RE: I am quickly developing a problem with immigrants.

RE: I am quickly developing a problem with immigrants. (Full Version)

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BamaD -> RE: I am quickly developing a problem with immigrants. (12/26/2013 11:09:31 AM)
quote: ORIGINAL: thompsonx quote: ORIGINAL: BamaD English is the dominate language of the US I would guess that it is dominant by probably close to 75% possibly more. That is not the issue. What is the issue is where another language, in this case spanish, begins to approach parity. Jlf lives in texas and I live in southern california where spanish is a language spoken by nearly half of the population. I have lived here most of my life and in all that time I have encountered latinos who are resistant to learning english and they amount to about five percent of all the latinos I know where as of the anglos I know who are reisitant to learning spanish they amount to about ninety percent and wholy based on pride and not on practicality. In response to that there are two major market chains in s. cal which are latino who have made a big dent in the domonance of the anglo supermarket chains. Their prices are competitive and their stores are clean, well lit and user friendly...the only thing that really distinguishes these two chains from the rest is that all of their employees are bi-lingual. I am sure that you will agree that I can be a priemium class asshole with the least amount of provication couple that with being old, hard of hearing and terminally impatient ...I shop in those two markets because I never have any problems understanding or being understood. After checking with the management it seems that that is one of the criteria of the operating principles of those stores....thus the requirement that all employees be fluent in both spanish and english facilitates that end which facilitates getting their money out of their pockets and into the stores. I have asked how many anglo employees they have and have found that they have none,,,would you hazard a guess as to why? According to the courts the lack of an ethnic group constitutes discrimination.

njlauren -> RE: I am quickly developing a problem with immigrants. (12/26/2013 11:34:24 AM)
quote: ORIGINAL: truckinslave quote: One of the reasons this has happened I think is that unlike past generations, when immigrants tended to concentrate in big cities, or maybe certain areas of certain states, it has become a lot more widespread. There's just more of it. We have the highest percentage of non-English- speaking immigrants in our history. Those immigrants are also much more likely to be from nations that have less in common with Western values..... We are being balkanized. This is a classic example of what happens when people don't read history or understand it, or read blog posts and such as 'truth'. -"We have the highest percentage of non English Speaking immigrants in our history"...really? The US has 330 million people in it, how many people in this country are non english speaking immigrants? You can't just post that as fact, and walk away from it, and assume people will believe it. Given how large the population is, unlikely.....Even if we assume that all the illegal immigrants, 13 million or so, don't speak english, and we had another 7 million on, at 20 million that would be less than 10% of the population... Now go back to the 19th century, when around the turn of the 20th century immigration from Southern and Eastern Europe was in the 1-2 million a year range, with a population that was roughly 60 million......given the flood of immigration and the size of the population, I would lay odds that a lot more people didn't speak english at any given time, the Poles, Italians, Russians, Jews from various places, you name it.......and the percentage would be lot higher. Those immigrants are also much more likely to be from nations that have less in common with Western values..... Really? So people from Mexico, Central and South America aren't part of the west? They weren't settled by European Countries, and aren't overwhelmingly Christian? So being Catholic isn't 'western values?'. If the GOP ever got its head out of its ass, they would realize that many of the people coming from central and south america have a lot more in common with their supposedly 'conservative' values than white trash like Honey Boo Boo and her family...... And let's see, Indians? Unlike yourself, I know a lot of Indians, the next town over has a large Indian population, and as far as I can tell, they might eat different food, probably are not Christian (most are Hindu, some are Moslem, many quite frankly are as irreligious as anyone else).....but other than that, I see people whose kids go to school and do well, who speak English (hate to tell you,but many Indian immigrants are more than able to speak English, even if they insist on using terms like "bugger" and stuff. ). They are family oriented, they pay taxes, buy houses, do all kinds of things..and their kids tend to become pretty americanized, judging by the parents complaining how their kids are lazy, don't want to work, want to play video games.. Chinese immigrants? Same thing. Koreans? Their parents are no bargain a lot of the time (sorry, but I have had a lot of exposure to recent Korean immigrants, both in NYC and where I live now, through my son being in music, and I have real issues with many of them, in some ways they are more racist and xenophobic then the people they cry racism at......but it is also unfair to judge all like that, either)....more importantly, I work with Chinese immigrants closely, and when we talk about kids and such, I hear the same thing I would say, and I know the kids of Asian immigrant parents, and most of them are no different than the kids of other parents...there are things I feel sad about with the pressure and such they are under, and I don't necessarily agree with what their parents do to them, but the kids turn out to be very different than their parents, same as immigrants before. Arabs/Moslems? Yep, right now they tend to live balkanized, in neighborhoods full of fellow Moslems, in many places, but the irony is missed on many of those going crazy about it. In Michigan, several of the old industrial towns with large Arab/Moslem populations used to be Polish speak havens.....more importantly, one of the things you have to remember is with all the cry about "shariah' law, the people who come to the US came here because they were escaping the effects of 'shariah' law and such......are there extremists? Yep, and it is something to be worried about. But I also work with Muslims from all over the world, and the one thing they all say is how thankful to have the US, where whatever the flaws, they can live as they wish, and not have Muslims killing Hindus, Hindus killing Muslims, Christians and Muslims fighting...most of those people came to the US to get away from the bullshit, not enforce it hear. Every time I hear about "Shariah law", it is usually some redneck complaining because banks have Sharia compliant loans and such.....and any time a judge has tried to say that Sharian law, like with divorces, outweights civil law, they have been reprimanded and their decisions overturned.. Balkanized? I think that is more a sign of the people who feel that, who lived in this world where Whites always ruled, where blacks had their place, where 'model minorities' like Asians were okay as long as they lived in their own places or were limited numbers, but talk to people who live in areas, cities and suburbs where immigrants were part of the picture, and most of them are puzzled. A Korean businessman who puts out signs only for Koreans and only wants to deal with Koreans is a fool, a store where everyone speaks only spanish isn't going to last more than a generation or so, because once the immigrant 'ghettos' break up, they will suffer. There was idiocy, there is no doubt, like government agenices going so head over heels for example, to have spanish speaking employees that there were documented cases where they literally had employees who could speak spanish, chinese, tagalog and other languages, but had no one who could speak English well (there was a big stink in NY about it, after it hit the news and such about 20 years ago), and bilingual employees now are supposed to be truly bi or tri lingual or polylingual, and it can't be "I speak chinese fluently, but my English is broken). Pick up a history book, and you saw the WASPS saying the same thing about the Irish and Italians, that they were bringing 'foreign' values (ie being Catholic), how they were going to destroy "the native culture".......when today other than maybe some backwoods hillbillies with no teeth, or maybe some evangeiicals, few would look at Italian or Irish immigrants having 'destroyed' the country..... Are there issues with immigration? Yes, there are, issues that need to be addressed. In some places, misguided attemtps at 'bilingual education' have turned out kids who by the time they graduate, have taken all their courses in their native language and have issues with English, which is ridiculous. There are some immigrants who are muslim who have radical ideas that need to be tempered or watched, and if someone tries to make law based on Sharia law, they need to be shot down (on the other hand, it is also blatently hypocritical when those who are so anti muslim, who cry about "shariah law', are the same jerk off "christians" who claim Christian teaching should be law, as is true for example with same sex marriage, whose opposition is entirely based on religion; and take note, there are about 30 million americans who claim to subscribe to Christian dominionism, that says biblical law should be higher than civil law........). There are real issues with floods of immigration, like how to pay for services and such for the immigrants and their children, which is costly (in the long run, immigration generates a lot more than it costs, but it doesn't solve the short term problems). One of the real problems I have with this post is that 'common american culture' has always changed, the people in Middle America who believe it has stayed the same for 200 years, that we were a land of God fearing, Good christians, who loved each other, etc, etc, is basically myth, a fantasy, as is the idea that small town america was always this virtuous place that produced so much, it is basically bullshit. Immigrants shaped US culture, not just in food, but in the way we do things, and while it never really was a 'melting pot' per se (that usually translated into 'you better imitate the way I live, or I'll burn your house down), but rather it kind of is a stew that constantly changes. More importantly, in the long run, while it changes, it also isn't ruined by any group, it isn't 'lost'.....sorry to say, but a lot of those moaning about the 'good ole days' either don't know what it was like, or actually are still pissed off that Jim Crow was banished or that white, Christian men no longer can assume to be in control of everything...

njlauren -> RE: I am quickly developing a problem with immigrants. (12/26/2013 11:52:37 AM)
quote: ORIGINAL: jlf1961 First of all, let me explain, I was born in Arizona, Chandler AFB to be exact, then we were transferred to Germany. So for the first years of my life I was speaking English and German, and would switch between the two without thinking. I did not take Spanish in school, because quite frankly, I didnt want to, and at the time, I rarely met anyone any where that did not have a very good use of the English language. I have met immigrants from Europe and Asia that seem to make a point to learn English. My problem is the individuals who do not want to learn English and expect to be understood in a predominately English speaking country. I am not talking about the second or third generation to be in this country either. Jif- but the point is, we should be concerned about the 2nd and 3rd generation,because that is the future., if they aren't learning English, it is a problem... My grandparents immigrated from Italy, my dad came here when he was 8..my grandparents lived in areas where there were a lot of fellow Italians, my grandfather was a stone mason which was mostly Italians at the time.....neither of my grandparents really learned to speak English. On the other hand my father and his brother spoke Italian at home, but all of them spoke English perfectly (well, okay, for kids from the Bronx, anyway). The next generation was as "American" as you could wish.... And yeah, there are areas like in Flushing in NYC where you can walk down the street and think English is unknown, signs are in Chinese or Korean (interestingly, stores owned by Indians have signs in English and whatever Indian language they use), there are places near where I live where signs and people talking are in Spanish...but again, this has always been true of first generation immigrants, many of them never really learn the language, but their kids and grandkids are native speakers. The Chicanos in LA, so feared back in the 1930's and 40's, have descendants today who are middle and upper income (or more), who probably are complaining about the 'recent immigrants" too..... Every study I have seen says the same thing, that by the next generation the kids have come into their own, that with the exceptions of recent Mexican immigrants, the same pattern is being repeated (with Mexicans, it is that the rate of English speakers in the next generation is lower than other groups, but is still significant). I have no problem with stores that are bi lingual, and having people who can speak other languages is a great idea; likewise, if a supermarket chain requires employees to be bi lingual that is fine, as long as they don't say 'you have to be bi lingual and white, hispanic, asian, etc....)..the skill is not discriminatory, race or ethnicity would be. My dad as a teen worked for a store owner because he spoke Italian, which allowed him to deal with the customers whose english wasn't great; he had a badly needed job during the depression, the store owner got the help he needed....

njlauren -> RE: I am quickly developing a problem with immigrants. (12/26/2013 11:57:55 AM)
quote: ORIGINAL: BamaD quote: ORIGINAL: thompsonx quote: ORIGINAL: BamaD English is the dominate language of the US I would guess that it is dominant by probably close to 75% possibly more. That is not the issue. What is the issue is where another language, in this case spanish, begins to approach parity. Jlf lives in texas and I live in southern california where spanish is a language spoken by nearly half of the population. I have lived here most of my life and in all that time I have encountered latinos who are resistant to learning english and they amount to about five percent of all the latinos I know where as of the anglos I know who are reisitant to learning spanish they amount to about ninety percent and wholy based on pride and not on practicality. In response to that there are two major market chains in s. cal which are latino who have made a big dent in the domonance of the anglo supermarket chains. Their prices are competitive and their stores are clean, well lit and user friendly...the only thing that really distinguishes these two chains from the rest is that all of their employees are bi-lingual. I am sure that you will agree that I can be a priemium class asshole with the least amount of provication couple that with being old, hard of hearing and terminally impatient ...I shop in those two markets because I never have any problems understanding or being understood. After checking with the management it seems that that is one of the criteria of the operating principles of those stores....thus the requirement that all employees be fluent in both spanish and english facilitates that end which facilitates getting their money out of their pockets and into the stores. I have asked how many anglo employees they have and have found that they have none,,,would you hazard a guess as to why? According to the courts the lack of an ethnic group constitutes discrimination. That isn't true. What the courts have ruled is that hiring based on ethnicity is illegal discrimination, but if hiring is based on relevant skill set, it is not. So in the example, if a store requires someone to be able to speak spanish and english, if someone applies who is Asian who can't speak Spanish, it is not discrimination, as would not hiring a Hispanic who didn't know how to program in Java when the job required a skilled Java programmer, would not be illegal. The days of quotas in terms of hiring are long gone, you can't argue that 10% of the population is Hispanic, so 10% of your hires have to be hispanic, when there isn't the pool with the qualifications required in the area. If the store refused to hire a white person who spoke spanish, they would have a case, assuming that there wasn't another legal reason not to hire the person (for example, a prison record).

njlauren -> RE: I am quickly developing a problem with immigrants. (12/26/2013 12:12:47 PM)
I think there are two different threads going on here, one about immigrants not learning the language, the other about the utility of multiple languages. In terms of immigration, I think it is way overblown about not wanting to learn english, I think people are seeing first generation immigrants for the first time, and assume they don't want to learn english, or more importantly, assume it was different than prior generations. In prior generations of immigrants, read history, read stories, and what do you find? That immigrants tended to live in areas with people who came from the same place. Jews from Eastern Europe tended to end up on the lower east side or in Williamsburg, among people who spoke the same language(s) (Russian, more likely Yiddish). Italians ended up in places like the lower east side, or little italy or in areas of Brooklyn or the Bronx, where they would in effect 'recreate' the old country to a certain extent......and many didn't really have to learn english well, because they often worked in trades with people like themselves, like in the garment trade or construction.....some, many, did of course get to be fluent, but many didn't, and I saw that, being the grandkid of immigrants and my dad being immigrant as well. I think a lot of it is part and parcel to realizing that whites no longer will be a majority, and can't assume things will be as they were, despite the GOP fighting a rearguard action to try and maintain that power, it doesn't work forever, can't. There are issues with floods of immigration, about handling the immigrants, about jobs and so forth, and also about how with anti immigrant fever there is a two edged thing going on, since employers benefit greatly by illegal immigration, since they can pay the workers peanuts, screw them out of wages and not worry (anyone notice how the immigration laws the GOP puts up refuse to have massive penalties for the employers who hire them?). To people who have been around immigration for a long time, this isn't a big deal, but in places where immigration has turned whitebread middle america into something different, it is scary as hell..... The other part, about learning languages, should be a no brainer, some of the most productive countries around, like Switzerland, have people speaking 4 and 5 languages, and in a globalized world makes sense, plus is good for the kids brains, too, it is like learning music and other things, have intrinsic value beyond 'practicality'. The reality is that English is not going anywhere, despite what the Chinese think, English is still a dominant lingua franca around the world, it is the recognized language of global finance, technology industry, and is the most spoken language as a first or second language last I checked (Chinese will probably never become dominant I suspect, in part because there isn't one spoken Chinese per se, even with attempts to make Mandarin a standard, and also because of the limitations of the Chinese written language, plus I don't think China is going to become the center of global technology or science, either, for a lot of reasons). I think we should have a multi lingual country, but we also need to recognize that English is going to be the common thread, and I don't think mandating English and Spanish makes any sense (why not English and Mandarin Chinese? Why not English and Hindi?), even in Canada it is not really dual language, despite the fact they teach french and english, lot of people from the French areas don't speak English, lot of English speaking Canadians don't speak French shrug.....

BamaD -> RE: I am quickly developing a problem with immigrants. (12/26/2013 12:49:04 PM)
quote: ORIGINAL: njlauren quote: ORIGINAL: BamaD quote: ORIGINAL: thompsonx quote: ORIGINAL: BamaD English is the dominate language of the US I would guess that it is dominant by probably close to 75% possibly more. That is not the issue. What is the issue is where another language, in this case spanish, begins to approach parity. Jlf lives in texas and I live in southern california where spanish is a language spoken by nearly half of the population. I have lived here most of my life and in all that time I have encountered latinos who are resistant to learning english and they amount to about five percent of all the latinos I know where as of the anglos I know who are reisitant to learning spanish they amount to about ninety percent and wholy based on pride and not on practicality. In response to that there are two major market chains in s. cal which are latino who have made a big dent in the domonance of the anglo supermarket chains. Their prices are competitive and their stores are clean, well lit and user friendly...the only thing that really distinguishes these two chains from the rest is that all of their employees are bi-lingual. I am sure that you will agree that I can be a priemium class asshole with the least amount of provication couple that with being old, hard of hearing and terminally impatient ...I shop in those two markets because I never have any problems understanding or being understood. After checking with the management it seems that that is one of the criteria of the operating principles of those stores....thus the requirement that all employees be fluent in both spanish and english facilitates that end which facilitates getting their money out of their pockets and into the stores. I have asked how many anglo employees they have and have found that they have none,,,would you hazard a guess as to why? According to the courts the lack of an ethnic group constitutes discrimination. That isn't true. What the courts have ruled is that hiring based on ethnicity is illegal discrimination, but if hiring is based on relevant skill set, it is not. So in the example, if a store requires someone to be able to speak spanish and english, if someone applies who is Asian who can't speak Spanish, it is not discrimination, as would not hiring a Hispanic who didn't know how to program in Java when the job required a skilled Java programmer, would not be illegal. The days of quotas in terms of hiring are long gone, you can't argue that 10% of the population is Hispanic, so 10% of your hires have to be hispanic, when there isn't the pool with the qualifications required in the area. If the store refused to hire a white person who spoke spanish, they would have a case, assuming that there wasn't another legal reason not to hire the person (for example, a prison record). Yes it is true. The college I went to lost a discrimination suit because only 4% of the student body was white. They have to allow whites who graduated from a Al high school in free until that number exceeds 10%. It has been a decade and they haven't made the goal yet.

BamaD -> RE: I am quickly developing a problem with immigrants. (12/26/2013 12:51:45 PM)
quote: ORIGINAL: njlauren I think there are two different threads going on here, one about immigrants not learning the language, the other about the utility of multiple languages. In terms of immigration, I think it is way overblown about not wanting to learn english, I think people are seeing first generation immigrants for the first time, and assume they don't want to learn english, or more importantly, assume it was different than prior generations. In prior generations of immigrants, read history, read stories, and what do you find? That immigrants tended to live in areas with people who came from the same place. Jews from Eastern Europe tended to end up on the lower east side or in Williamsburg, among people who spoke the same language(s) (Russian, more likely Yiddish). Italians ended up in places like the lower east side, or little italy or in areas of Brooklyn or the Bronx, where they would in effect 'recreate' the old country to a certain extent......and many didn't really have to learn english well, because they often worked in trades with people like themselves, like in the garment trade or construction.....some, many, did of course get to be fluent, but many didn't, and I saw that, being the grandkid of immigrants and my dad being immigrant as well. I think a lot of it is part and parcel to realizing that whites no longer will be a majority, and can't assume things will be as they were, despite the GOP fighting a rearguard action to try and maintain that power, it doesn't work forever, can't. There are issues with floods of immigration, about handling the immigrants, about jobs and so forth, and also about how with anti immigrant fever there is a two edged thing going on, since employers benefit greatly by illegal immigration, since they can pay the workers peanuts, screw them out of wages and not worry (anyone notice how the immigration laws the GOP puts up refuse to have massive penalties for the employers who hire them?). To people who have been around immigration for a long time, this isn't a big deal, but in places where immigration has turned whitebread middle america into something different, it is scary as hell..... The other part, about learning languages, should be a no brainer, some of the most productive countries around, like Switzerland, have people speaking 4 and 5 languages, and in a globalized world makes sense, plus is good for the kids brains, too, it is like learning music and other things, have intrinsic value beyond 'practicality'. The reality is that English is not going anywhere, despite what the Chinese think, English is still a dominant lingua franca around the world, it is the recognized language of global finance, technology industry, and is the most spoken language as a first or second language last I checked (Chinese will probably never become dominant I suspect, in part because there isn't one spoken Chinese per se, even with attempts to make Mandarin a standard, and also because of the limitations of the Chinese written language, plus I don't think China is going to become the center of global technology or science, either, for a lot of reasons). I think we should have a multi lingual country, but we also need to recognize that English is going to be the common thread, and I don't think mandating English and Spanish makes any sense (why not English and Mandarin Chinese? Why not English and Hindi?), even in Canada it is not really dual language, despite the fact they teach french and english, lot of people from the French areas don't speak English, lot of English speaking Canadians don't speak French shrug..... Both are no brainers. Everything you learn helps you, languages more than most. Language is a unifying force in society. multiple equal languages is balkanizing.

EdBowie -> RE: I am quickly developing a problem with immigrants. (12/26/2013 1:22:37 PM)
Don't try to put this back on me, you got caught making something up, either admit that I never said that, or keep getting called on it. (Or run away, as is most likely). quote: ORIGINAL: crazyml How is your little "reading for understanding" project going? <snort>

njlauren -> RE: I am quickly developing a problem with immigrants. (12/26/2013 1:24:32 PM)
quote: ORIGINAL: BamaD quote: ORIGINAL: njlauren quote: ORIGINAL: BamaD quote: ORIGINAL: thompsonx quote: ORIGINAL: BamaD English is the dominate language of the US I would guess that it is dominant by probably close to 75% possibly more. That is not the issue. What is the issue is where another language, in this case spanish, begins to approach parity. Jlf lives in texas and I live in southern california where spanish is a language spoken by nearly half of the population. I have lived here most of my life and in all that time I have encountered latinos who are resistant to learning english and they amount to about five percent of all the latinos I know where as of the anglos I know who are reisitant to learning spanish they amount to about ninety percent and wholy based on pride and not on practicality. In response to that there are two major market chains in s. cal which are latino who have made a big dent in the domonance of the anglo supermarket chains. Their prices are competitive and their stores are clean, well lit and user friendly...the only thing that really distinguishes these two chains from the rest is that all of their employees are bi-lingual. I am sure that you will agree that I can be a priemium class asshole with the least amount of provication couple that with being old, hard of hearing and terminally impatient ...I shop in those two markets because I never have any problems understanding or being understood. After checking with the management it seems that that is one of the criteria of the operating principles of those stores....thus the requirement that all employees be fluent in both spanish and english facilitates that end which facilitates getting their money out of their pockets and into the stores. I have asked how many anglo employees they have and have found that they have none,,,would you hazard a guess as to why? According to the courts the lack of an ethnic group constitutes discrimination. That isn't true. What the courts have ruled is that hiring based on ethnicity is illegal discrimination, but if hiring is based on relevant skill set, it is not. So in the example, if a store requires someone to be able to speak spanish and english, if someone applies who is Asian who can't speak Spanish, it is not discrimination, as would not hiring a Hispanic who didn't know how to program in Java when the job required a skilled Java programmer, would not be illegal. The days of quotas in terms of hiring are long gone, you can't argue that 10% of the population is Hispanic, so 10% of your hires have to be hispanic, when there isn't the pool with the qualifications required in the area. If the store refused to hire a white person who spoke spanish, they would have a case, assuming that there wasn't another legal reason not to hire the person (for example, a prison record). Yes it is true. The college I went to lost a discrimination suit because only 4% of the student body was white. They have to allow whites who graduated from a Al high school in free until that number exceeds 10%. It has been a decade and they haven't made the goal yet. You are leaving a lot out of this, not surprisingly. In the case of the college, the logic was that the population was only 4% white, and that there was no reason why it should be so low, and that is the key reasoning here. With a college, if it was a commuter school (no dorms) and the surrounding area was predominantly non white, that decision would probably not have happened, because the school is a commuter school (again, this is a hypothetical). If the college had dorms and drew students from all over, then there could be no argument for having so few whites, because they could recruit from all over. The difference between illegal discrimination and legal discrimination is based in cause; if the cause is those running the school don't want any of 'those 'people there, it is illegal, if it is because of issues of qualification or in this example, ability to draw people of that type is difficult, it would not be. It would be like a firm hiring a solid state physicist with a PHd, and being censored because blacks make up 13% of the population, and of the 10 PHD's they hire, none are black; meanwhile, in reality, the number of PHd's in solid state physics makes it so there are very few blacks with the qualifications for the job (heck, very few, period), the nature of the qualifications and the nature of the school system and such make it so the distribution is not uniform. On the other hand, if a candidate who was black came in, had a PHd in solid state physics, and was turned away without an interview, then it would raise eyebrows.

njlauren -> RE: I am quickly developing a problem with immigrants. (12/26/2013 1:31:46 PM)
quote: ORIGINAL: BamaD quote: ORIGINAL: njlauren I think there are two different threads going on here, one about immigrants not learning the language, the other about the utility of multiple languages. In terms of immigration, I think it is way overblown about not wanting to learn english, I think people are seeing first generation immigrants for the first time, and assume they don't want to learn english, or more importantly, assume it was different than prior generations. In prior generations of immigrants, read history, read stories, and what do you find? That immigrants tended to live in areas with people who came from the same place. Jews from Eastern Europe tended to end up on the lower east side or in Williamsburg, among people who spoke the same language(s) (Russian, more likely Yiddish). Italians ended up in places like the lower east side, or little italy or in areas of Brooklyn or the Bronx, where they would in effect 'recreate' the old country to a certain extent......and many didn't really have to learn english well, because they often worked in trades with people like themselves, like in the garment trade or construction.....some, many, did of course get to be fluent, but many didn't, and I saw that, being the grandkid of immigrants and my dad being immigrant as well. I think a lot of it is part and parcel to realizing that whites no longer will be a majority, and can't assume things will be as they were, despite the GOP fighting a rearguard action to try and maintain that power, it doesn't work forever, can't. There are issues with floods of immigration, about handling the immigrants, about jobs and so forth, and also about how with anti immigrant fever there is a two edged thing going on, since employers benefit greatly by illegal immigration, since they can pay the workers peanuts, screw them out of wages and not worry (anyone notice how the immigration laws the GOP puts up refuse to have massive penalties for the employers who hire them?). To people who have been around immigration for a long time, this isn't a big deal, but in places where immigration has turned whitebread middle america into something different, it is scary as hell..... The other part, about learning languages, should be a no brainer, some of the most productive countries around, like Switzerland, have people speaking 4 and 5 languages, and in a globalized world makes sense, plus is good for the kids brains, too, it is like learning music and other things, have intrinsic value beyond 'practicality'. The reality is that English is not going anywhere, despite what the Chinese think, English is still a dominant lingua franca around the world, it is the recognized language of global finance, technology industry, and is the most spoken language as a first or second language last I checked (Chinese will probably never become dominant I suspect, in part because there isn't one spoken Chinese per se, even with attempts to make Mandarin a standard, and also because of the limitations of the Chinese written language, plus I don't think China is going to become the center of global technology or science, either, for a lot of reasons). I think we should have a multi lingual country, but we also need to recognize that English is going to be the common thread, and I don't think mandating English and Spanish makes any sense (why not English and Mandarin Chinese? Why not English and Hindi?), even in Canada it is not really dual language, despite the fact they teach french and english, lot of people from the French areas don't speak English, lot of English speaking Canadians don't speak French shrug..... Both are no brainers. Everything you learn helps you, languages more than most. Language is a unifying force in society. multiple equal languages is balkanizing. Which raises the question, how do you define "equal" languages? English is the dominant language in this country, and it isn't going anywhere. Yeah, you have 'dial 1 for english', you have ATM's with multiple languages, there are cable channels in Korean, Chinese, Spanish, etc, but if you look at the 600+ channels on a cable station, less than 10% are foreign language. Government documents will often reflect the makeup of the local population, but it varies, with the one constant, English is the common language. The other thing about balkanization is few are trying to do that. A friend of mine had been a teacher in the NYC schools, and she said that when they started the so called 'bilingual' education program, a lot of the parents from spanish speaking homes complained and didn't want there kids in them, while it was white, liberal 'education experts' who pushed for it.....the real problem with that kind of bilingual education it turned from being a way for kids not speaking english to keep up with core subjects while learning english then tracking back into english language classes in the core subjects, became a program where the kids continued to learn all subjects in their native language......but that also has led to reforms, as well, even in NYC where the morons from Columbia school of education and such bolloxed up things, and it has changed. Having multiple languages does not change the reality, nor will it, that English is the common language, whether spoken as a first or second language. Hang out a couple of years, and a lot of people who press "2" for spanish will be pressing "1" for english.

BamaD -> RE: I am quickly developing a problem with immigrants. (12/26/2013 1:38:09 PM)
quote: ORIGINAL: njlauren quote: ORIGINAL: BamaD quote: ORIGINAL: njlauren quote: ORIGINAL: BamaD quote: ORIGINAL: thompsonx quote: ORIGINAL: BamaD English is the dominate language of the US I would guess that it is dominant by probably close to 75% possibly more. That is not the issue. What is the issue is where another language, in this case spanish, begins to approach parity. Jlf lives in texas and I live in southern california where spanish is a language spoken by nearly half of the population. I have lived here most of my life and in all that time I have encountered latinos who are resistant to learning english and they amount to about five percent of all the latinos I know where as of the anglos I know who are reisitant to learning spanish they amount to about ninety percent and wholy based on pride and not on practicality. In response to that there are two major market chains in s. cal which are latino who have made a big dent in the domonance of the anglo supermarket chains. Their prices are competitive and their stores are clean, well lit and user friendly...the only thing that really distinguishes these two chains from the rest is that all of their employees are bi-lingual. I am sure that you will agree that I can be a priemium class asshole with the least amount of provication couple that with being old, hard of hearing and terminally impatient ...I shop in those two markets because I never have any problems understanding or being understood. After checking with the management it seems that that is one of the criteria of the operating principles of those stores....thus the requirement that all employees be fluent in both spanish and english facilitates that end which facilitates getting their money out of their pockets and into the stores. I have asked how many anglo employees they have and have found that they have none,,,would you hazard a guess as to why? According to the courts the lack of an ethnic group constitutes discrimination. That isn't true. What the courts have ruled is that hiring based on ethnicity is illegal discrimination, but if hiring is based on relevant skill set, it is not. So in the example, if a store requires someone to be able to speak spanish and english, if someone applies who is Asian who can't speak Spanish, it is not discrimination, as would not hiring a Hispanic who didn't know how to program in Java when the job required a skilled Java programmer, would not be illegal. The days of quotas in terms of hiring are long gone, you can't argue that 10% of the population is Hispanic, so 10% of your hires have to be hispanic, when there isn't the pool with the qualifications required in the area. If the store refused to hire a white person who spoke spanish, they would have a case, assuming that there wasn't another legal reason not to hire the person (for example, a prison record). Yes it is true. The college I went to lost a discrimination suit because only 4% of the student body was white. They have to allow whites who graduated from a Al high school in free until that number exceeds 10%. It has been a decade and they haven't made the goal yet. You are leaving a lot out of this, not surprisingly. In the case of the college, the logic was that the population was only 4% white, and that there was no reason why it should be so low, and that is the key reasoning here. With a college, if it was a commuter school (no dorms) and the surrounding area was predominantly non white, that decision would probably not have happened, because the school is a commuter school (again, this is a hypothetical). If the college had dorms and drew students from all over, then there could be no argument for having so few whites, because they could recruit from all over. The difference between illegal discrimination and legal discrimination is based in cause; if the cause is those running the school don't want any of 'those 'people there, it is illegal, if it is because of issues of qualification or in this example, ability to draw people of that type is difficult, it would not be. It would be like a firm hiring a solid state physicist with a PHd, and being censored because blacks make up 13% of the population, and of the 10 PHD's they hire, none are black; meanwhile, in reality, the number of PHd's in solid state physics makes it so there are very few blacks with the qualifications for the job (heck, very few, period), the nature of the qualifications and the nature of the school system and such make it so the distribution is not uniform. On the other hand, if a candidate who was black came in, had a PHd in solid state physics, and was turned away without an interview, then it would raise eyebrows. It was not a commuter school, it was a state university in the states capital with dorms and everything. The true reason was that white people didn't want to go there. The only things I learned in my field were that the only decent thing white people ever did was kill other white people (Civil War) and that there were Quaker pirates. They lowered their entry standards to see to it blacks could get in which meant that they had a bad reputation for quality of education. All that having been said the lawsuit was filed and ruled upon on the court established view that the 4% white population was de facto proof of a hostile environment.

BamaD -> RE: I am quickly developing a problem with immigrants. (12/26/2013 1:48:06 PM)
Going back to the exchange that got that started this he was trying to say that an entire chain of store that require bi lingual employees did not have a single anglo employee was that fault of anglos, I was pointing out another possibility. Being mostly Hispanic is understandable but not one anglo? Doesn't pass the smell test.

tj444 -> RE: I am quickly developing a problem with immigrants. (12/26/2013 3:32:05 PM)
quote: ORIGINAL: BamaD quote: ORIGINAL: tj444 quote: ORIGINAL: Zonie63 The problem with "immigrants" might be best solved by fixing the problems with Mexico. Their economy, housing, infrastructure, wages, standards of living - some improvements have been made in these areas, but they still have a long way to go. We might have to help them, perhaps some kind of "Marshall Plan" for Latin America might help those on both sides of the border. By making their own countries more livable, they wouldn't have much of a reason to come to the United States, and the problems discussed in this thread would slowly fade away. But as long as these disparities continue to exist, then people from the less affluent areas will gravitate towards areas with higher standards of living. There doesn't seem to be any way of stopping it, no matter what we try to do on this side of the border. The problem is also on the other side of the border, too. even if the US could "fix" the problems in Mexico, Mexico has its own illegal immigrant problems and that would only increase.. people living in poorer SA countries would go to Mexico (or perhaps go all the way north to the US, so instead of illegal Mexicans, you would have illegals from those other countries).. You can't "fix" the world.. not to mention ya'll are busy throwing money at fighting Iran, still in Iraq, Afghanistan, etc.. Then do you suggest that we turn the southern border into the Berlin wall(except to keep people out) or that we just open our borders completely and surrender. You have already turned the southern border into the Berlin Wall & continue to expand on that, The US never tried to "fix" Mexico so don't delude yourselves that is even on the table.. Thru your history you have had all sorts of unwanted immigrants (I am not talking about Mexicans or other South Americans, even certain whites were unwanted & illegal).. But my comment was about the US not having enough printed money to "fix" Mexico even if the US actually did want to.. heck, aren't you still trying to "fix" Iraq? how much has that cost so far? and its not done yet & never will be.. once the US does leave, the place will revert back to what it was before you got there and all the money and dead soldiers will be all for naught (unfortunately)..

RedMagic1 -> RE: I am quickly developing a problem with immigrants. (12/26/2013 4:26:44 PM)
Actually, tj444, there are simple, practical steps the US could take to improve Mexico and the immigration "problem." The most obvious is the legalization and regulation of mind-altering drugs, which would change the economy between the two countries overnight. That's going to be a while yet, but I think it will happen in my lifetime. We'll see.

MsMJAY -> RE: I am quickly developing a problem with immigrants. (12/26/2013 6:01:04 PM)
quote: ORIGINAL: BamaD Yes it is true. The college I went to lost a discrimination suit because only 4% of the student body was white. They have to allow whites who graduated from a Al high school in free until that number exceeds 10%. It has been a decade and they haven't made the goal yet. It was not a commuter school, it was a state university in the states capital with dorms and everything. The true reason was that white people didn't want to go there. The only things I learned in my field were that the only decent thing white people ever did was kill other white people (Civil War) and that there were Quaker pirates. They lowered their entry standards to see to it blacks could get in which meant that they had a bad reputation for quality of education. All that having been said the lawsuit was filed and ruled upon on the court established view that the 4% white population was de facto proof of a hostile environment Are you sure that was an Alabama case? It sounds a lot like the Ayers case in Mississippi where predominantly black colleges and universities were required to maintain a white population of above 10% for 3 consecutive years in order to qualify for funding from a 500 million dollar settlement that was set aside exclusively to increase diversity in those colleges. BTW- Unless it has recently changed all predominantly black colleges and universities offer free full scholarships to white students.

BamaD -> RE: I am quickly developing a problem with immigrants. (12/26/2013 6:03:39 PM)
quote: ORIGINAL: tj444 quote: ORIGINAL: BamaD quote: ORIGINAL: tj444 quote: ORIGINAL: Zonie63 The problem with "immigrants" might be best solved by fixing the problems with Mexico. Their economy, housing, infrastructure, wages, standards of living - some improvements have been made in these areas, but they still have a long way to go. We might have to help them, perhaps some kind of "Marshall Plan" for Latin America might help those on both sides of the border. By making their own countries more livable, they wouldn't have much of a reason to come to the United States, and the problems discussed in this thread would slowly fade away. But as long as these disparities continue to exist, then people from the less affluent areas will gravitate towards areas with higher standards of living. There doesn't seem to be any way of stopping it, no matter what we try to do on this side of the border. The problem is also on the other side of the border, too. even if the US could "fix" the problems in Mexico, Mexico has its own illegal immigrant problems and that would only increase.. people living in poorer SA countries would go to Mexico (or perhaps go all the way north to the US, so instead of illegal Mexicans, you would have illegals from those other countries).. You can't "fix" the world.. not to mention ya'll are busy throwing money at fighting Iran, still in Iraq, Afghanistan, etc.. Then do you suggest that we turn the southern border into the Berlin wall(except to keep people out) or that we just open our borders completely and surrender. You have already turned the southern border into the Berlin Wall & continue to expand on that, The US never tried to "fix" Mexico so don't delude yourselves that is even on the table.. Thru your history you have had all sorts of unwanted immigrants (I am not talking about Mexicans or other South Americans, even certain whites were unwanted & illegal).. But my comment was about the US not having enough printed money to "fix" Mexico even if the US actually did want to.. heck, aren't you still trying to "fix" Iraq? how much has that cost so far? and its not done yet & never will be.. once the US does leave, the place will revert back to what it was before you got there and all the money and dead soldiers will be all for naught (unfortunately).. If you believe that you have no memory of the Berlin wall, when was the last time people were machine gunned trying to get into the country? where are the miles of barbed wire and the free fire zones? So that only leaves surrender, maybe we should simplify things and ask Mexico to annex us.

Zonie63 -> RE: I am quickly developing a problem with immigrants. (12/26/2013 6:06:49 PM)
quote: ORIGINAL: tj444 quote: ORIGINAL: Zonie63 The problem with "immigrants" might be best solved by fixing the problems with Mexico. Their economy, housing, infrastructure, wages, standards of living - some improvements have been made in these areas, but they still have a long way to go. We might have to help them, perhaps some kind of "Marshall Plan" for Latin America might help those on both sides of the border. By making their own countries more livable, they wouldn't have much of a reason to come to the United States, and the problems discussed in this thread would slowly fade away. But as long as these disparities continue to exist, then people from the less affluent areas will gravitate towards areas with higher standards of living. There doesn't seem to be any way of stopping it, no matter what we try to do on this side of the border. The problem is also on the other side of the border, too. even if the US could "fix" the problems in Mexico, Mexico has its own illegal immigrant problems and that would only increase.. people living in poorer SA countries would go to Mexico (or perhaps go all the way north to the US, so instead of illegal Mexicans, you would have illegals from those other countries).. You can't "fix" the world.. not to mention ya'll are busy throwing money at fighting Iran, still in Iraq, Afghanistan, etc.. I see what you're saying, although the money that we're spending in the Middle East could be put to better use closer to home. Let the Eastern Hemisphere take care of itself, while we should concentrate on the Western Hemisphere.

BamaD -> RE: I am quickly developing a problem with immigrants. (12/26/2013 6:07:01 PM)
quote: ORIGINAL: MsMJAY quote: ORIGINAL: BamaD Yes it is true. The college I went to lost a discrimination suit because only 4% of the student body was white. They have to allow whites who graduated from a Al high school in free until that number exceeds 10%. It has been a decade and they haven't made the goal yet. It was not a commuter school, it was a state university in the states capital with dorms and everything. The true reason was that white people didn't want to go there. The only things I learned in my field were that the only decent thing white people ever did was kill other white people (Civil War) and that there were Quaker pirates. They lowered their entry standards to see to it blacks could get in which meant that they had a bad reputation for quality of education. All that having been said the lawsuit was filed and ruled upon on the court established view that the 4% white population was de facto proof of a hostile environment Are you sure that was an Alabama case? It sounds a lot like the Ayers case in Mississippi where predominantly black colleges and universities were required to maintain a white population of above 10% for 3 consecutive years in order to qualify for funding from a 500 million dollar settlement that was set aside exclusively to increase diversity in those colleges. BTW- Unless it has recently changed all predominantly black colleges and universities offer free full scholarships to white students. Yes I am certain. They were going to let me in free till they found out that I went to high school in Missouri. Same kind of suit different school.

Zonie63 -> RE: I am quickly developing a problem with immigrants. (12/26/2013 6:12:50 PM)
quote: ORIGINAL: thompsonx I go to mexico about once a month. I go to bull fights , bicycle races I ride public busses. I go to los angeles once a week I go to public venues and ride public busses and in the past forty some years I have not been shot at in either place. Neither have I. Turistas aren't usually targeted, but a lot of people are still getting killed down there. The death toll since 2006 is close to 100,000. quote: 62 killed in 2006[19] 2,837 killed in 2007[19] 6,844 killed in 2008[19] 11,753 killed in 2009[19] 19,546 killed in 2010[20][21] 24,068 killed in 2011[22][23][24] 18,061 killed by 31 October 2012[25] Total killed: 90,000-106,000 killed 6,800+ killed in 2013 under Nieto administration [26] Total estimate of deaths (varies): 83,191+ during Felipe Calderon administration. 6,800 + killed in first three months of Enrique Nieto administration [27] = 90,000+[28][28] Total displaced: 1.6 million[29] quote: quote: We might have to help them, perhaps some kind of "Marshall Plan" for Latin America might help those on both sides of the border. Mexico is not unaware of how the u.s. "helps". We did steal more than half of their country at the point of a gun. Then it might be prudent for us to change our ways and reverse previous policies regarding things like that.

BamaD -> RE: I am quickly developing a problem with immigrants. (12/26/2013 6:21:14 PM)
quote: ORIGINAL: Zonie63 quote: ORIGINAL: thompsonx I go to mexico about once a month. I go to bull fights , bicycle races I ride public busses. I go to los angeles once a week I go to public venues and ride public busses and in the past forty some years I have not been shot at in either place. Neither have I. Turistas aren't usually targeted, but a lot of people are still getting killed down there. The death toll since 2006 is close to 100,000. quote: 62 killed in 2006[19] 2,837 killed in 2007[19] 6,844 killed in 2008[19] 11,753 killed in 2009[19] 19,546 killed in 2010[20][21] 24,068 killed in 2011[22][23][24] 18,061 killed by 31 October 2012[25] Total killed: 90,000-106,000 killed 6,800+ killed in 2013 under Nieto administration [26] Total estimate of deaths (varies): 83,191+ during Felipe Calderon administration. 6,800 + killed in first three months of Enrique Nieto administration [27] = 90,000+[28][28] Total displaced: 1.6 million[29] quote: quote: We might have to help them, perhaps some kind of "Marshall Plan" for Latin America might help those on both sides of the border. Mexico is not unaware of how the u.s. "helps". We did steal more than half of their country at the point of a gun. Then it might be prudent for us to change our ways and reverse previous policies regarding things like that. Give back the southwest?

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