We Are All Global Citizens

“For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in…” (Matthew 25:35)

By Adel – PeaceMaker

January 20, 2010

The pursuit of "illegal aliens" has become a high government priority. The federal prosecutors convicted Walt Staton (A member of the group No Mas Muertes/No More Deaths) on June 4, 2009 of littering. His "littering" consisted of leaving jugs of fresh drinkable water in an area near the Mexican border for entering aliens who might otherwise have died from dehydration.

After Staton left a cache of water bottles in Arizona’s Buenos Aires Wildlife Refuge in the hope they would come in handy to any sun-stricken illegal immigrants who might pass that way, the Federal prosecutors went after him and got him convicted of — littering.

The 27-year-old graduate student was sentenced to on year probation and 300 hours of community service, and banned from the Arizona’s Buenos Aires Wildlife Refuge in which he had done his evil deeds.

”I’m not going to do any hours or pay any fine,” Staton said. “This is a matter of international human rights.”

“...my actions are better classified as ‘civil initiative.’ When a government fails to respect and protect basic human rights—or, worse, is itself a violator—it is the responsibility of citizens to act in defense of those rights,” Staton wrote.

The logic behind making it a criminal act to give someone a drink of water is deplorable. If “illegal aliens" die from thirst this will make crossing into the U.S. less attractive, and reduce the burden of policing the border.

It is clear what the next step might be: make it a criminal act to give or sell food to anybody who cannot document that they are a citizen or here with official government approval.

Where do we draw the line?

An alternative would be to regard every human being on the planet as a member of the human race and a citizen of the world. Inside the United States no matter what state we were born in, we automatically acquire state citizenship merely by moving there.

There is no reason why this system could not work at the world level.

Does anybody really want to live in a world where it is illegal to give a fellow human being a drink of water?