Surprise! America Already Built The Wall

The US-Mexico border is many things: a line on a map, a setting for 'Sicario' movies, a heinous crime scene. North America's most famous border is so prominent in our minds and our hearts, it's easy to forget it's also a place most of us have never been. Do we really understand what it's like down there, or has it been misrepresented by every anti-immigration "tough guy" we see on TV? Is it really the unique migration crisis we think it is, or are other countries' borders even deadlier flashpoints? And most surprising of all: what if that potential wall that dominated the 2016 election ALREADY EXISTS, and has existed for over a decade?

On this week's episode of The Cracked Podcast, Alex Schmidt is joined by Dr. Reece Jones, a scholar who literally wrote the book on our modern violent borders. They'll draw on Dr. Jones's experiences at walled borders from Arizona to Morocco to Bangladesh (fun fact: some "fences" sure are wall-shaped!). They'll explore 230-plus years of predatory & inconsistent American migration policies. And you know those Executive Branch photo ops where Fearless Leaders examine Strong Border Walls that Make Us Stronger? Turns out they're even more full of crap than you think they are (and we say that knowing you can imagine a lot of crap).

Footnotes:

The Many Lives of Fort Moore Hill: The Shifting and Shrinking of a Los Angeles Icon (KCET)

Violent Borders: Refugees and the Right to Move by Dr. Reece Jones

Open Borders: In Defense of Free Movement (edited by Dr. Reece Jones)

Opinion: Why Democrats should support open borders (The Guardian)

Opinion: Something There Is That Doesn't Love a Wall (The New York Times)

As Chinese Exclusion Act Turns 135, Experts Point To Parallels Today (NPR Code Switch)

What to Know About the 1952 Law Invoked by President Trump's Immigration Order (TIME)

This Day In History, May 26: Coolidge signs Immigration Act of 1924 (History.com)

How the Partition of India happened - and why its effects are still felt today (The Conversation)

Defining Moments in Australian History: the White Australia policy (National Museum of Australia)

Why Google Shows Different Maps to Different Countries (On The Media)