I almost made this an Ethics Quiz, but I ultimately decided that I know the correct answer. The right course of action is clear. Derek Guy, above, and all long-time illegal immigrants who come forward to say, “I’m illegal and I’m proud” are ficks. And their candor should place them at the top of the deportation list.
I pay no attention to fashion, fashion mavens, and fashion world news, and I don’t have a lot of respect for those who do. So I was blissfully unaware of Derek Guy’s existence [“Derek Guy, also known as Menswear Guy, who is well-known on on X for his men’s fashion tips and analysis…”] and that he has been thrilling the Trump Deranged for his mockery of J.D. Vance’s and the President’s attire. Nevertheless, the completely trivial celebrity posted this screed on Twitter/X that has “gone viral,” as they say…Don’t worry, it ends eventually:
Well.
The thing is full of every rationalization, straw man, appeal to emotion and unethical spin that you and I have ever seen regarding open borders and illegal immigration. In no particular order…
1. Nobody has ever said or implied that every illegal immigrant is a criminal or a gang member. But one criminal who doesn’t belong here is one too many, and there are a lot more than one.
2. “Technically illegal” is as illegal as good old fashioned, uncomplicated illegal.
3. Illegal immigrants who were brought here as children still have a problem that it is their obligation to address as soon as they are adults.
4. Being here illegally has been a burden? Everyone has some burdens that make life difficult: Guy’s was and is within his power to fix. Many of us have burdens that we are stuck with.
5. Law enforcement has been called “inhumane” as long as it has existed, along with dog catchers and tax collectors. If illegal immigrants didn’t break our immigration laws, there would be no need for ICE.
6. Yes, yes, we know: your parents came here for a better life. Bank robbers have the same excuse. If the legal system accepts that as an excuse, the rule of law is impossible.
7. “Undocumented immigrants” is deliberate obfuscation, and anyone who uses the term is trying to deceive. Guy also neatly slips into using “immigrants” when he’s talking about illegal aliens. This renders him an unreliable messenger.
8. He repeats the canard that illegal immigrants are more law abiding that native born citizens. That’s a fake statistic that has entered the pantheon of favorite Axis lies. There is no such data, and it obviously isn’t true, but even if it were true, again, citizens who commit crimes have a right to commit them in the U.S. Illegal immigrant criminals do not. One of the latter is too many: the U.S. has millions.
9. That the immigration system needs an overhaul is not a justification for violating the law. This is like arguing that because the tax code is a mess, nobody should have to pay taxes.
10. What we are seeing in L.A. is not “non-violent resistance.”
11. The fact that past administrations have allowed the illegal immigration problem to become so intolerable that addressing it will be painful and chaotic is not a valid reason for not addressing it. The policy is not to seek to deport all of the illegals, but the justification for not deporting all of them is pragmatic rather than legal. Illegals who have been law abiding in other respects, have been in the U.S. for long periods and who have ties to the community should be at the back of the line.
12. Indeed, if Guy were to be deported now, he’d be sent to a foreign country from his perspective. That’s not ICE’s problem, nor Trump’s, nor mine. Guy allowed himself to be in that dilemma.
So Derek Guy has come out as a fick, the EA term for someone who is openly unethical and is apparently proud of being so. Now the question is what should be done about him and others, who will start popping up like mushrooms if a clear message isn’t sent, and quickly.
I would normally say that he and the others should be deported. Openly boasting about illegal immigrant status should move these ficks, if not to the head of the line, nearer to it. They are openly defying the law. They are encouraging others to do so as well. They are daring authorities to do their jobs, knowing that they have just made it more difficult and controversial. This is not good citizenship; it is irresponsible, destructive conduct from non-citizens.
Nor is boasting about law-breaking protected free speech, but I guarantee there will be “experts” who claim it is. If someone boasts of committing a felony on social media, will any sane person argue that the government would be infringing on her rights by arresting her? Yet the Axis is in full “Republicans pounce” mode, writing that Vance and Trump are preparing to deport Guy as revenge for him making fun of their ties. I guarantee that this will be the narrative—-Fascism!—if Guy gets what he deserves. I also guarantee that most Americans won’t be able to think their way through “What’s going on here?” A celebrity and “influencer” is undermining the rule of law and encouraging others to do the same. That is what is going on here, and it is unethical.
Deporting Guy would be legal, justifiable, and dumb. What should happen now is for Homeland Security and the President to draw a metaphorical line in the sand. Derek Guy didn’t know that he was asking to be deported by openly admitting that he is in the U.S. illegally. Now he will, and so should everyone else in his position. From this point on, if you proclaim yourself to be illegal and proud of it, you move to the front of the deportation line, behind the felons, rapists, gang members and the other criminals, but ahead of long-time resident illegals who have been behaving like good citizens even if they aren’t. I would put the Derek Guys in the same category as non-citizen students who disrupt college campuses.
A warning is fair and compassionate. But one warning is enough.
Ethics Alarms 
From his wiki page: ‘Guy’s avatar depicts Elliot Richardson described by him as “one of the best-dressed men in American politics ever”‘
Weird. But that’s why the photo above struck me as strange for a Vietnamese refugee of Chinese descent. It also reminded me Cary Grant.
I need an avatar.
I couldn’t find a verified photo that didn’t look like Richardson, though of course he could look like Lon Chaney in “Phantom of the Opera” and it still wouldn’t make any difference to the post.
Au contraire, mon ami. I’d say anyone “using an avatar” is ethically challented to the point of being disqualified from engaging in public discourse.
Hey now !!!!!!
“8. He repeats the canard that illegal immigrants are more law abiding that native born citizens. That’s a fake statistic that has entered the pantheon of favorite Axis lies. There is no such data, and it obviously isn’t true, but even if it were true, again, citizens who commit crimes have a right to commit them in the U.S. Illegal immigrant criminals do not. One of the latter is too many: the U.S. has millions.”
And is also not the point. No one is saying that illegal immigrants commit more crimes or are more likely to commit crimes than citizens. The argument is that some illegal immigrants commit additional crimes once they get there and that those crimes are 100% preventable – or would be if they weren’t permitted to stay here.
I would bet my left foot, however, that illegal immigrants in fact DO commit crimes more frequently than citizens. But it would be very hard to prove, just as the reverse.
If you consider using false Social Security Nos., or tax id. nos. crimes, then, I suspect, the “morally superior undocumented migrant” does, in fact, commit more crimes than that average United Stateser*.
jvb
*Ed. Note: I love Spanish. It is a lovely, beautiful, rich language. Spaniards, though, have a delicious penchant for cursing and nobody – NOBODY – curses like a Spaniard.
The Spanish speaking world, much like the English speaking world, refers to citizens of a particular country by that country’s name, right? We say French, or British/English/Irish, etc. The Spanish word for US citizens is “estadounidenses” which I translate to “United Statesers.” I love it.
I have said that. I have written that. I have implied that. Every person that enters our country illegally has broken at least one law. No, that person may not be a member of MS-13, and he/she may not be a career criminal or even an occasional breaker of the law. But that person has broken the law and being subjected to the traditional consequence for that offense – being required to leave our country – is not cruel or unfair or unusual or unprecedented. It’s justice.
This is my take as well… The opposing narrative is “If you ignore the law that 100% of them broke, they are less likely to have broken other laws”… I also doubt that to be true, but that’s really not the assignment, is it?
Googled it and AI came up with the following:
llegal entry into the United States is a federal misdemeanor under 8 U.S.C. § 1325, with a first offense potentially punishable by a fine, up to six months in prison, or both. However, re-entry after deportation, even for a misdemeanor offense, can be a felony punishable by up to two years in prison, with higher penalties possible for prior convictions.
“That’s a fake statistic that has entered the pantheon of favorite Axis lies. There is no such data, and it obviously isn’t true“
This is always the fallback retort, but I’ve never seen it cited/confirmed, either pro or con; others?
PWS
Here’s a good one:
https://www.realclearinvestigations.com/articles/2024/11/25/illegal_migrants_less_likely_to_commit_crime_guess_again_1074276.html
Thanks!
I found this at NPR (yes, I know NPR)
https://www.npr.org/2024/03/08/1237103158/immigrants-are-less-likely-to-commit-crimes-than-us-born-americans-studies-find
which led me to this, which at least is a NBER working paper
https://www.nber.org/system/files/working_papers/w31440/w31440.pdf
I’m guessing that the trope “Immigrants commit less crime than natives” implicitly is making a generalization about variations in commercially motivated street crime and “altercations of unknown origin” between young men.
Implicitly the argument assumes that there is a “baseline rate” of crime and we know what it is among natives (kind of true) , and then we also know what it is among illegal immigrants (highly doubtful). The rest is arithmetic.
Professor Philip Tetlock in works such as _Superforcasting_ has discussed the importance of estimating the “baseline rate” for phenomena of interest.
= – = – = – =
I can imagine certain situations where “immigrants commit fewer crimes” might ring true from casual inspection. The most obvious example would be in low income urban neighborhoods that transition from Black American to Hispanic, in settings such as inner city Los Angeles.
I disqualify myself from serious discussions of that issue, but you can imagine how a neighborhood might be safer and quieter with less street crime when it transitions from Black to Mexican American.
This issue is also something that Larry Elder and Steve Sailer have probably discussed. Steve Sailer, being politically incorrect, has suggested that “top of the food chain” urban elites like to importing working class Hispanic immigrants to “tip” neighborhoods from Black “Hood” to Hispanic. The neighborhoods can then be gentrified by developers who have advance knowledge of the dynamics and get in on the business plans very early.
Methinks Larry Elder got in trouble by saying that Black “South Central” LA was gradually becoming Hispanic, with Black inhabitants sometimes being driven out with targeted violence from Hispanic hot heads. Methinks that Elder, an outspoken man, has mentioned it as something that “everybody knew was going on if they were paying attention.”
News treatment of immigrant organized crime run by ethnically based syndicates is always good for sensationalistic journalism. It could be that many Americans become aware of such stories from osmosis, and then assume that immigrant crime syndicates are the norm rather than somewhat unusual, picturesque oddities.
For example, Sam Quinones book _Dreamland_ (2015) provided a portrait of the “black tar heroin” drug retailing syndicates that emerged in the last several decades in parts of the USA. It’s an intriguing book, depressing, kind of schizophrenic–half is about the opiate crisis spawned by excessively easy to get prescription pain killers, but the other half is about the business model selling black tar heroin from Mexico, making it as easy to get as ordering a pizza.
Quinones called the dealers “Xalisco Boys” because entry level drug crew members were almost invariably illegal Mexican immigrants from the town of Xalisco (with an “X”) in Nayarit State, Mexico. Their operations were discreet, flew under the radar for some time, and many dealers were simply deported when caught and charged.
charles w abbott
rochester NY
P.S.: For those who never heard of Quinones book of 2015
https://alumni.berkeley.edu/california-magazine/fall-2015-questions-of-race/opium-dreamland-reporter-sam-quinones-heroin-pills-and/
I dislike the wording of “… have a right to commit them in the U.S. …”. It should read “… have a right to [be in the US to commit them]… ” or something similar. As written, it implies that committing crimes is a right.
You have a right to commit crimes, if you are willing to be transparent and accept the punishment. It’s part of the pursuit of happiness. You don’t have a right to commit a crime and try to get away with it.
[I’m not sure I really believe that, but I’m attempting to distinguish between native criminals and illegal ones. Native is better.]
I somehow don’t see any difference between being mugged by a citizen or a non-citizen. I have still lost my wallet and am injured. Neither have a right to attack me so native is not better.
The government non-feasance is partially responsible for one, but not the other. As a citizen, I accept that I may have to cope with citizen felons. I do not accept being victimized by citizne of other nations.
That photo sure e does not resemble anyone I came across while particiapting inthe TET offensive of 1968. His story is eerilngly familair to the sotry told by that MN representaive a few dasy ago. So one of them is a plagarist.
This whole issue of course is muddled by the prupsoely eidted “illegal”, No one Iknow is oppsoed to legal imigartion, A lot of legal immigrants, i know, however are oppsoed to illegal immigration.
“Nor is boasting about law-breaking protected free speech, but I guarantee there will be “experts” who claim it is. If someone boasts of committing a felony on social media, will any sane person argue that the government would be infringing on her rights by arresting her?”
I think we agree, but this may have been worded poorly. I don’t claim to be an expert, but it seems fairly obvious that it would be first amendment protected speech, but it wouldn’t prevent an arrest. I mean, I can’t think of the exemption that one would use to argue otherwise, but if you could, please.
I think the closest you could get would be that the government acting on that speech might chill said speech and that acts as a deterrent, but I don’t think the law would actually have much of a problem disentangling that: You have to separate what they did from what they said, and so long as there weren’t additional charges or penalties stemming from that speech, people can incriminate themselves with their speech to their heart’s content… There’s even an amendment giving them the right not to do that. If they forgo that right and announce very publicly that they’ve done something illegal, that obviously doesn’t prevent prosecution.
I actually talked my way into not being sure about my post. I was going to try to explain that I’d written a whole lot more than that, and in editing it down for digestibility, that awful start to the second paragraph was born. My point was that even though enforcing the law on someone admitting they broke the law had a chilling effect on speech, the law wouldn’t be confused by that. But then I wondered if that was enough to say the speech doesn’t have first amendment protections?
I still don’t think so… Usually when we’re talking about a chilling effect, the base action is legal… Being a communist was legal, even in the 50’s when they gave the concept the term. I think that there’s an unwritten bit of sanity in the law that comprehends that the law needs to be enforced. Because my original point stands: The government still couldn’t say that admitting to a crime via Social Media is punishable in and of itself.
It sounds like his family was granted asylum in Canada. So if he were to be deported, I’d assume that is where the US would send him? Should Canadians be offended that he considers it horrible to be deported to Canada?
Billions of people would be quite happy if that could happen to them.