After watching Peter Cohn’s documentary Golden Venture, I was impressed not only by its coverage of the culminating issues of this country’s failure to produce progressive immigration reform, but also the unique perspective that chronicled the personal plight of four of the Chinese immigrants aboard the freighter.

These men humanized what has become an increasingly convoluted political, social, and economic debate. Will the influx of undocumented immigrants harm the American economy and strained job market? Topple an already-oversized population? Or in the abhorrent words of Rep. Louie Gohmert, bring “terror babies” through our democratic borders? These are all questions that have stimulated the ongoing controversy, and formed the basis of American animosity towards the 286 immigrants who arrived on the Golden Venture in 1993. Instead of this animosity being focused on the exploitative gang who sent the immigrants across the ocean, or the exploitative employers who offer immigrants jobs with excessively low wages and long hours; it is forced upon the Chinese expatriates. Cohn was able to successfully show the repercussions of this political animosity on a much more personal level in the lives of these select immigrants, who expressed impressive resilience in the face of such strong political and social adversity.

The debacle over immigration reform and the influx of undocumented immigrants is not simply polarizing political and social groups, but it is directly affecting the immigrants, and in the case of the Golden Venture, had forced a great number of the Chinese immigrants to accept deportation over their emotionally-draining incarceration. So while Cohn conveys the inherent concerns of illegal immigration, he also reveals the harrowing effects it has on the lives of the immigrants in question, to whom my sympathy is vehemently given in the context of this country’s abhorrent state of political affairs and blatant bigotry.