They all faced similar discrimination. For the Irish it may have been signs with “no Irish need apply” and chastisement for drinking habits; for the Jewish it may have been the contrasting images of them being peddlers and pretentious businessmen; for the Italians, it may have been the criminal stereotype. But nevertheless, they all faced degrading criticism. They were all judged as a group for their supposed habits, right off the bat. And despite this, they all worked to find their niches in society and the economy.
They all experienced the tenement life, that dark, cramped, smelly, barely-home housing that they returned to after their back-breaking job. Or in the case of the Jewish that brought their work home with them, they never really left their job. They all experienced the unpleasant streets of this ramshackle area of the city–
–And yet–they made no ample effort to reach out to each other. It is a staggeringly upsetting idea to me is the fact that they all went through nearly the same thing, and at no point did earlier groups stop and help out the next group. Just how much did they differ when they were already living in similar areas of the city, living in similar squalid housing, working similarly taxing jobs? There are so many parallels that it is so obvious from an outsider studying the history that so much struggle could be avoided if one group were to turn around after succeeding in their battle to survive and reach out to the next group. Not to go extremely out of their way to find them jobs or something, but to at the very least put aside the discrimination and not take advantage of them. The conflict could have been avoided in exchange for some coexistence if they just attempted to cooperate.
History is not nice, of course, and people are not inherently nice if it isn’t doing anything for them. That is why this pattern is inevitably continued throughout history when the next group comes and the next group comes. Who is American? What makes an American? How much cultural differences can Americans handle? All of these become issues because by the time each group starts treading water instead of drowning it, they don’t want to take any steps back down to help anyone up, and they’re just looking forward to their own journey.
