickbait-y headline titles and brawling politicians; the mainstream media caters to drama-infused reality that truly drives Americans. Given this, the topics covered by the mainstream media are actually what are at the forefront of the average American consciousness, and therefore provide the most room for change. Looking back at this past week’s episode of “The Real Events of the United States of America,” we heard of something called a national border wall crisis where President Trump illustrated the sheer necessity for a wall to be built between the US and Mexico to stop increased gun violence at the border--a piece of information he got from “many stats” (Trump 43:17).

There is a lot of controversy surrounding this wall--whether it is the right solution or not to stop the illegal immigration. Yet, before we entertain these possible solutions, we must first find the root of this issue, and why it continues to be an issue, by looking at it from the perspective of illegal immigrants. I imagine illegal immigrants as individuals who so strongly believe in the prospect of the American Dream that they are willing to do anything to achieve it, even if it means coming here illegally. They likely think of the rich, white billionaires waltzing around as their tax cuts only grow with time, allowing their savings to grow without even having to lift a W-2 form. They think, these white people too once immigrated here without any permission from the current residents, and if they can make here, surely you can. Therefore, instead of jumping head first into building a wall, we should first address the desirability of our country that continues to perpetuate illegal immigration. A wall does not make our country less desirable, in fact, it alludes to the ‘unknown’--blocking the border from plain sight, leaving immigrants to only fantasize about what our country is like and potentially come up with visions that paint our country as even more tantalizing-ly opportunistic than it actually is. So what other way to deter foreigners than to trash our country, making it as vehemently disturbing and grotesque as possible to destroy all their phantasmagorical fantasies of life in this country and potential plans to immigrate here.

Trashing our environment is something that already comes naturally to Americans. According to science news website, Livescience, “Americans produced about 258 million tons of solid waste” in 2014, where only a little over half of the waste was disposed of in a landfill while the rest of it was artfully scattered over the nation (Bradford par. 3). While we are off to a great start of almost 50% of our trash not being disposed of properly, I aim to make that number a 100%, so it is really made apparent to outsiders how grotesque this country is. Effective immediately, I will be laying-off all those who are employed as trash collectors and instead will urge you all to dump the contents of your trash cans onto your neighborhood streets. These trash-laden streets will not only decrease the value of your home, but some of it will inevitably get caught in sewer drains, allowing for trash to contaminate the supply of groundwater used to water our crops as well contribute to killing off our fish population for the drains leading into bodies of water. As successfully demonstrated by Minneapolis in the early 20th century, before such staunch environmental regulations, many viewed rivers as opportune places to dispose of the unwanted, so by the time their pollution had travelled downstream to St. Louis, the Mississippi River had successfully been turned into “a fish-free cesspool” (Lindeke par. 5). While I understand the fear surrounding Americans losing clean water and a food source, I assure you that it is really just for show to affect foreigners’ perception of the country more so than actual Americans. By laying-off all garbage collectors as well as dismantling our entire Environmental Protection Agency, which in all fairness was never that effective, we will have saved enough money to supply each American with a lifetime supply of bottled water with left over money to invest in genetically modified foods (GMOs). GMOs do double duty. They will provide us with a safe food source while also leading to increased herbicide use to further pollute our soil. Because the herbicide-resistant gene many plants are modified with increase the herbicide-resistance of the plant’s surrounding weeds, ironically more herbicides actually have to be used to combat the surrounding weeds. As revealed in the largest study of genetically modified crops, “genetically modified crops us[ed] 28 percent more herbicides than non-adopters” (Newman par. 6). While these measures may seem drastic, I can assure they will be 100% effective in warding off immigrants from our country’s melting pot of sewer sludge and pesticides.

By living in a visually unappealing place of contrived disarray to solely the knowledge of the residents, our acts to dirty our country physically go forth to communicate a larger message to the world of institutional disarray--within the government itself. It is only through such an extreme as this that we ever are to destroy something as truly desirable as the American Dream once and for all. In her hit novel, The Life Changing Magic of Tidying Up Marie Kondo reveals that a “messy room equals a messy mind,” for it reveals a lack of care for one’s self, or on a larger scale, a lack of care for American citizens (Kondo 21). From my own experiences, I can attest to the power of a dirty room. When I go two or more weeks without cleaning my room, my mom refuses to even open up my door out of the fear of what contaminants she may find. In my concluding thought, I apologize if this was neither as succinct or drama-infused as your typical media, but I leave you to remember this slogan when all else fails: remember to reduce immigration, we have to reuse pollution tactics so we are able to recycle age-old xenophobic doctrines towards people of color.        

Works Cited

Bradford, Alina. “Pollution Facts & Types of Pollution.” Livescience.com. 27 February 2018, livescience.com/22728-pollution-facts.html. Accessed 5 March 2019.

“Key Gun Violence Statistics.” Bradycampaign.org. bradycampaign.org/key-gun-violence-statistics. Accessed 20 February 2019.

Kondo, Marie. The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up. Ten Speed Press, 14 October 2014.

Lindeke, Bill. “Remember: What Goes into Storm Sewers Goes Right into the Mississippi.” Minnpost.com. 8 May 2015, minnpost.com/cityscape/2015/05/remember-what-goes-storm-sewers-goes-right-mississippi/. Accessed 28 February 2019.

Trump, Donald. “President Trump Announces National Emergency.” Youtube, 15 February 2019, youtube.com/watch?v=iEtXjuSJcLg&t=1788s.