Child Pain At and Inside Our Border

This week there has been much outrage seen and heard around America over the treatment of families. Not outrage for all families, but just for those illegally entering the United States. As always, there was child pain. President Donald Trump just signed an executive order to keep together the families of those entering the US illegally.

It isn’t clear where the Americans expressing this outrage want to keep those families. The parents of these families took many risks traveling from their home country to illegally enter our country. Their aim was to quickly but illegally gain entrance to the United States. They entered illegally but not quickly and not painlessly.

What they were trying to do did not work out for them. That’s because all countries have laws against entering or staying illegally. They knew what they were doing was against the law.

I know quite a few people who live in our country who moved here from Mexico, Myanmar and other parts of the world. The people I know work hard and they are very supportive of America’s laws.

There are always penalties or repercussions for anyone who breaks the law, anywhere in the world. I would never want to see children ripped away from a mother or father. In the US when parents do something illegal they may be separated from their children.

I’m all for keeping border families together. People who leave their home country to cross our border illegally are often desperate people in search of a better place.

Not everyone who enters our country does it illegally, though. Every day of every year, people who wish to enter our country go through the proper channels, and conform with our laws. Millions of those people are now legally in America, some of them working jobs that we are told Americans no longer want. This is good for those who want to work, but very sad for our country, that Americans don’t want those jobs.

border crossing, 2014 and 2018
Border Crossing, 2014 and 2018

But now we have a problem. We have temporary responsibility for families who purposely broke our laws and are on our soil. What do we do with them now?

Shall we give them free board in full-service hotels? Should we send them to Disney World to stay at a resort property? We assume that most left third world countries where conditions were not very good. Hopefully there were no terrorists among them.

How much do those expressing outrage think we should do for people who show up and demand entrance to America?

For Americans and others who demand action of our government, there is an important question. What would you do for people showing up at your front door demanding lodging, meals and healthcare? It’s hard for most people when family shows up unannounced, but these are people you know nothing about.

Watching the television, I saw the outcries of demonstrators and media personalities. Where were their cries over how America treats our own children including unborn children? As I write this, there will be close to 3,000 legalized abortions in America. There were 652,639 legalized abortions in 2014 according to the CDC.

Each year in the United States, 7000 children are abandoned. According to media reports, there are more than 20 million orphans in China. Where is the outrage over that?

Those expressing outrage over this border situation apparently have no outrage over millions of American babies and children who spend their first five years in daycare. Nor that they are essentially raised by schools. It’s a tough day for American families trying to survive financially. We know that money, consumer items and achievements never take the place of time shared between children and families. This is easy to see in hindsight.

It is good that there are Americans who verbalise their pain about the importance of children and parents being together. It is important because that makes our society. Maybe in the future there will be some outrage over the state of American families who don’t treat their children very well.

Glenn Mollette

Dr. Glenn Mollette writes about issues that concern America. He is the author of 12 books.

His columns are read in all 50 states. He is President, Newburgh Theological Seminary, since June 2003, with over 6000 students and alumni in fifty states and over forty countries.

Humanitarian Relief

Glenn has been involved in Humanitarian relief since 1988, and he served churches from 1971 through 2010 throughout Kentucky, Ohio and Indiana.