According to Sarah Bolton in her column on Oct. 23, the 11 illegal immigrants who suffocated to death in a sealed freight car had only themselves to blame for their appalling fate. This “sad and tragic situation,” she writes, is simply the result of foolish choices on the part of the deceased. After all if “they had just followed the rules and stayed where they should have,” these unfortunates would still be alive today.

Ms. Bolton is able to make this point only because she has neglected one of the crucial elements of critical thinking: The process of looking at an issue from multiple perspectives before forming an opinion.

Perhaps she could have taken a moment to consider the immigrants’ point of view. They didn’t make the decision to board that freight car on a lark; they did it because the other options available to them seemed even worse. For these immigrants, coming to the United States legally was almost certainly not an option. In addition, they almost certainly lived in poverty. To people who are starving and worried about providing for their families, breaking some rules for the sake of a better life might seem like a worthwhile act.

At the same time, there’s the question of what these immigrants probably planned to do here — agricultural work.

American farmers rely on the cheap labor these people provide. Illegal immigrants wouldn’t cross the border if there weren’t people to hire them on the other side.

Once they get here, unfortunately, these newcomers often do not “carry on as if they were normal citizens”; they carry on as if they were members of a disenfranchised underclass, with few of the rights and benefits “normal citizens” take for granted.

Persuading would-be illegal immigrants to “follow the rules,” then, is not a valid solution. Instead, we need to address the larger problems these terrible deaths bring to our attention.

John Monroe

Assistant Professor

History