Also a lot of people applying that legal moralism consider it not just acceptable, but laudable to try to cheat on your taxes, a pretty significant crime.
Combining qualities you oppose into theoretical groups is a common, very human fallacy, but it will poison your mind against humanity. It's the origin of tribalism.
For example, I'm a white non-religious straight liberal US man with a hippy upbringing that I value dearly, and I think the opportunity to immigrate should be as available as possible to all good people. But I also recognize that it must be responsibly controlled, and the native culture and quality of life must be prioritized (for all nations, not just the West), and one piece of that is stopping illegal immigration. And it's not unreasonable to have an opinion that we are, to some degree, failing at all the pieces.
Maybe I wasn't clear - I mean each country must prioritize its citizens and native culture (i.e. the default position of most nations). Not that they must prioritize their native-born citizens over their immigrant citizens (once they are actually full-fledged citizens). The point being that one affects the other: Bad immigration practices (bad laws, bad enforcement of good laws, etc) negatively affect citizens, but the people trying to immigrate become citizens who we are morally obligated to then prioritize equally, so it requires a balance.
You may make the argument that a country shouldn't prioritize anybody in the world, but it falls into the same category of argument as "there should be no borders". Yes, you are envisioning a beautiful world, and maybe in a few hundred or a few thousand years we will be able to get there. But each day in between we must give a shit about reality.
>But I also recognize that it must be responsibly controlled, and the native culture and quality of life must be prioritized (for all nations, not just the West), and one piece of that is stopping illegal immigration.
I agree, it's about time we prioritized natives over illegal immigrants. We should start by giving back the land we stole from them, honoring our treaties and respecting tribal sovereignty. Maybe give Mount Rushmore back to the Lakota.
Reverse the order of the crimes in that sentence and you can find that opinion in droves on HN any day of the week.
What we really ought to be ridiculing if not punishing and marginalizing is inconsistency and cognitive dissonance.
There are so many issues possible in a nation of 300+mil that we cannot form opinions on policy based on vibes and emotions, we must have principals and let them inform our opinions.
The vast majority of accusations of hypocrisy in social/political arguments are based on subjectivity in the first place. There is simply no such case where X is objectively the same as Y - or else it would be X, and not Y. You can always form an argument around the difference between the two things. Maybe it's a weak argument and the person making it is obviously engaging in a double standard - but there is no way to draw a line.
