Does National Geographic’s “Border Wars” Series Sensationalize Border Enforcement?
by Guest Contributor Ishita, originally published at Restore Fairness
The issue of long-term and comprehensive immigration reform has gained tremendous momentum over the last month. Be it progressive bloggers, faith-based groups, immigration rights activists, the White House or Congress, the buzz is that those in power must deliver a sustainable and humane solution to the immigration problem. But the disconnect between the mainstream media and the issues of immigration continues to remain challenging.
National Geographic Channel’s new reality series, “Border Wars”, is a perfect example of how the popular media tends to misconstrue the issue of immigration through a sensationalist approach to the problem. Launched on January 10th 2010, and co-produced by U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP), “Border Wars” follows agents from CBP as they go after drug trafficking, human smuggling, and undocumented migrants trying to cross the border.
The description of the show from the National Geographic website says -
The U.S.-Mexico border stretches for 2,000 miles, over mountains, through deserts and dividing cities. Each year over one million undocumented people cross this border….U.S. dollars are the answer for many poor people struggling in Mexico, Central America, and beyond….From the skilled tracker on foot to the agent able to see in the dark with special night-vision equipment, the U.S. Border Patrol faces the challenge of controlling the desert every day. In “Border Wars”, National Geographic goes inside the world of the U.S. Border Patrol with unprecedented access to the surprising world of the southern border.
On the day that it was launched, the premiere episode received the highest ratings in the history of the channel. This is not surprising considering the conspicuous usage of words such as “war” and “terrorist” in the promos, the sensationalistic imagery, and the battle hardy agents. A look at the title, the way that the promos for the show have been framed, and the description of the series all work to invoke fear and reinforce stereotypes associated with immigrants. More importantly, while the show frames the agents and the migrants through the simplistic binary of “good” and “bad,” it fails to provide any contextual information about the fact that despite the huge amounts of money that have been pumped into border enforcement, the success of border policies remains questionable. It also fails to address the fact that while drug trafficking remains a huge problem, a majority of those who attempt to cross the border do so in search for a job, and are far from posing a threat to anyone.
In a scathing critique of the show, Huffington Post writer John Carlos Frey, who denounces the ratings-hungry tactics of Border Wars, writes -
What the show fails to mention is that “raising the stakes” has deliberately and inhumanely forced migration over deadly terrain resulting in the death of thousands of migrants on U.S. soil. Conveniently, “Border Wars” also fails to mention that current border policy and security infrastructure is not working…The multi-billion dollar project was supposed to be completed in 2008 and now is scheduled for completion in 2016 if at all…Billions of dollars, tens of thousands of border guards and horribly, thousands of dead migrants later, the National Geographic Channel’s ratings darling, “Border Wars”, forgets to mention the border policy they are glorifying in their program is deliberately forcing people to cross deadly terrain and may not be “halting illegal immigration.”
The Equal Justice Society has taken a stand against the show, claiming that it works foster false impressions that are extremely dangerous in their potential to engender racism against immigrants and detract from the reality of the situation. In their critique of the show they say -
The promotions for this new show, as well as the show itself, have managed to recklessly imply that the U.S. and Mexico are at war, that the U.S.-Mexico border is a terrorism hot spot, that undocumented immigrants are the terrorists attempting to infiltrate this country, and that U.S. border agents are our soldiers ensuring national security and justice. These implications are false and dangerous. What “Border Wars” will not show you are fleeing immigrants being shot, immigrant children being separated from their families, and immigrants being forced to return to lives that include poverty, violence, and despair. That is the reality of the U.S.- Mexico border.
Worse still, the website allows viewers to participate in a simulated version of the show in which they can “play” at being a Border Patrol agent. For years, The National Geographic Channel has remained committed to intelligent and sensitive programming of shows that celebrate the beauty of our planet and the diversity of its cultures. When a channel such as this one gives up its integrity in favor of ratings and in the process, compromises the access to knowledge around an extremely sensitive topic, it is difficult not to be despondent about the future of television.
If you would like to contact National Geographic about “Border Wars” to express your disappointment and outrage, you can do so by clicking here.
(Image Credit: National Geographic.com)
Carmen Van Kerckhove is co-founder and president of
Frowner wrote:
Thank you for writing this. I don’t watch much TV and hadn’t heard of this program. How foul and immoral this is, and how reductionist. It makes me extremely angry that the people I’ve been fortunate enough to work with on immigrants’ rights/undocumented people’s rights get turned into cheap, tawdry, right-wing entertainment in the service of stupid American policy. How transparent this is–a television program designed to make viewers feel that they “know” something about the “truth” of immigration, when the whole field of such “knowledge” is just mustered in support of racist anti-immigration sentiment. It makes me tired–now at every event or protest I’ll have to deal with stupid white USians who will reiterate garbage that they’ve “learned” from this program.
Posted 02 Feb 2010 at 10:20 am ¶
Latoya Peterson wrote:
@Frowner –
It’s not just white USians, it’s Americans in general who bought into the rhetoric around immigration.
Posted 02 Feb 2010 at 10:24 am ¶
Jess wrote:
I have to agree this show is bloody stupid on the part of NatGeo. I was disappointed.
It’s in the old tradition of Cops. Ride-along stuff wasn’t a bad idea in and of itself; as a reporter it’s one of the kinds of stories you will do at least once or twice. They can be fun. They’re certainly never boring.
But this, this stuff is just awful viz. he whole issue of immigration and enforcement. It’s another macho-cop fest.
One of the dirty little secrets for a long time was that the people in the Border Patrol were there because they couldn’t get into any other law enforcement agency. They got paid less generally and since it wasn’t considered a plum agency (no prestige like the FBI) they didn’t get the best class of candidate. So what happens? You get shootings, you get people buried in the desert.
Some of that has changed — the Border Patrol certainly has bigger budgets now — but I wonder if they improved the screening any.
Also, interestingly, of the three BP cops I spoke with at length, two were from local Latino families. I spotted more in Nogales with Spanish names on the badges. I don’t know how representative that is — the sample is way too small — but I’d be interested to see how the demographics of the Border Patrol have changed over the years and if there are any stats available. Is it whiter than it used to be? More diverse? Less?
Given the demographics of the region, I’d be a bit surprised if many families that had been there more than a generation or two — even “white” families — didn’t have a Latino relative(s) somewhere. But I have no idea what the hiring patterns at USCIS have been. It would be really interesting if it turned out that BP jobs were becoming a ticket to the middle class for a lot of local Latino families (just as cops in loads of other places were such for other groups, Irish and Italians being tw0).
Posted 02 Feb 2010 at 11:35 am ¶
Slush wrote:
National Geographic should be so ashamed at being a mouthpiece for Border Patrol, an agency riddled with agents who harass, abuse, beat, and kill not only migrants but border residents throughout the region.
Posted 02 Feb 2010 at 11:44 am ¶
Gregory A. Butler wrote:
Considering the National Geographic Magazine’s long history of racism, dating back to the inception of the magazine, it’s not surprising that they’d make what amounts to a propaganda series glorifying the US CBP.
Disappointing – and angry making – but not that surprising at all.
Posted 03 Feb 2010 at 12:30 am ¶
CDF wrote:
As Jess pointed out, it’s basically “COPS” on the border. I’ve seen it a few times, but it’s not something I’d mail home about.
Posted 03 Feb 2010 at 1:03 pm ¶
RCHOUDH wrote:
And here I thought National Geographic was supposed to promote the value of education, tolerance and understanding towards others/sarcasm! This is simply a ratings ploy nothing else. I can’t help but think they want to follow the The Learning Channel’s footsteps and rely on emotions and sensationalism to get viewers to watch their supposedly “educational” shows. It’s pretty insulting of them too to think that everyone would fall for their obviously racist cues in this show. Then again they wouldn’t care what decent minded people think of this show as long as they have enough racist yahoos addicted to this!
Posted 03 Feb 2010 at 7:31 pm ¶
Mena wrote:
I don’t know, I’m a bit torn. I moved to Tucson Arizona three years ago from New York City. While before I moved here, I was on the side of the migrants, being here has shown me that the situation is more complex than both sides really believe. You have to be here to experience it. While I believe anyone who wants to put in hard work should be allowed to, I don’t think we should turn a blind eye to what’s happening.
What rarely gets in the news is the women and girls who are raped by traffickers, the fear that Tohono O’odham people have to live in now that the migrants cross through their land and the toll on the environment in a very delicate ecosystem.
It’s not so cut and dry as both sides would have you believe.
I’ve watched the show and I’d have to say that it’s not as sensationalized as they would have you believe.
Posted 03 Feb 2010 at 10:53 pm ¶
ourname wrote:
My father’s in the Border Patrol and I grew up surrounded my agents and their families. I would say that about 3/4 of the agents I know are Mexican-Americans. For many of them it’s just a job, something to do that pays decently (what other job can you do in a shit town along the border that pays 80,000 a year). People have these assumptions that the BP is made up of angry white guys. When I (pretty obviously a Latina) tell people that I’m the daughter of a BP agent, they are just freaked out and don’t know quite what to say. I haven’t seen this show but I doubt that it’s addressing the very real fact that a HUGE portion of the BP is NOT white and that there isn’t some huge racist agenda at work (at least by the agents themselves).
Posted 04 Feb 2010 at 12:59 am ¶
Monica wrote:
I live in AZ and things didn’t use to be so bad. My family used to go to California pretty regularly and we were rarely stopped at the state lines. But ever since the inception of DHS, its been a lot more difficult to travel freely, even 50 miles from the border. It doesn’t help that on the I-8 CA/AZ border there are like 3 check points to stop at. Now I try to avoid driving to CA, especially on the route to San Diego.
I have to say, as a Native woman, it’s pretty infuriating to have to be asked by Border Patrol during each and every crossing if I’m a US citizen and at times, being asked to show ID (sometimes I think I’m being singled out). The last time that happened, my white boyfriend had the gall to challenge their profiling and they weren’t pleased one bit. Our car ended up being searched for 20 minutes and they acted like THEY were the ones being inconvenienced. I’m curious to know if any other PoC undergo such treatment in the name of “national security”?
Posted 04 Feb 2010 at 1:28 am ¶
PatrickInBeijing wrote:
I posted a complaint at their channel, thanks for giving us the link to do that.
@Mena The women and girls being raped are put in danger by the Border Patrol and by the US approach to immigration. Traffickers would not have so much power if WE didn’t demonize people who cross the border. WE created the environment that leads to their abuse. The traffickers thrive in the evil spaces WE make.
In terms of damage to the land, the same thing applies. Our foolish attempts to stop humans from migrating create the conditions that force people into the least environmentally friendly areas. WE create those conditions. WE create the fear. What you see is the result of the actions of the US government acting in behalf of ALL American citizens.
Nativism and Xenophobia are no newer to the American story than Racism. They have always been used to exploit certain segments of society.
This kind of show is evil, just as “Cops” is evil, because it substitutes sensationalism for discourse. It makes me want to jump up and down and smash my head against the wall. Anyone who tears down a part of that wall is my hero.
Posted 04 Feb 2010 at 2:56 am ¶