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From: pjm@spuxll.UUCP
Newsgroups: net.poems,net.politics,net.women
Subject: Re: How to fight Communism.
Message-ID: <467@spuxll.UUCP>
Date: Fri, 11-May-84 11:22:03 EDT
Article-I.D.: spuxll.467
Posted: Fri May 11 11:22:03 1984
Date-Received: Sun, 13-May-84 08:36:13 EDT
References: <345@charm.UUCP>, <145@iwpba.UUCP>
Organization: AT&T Information Systems, South Plainfield NJ
Lines: 26



My parents were also immigrants.  I dont think they were offended at
all by the poem on the Statue of Liberty.  It is trting to describe the
US the way it was perceived by many people ie. as the land of
oppurtunity etc.  You can call that corny but many people believed it
came here and bettered their lot in life while making MANY SIGNIFICANT
contributions to their new homeland.  If you think it is a trivial
undertaking to transplant a family from a native country to one where
you dont understand the language and dont know many people then you
should talk to some first generation americans who have been through it.

I can almost guarantee that they would not be offended by being called
'wretched huddled masses' or whatever.  They wanted what America had to
offer, because, compared to it they were not too far removed from how
the poem described them.  If anyone takes offense to this, accept my
apologies.  I am sure that not everyone immigrated to this country
because of they were in desperate financial conditions.  I beleive
the VAST majority, however did.  To these people, the words of the poem
has real meaning and it is anything but offensive.

Sorry if I got carried away..

                                              Paul Maioriello
                                                 AT&T ISL
                                                spuxll!pjm