I shared with an African-American colleague about my Small Acts of Racism posts and announced “I am trying to have a racism free day! He chuckled and said, “Have you had lunch, yet?” 

Me: “No!”

Him: “Give it time!” He had a Cheshire grin plastered across his face. 

He wanted me to call today’s post, “Check yourself before you wreck yourself!” And, continued to talk about his own experiences with mistaken identity. I thought it fit with previous posts and decided against it. 

So, today I am going to talk about assimilation because I read an article over lunch about the Kashmiri crisis.  I am not going to go into the detail about the crisis because I do not know enough. However, the writer suggested that India was engaging in a policy of assimilation against an unruly dependent region. Currently, the Indian controlled Kashmiri region has been cut off from the Internet and all telephone and cell service. 

During one of my previous back-and-forths on a friend’s page in reference to the “send her back chants,” one of his followers said, “I don’t care if people come from other countries, but they need to assimilate and learn the language.” 

Assimilation is defined as “the process of adapting or adjusting to the culture of a group or nation, or the state of being so adapted.” Unfortunately, for past generations of immigrants to this country that has typically meant a loss of the cultural norms, language and customs of their home countries. For many, this distanced them and their resulting American offspring from their extended family who may have remained in their home country. 

My response to this person was to explain why the demand for assimilation of people coming from countries south of the border is a racist notion by using a science fiction reference. They didn’t appreciate that; however, sometimes I find not using hot button words like racist and racism to explain the concepts is more hospitable to someone hearing the message. Therefore, tonight’s topic: When did America become The Borg? 

For those of you who don’t know The Borg is a repetitive enemy in the Star Trek franchise beginning with Star Trek: The Next Generation. The Borg is best described as an Artificial Intelligence Collective that partially runs off of organic intelligence including humans. The Borg goes about multiple galaxies attacking innocent planets, space ships and anything else it can find simply because it thinks it has the right to because it thinks it’s way is the right way and everyone should just fall in line. It believes space is it’s domain and anyone entering it has opened themselves to become part of The Borg. Once a part of The Borg, organic creatures got a part machine “upgrade.” This was called assimilation and the “improved” creatures were given names like Six of Nine to indicate they were no longer part of their original organic line, but something altogether new. Altogether better.

The Collective is an oft-repeated plot line in Science Fiction and Fantasy. It’s like The Green in Killjoys, The Kree in the MCU franchises and like Voldemort and his Death Eaters in Harry Potter. But, what everyone can agree on in these fictional worlds is assimilation and colonization is a bad thing. It is the enemy. These fictional story lines are meant as a commentary on life. Otherwise, people would not relate to them. 

The Borg storyline gave birth to  sayings such as, “You will be assimilated” and “resistance is futile.” The Borg made simple demands with the expectation that they be followed, such as, “We are The Borg. Lower your shields and prepare to be boarded.” And, “We are The Borg. Existence as you know it is over.” Of course The Enterprise was like “Um…why would we do that? You got me all kinds of f$&ked up! Set photon torpedoes to murderous rampage!” because they felt like they had the right to go wherever they wanted without having to be assimilated into anything. They just wanted to explore where no human has gone before. Sound familiar?

If you were slow to catch the analogy, America is not The Borg. In fact, it is a nation welcoming to the “tired,  poor, huddled masses yearning to breathe free” including the “wretched refuse of teeming shores.” The poem on the Statue of Liberty goes on to say, “Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed to me, I lift my lamp beside the golden door.” At no point does it say, come in legally, learn the language and leave the best parts of where you come from behind. 

The Constitution says that this is a land for the people by the people. That includes people who live on this land, citizens and non-citizens alike. Yes, the constitution protects everybody, not just those with legal status. If this country can tolerate Boston being Irish and the Little Italy’s all over this country, then I am sure we can tolerate brown people from south of the border. 

So, when did America become The Borg? It didn’t. 

They even had Jean-Luc Picard f$&ked up!