Porktown
Posts: 2296
Joined: 9/4/2001
Status: offline
|
quote:
ORIGINAL: indsguiz
As a good example: When my grandfather came here from Germany, one of the first things he said was: We are no longer Germans, Now we are Americans. We will not speak German we will learn English. And he made that a RULE, so much so that my dad never learned German from his own parents. In one generation they assimilated. It was rough for gramps and the family at first but the goal was achieved in 20 years. Now days we have whole generations of people for whom English is still a second language, and our government goes way out of the way to accommodate them.
Although it's unpopular, I am for English being the offical language of America. And the only language. I would disallow "anchor babies" and immediately deport any illegal found here. There are ways to legally come into America and the laws were passed to keep out the people who would be a drain on our economy (by our grandfathers). Sometimes I think we need to look to history in order to learn. "Those who fail to learn from history are doomed to repeat it's mistakes"
Indsguiz -
You make a great case on the illegal immigrants, as I am not for anyone entering this country illegally and staying, even born from illegal immigrants.
As for the immediate nationalization, remember that your grandfather was in the minority of people that did this back when most of our ancestors were immigrants. I would imagine there are many new immigrants that attempt the same philosophy. Many are successful, but others just don't have the ability to never stop speaking their native tongue, which I would imagine is about 99.9999% of immigrants from 1700 until present day. People would want to believe that this is a new phenomenon, with the Hispanic rush of immigration. Our country was built on immigrants. This section of the country (Western PA) had more immigrants working the steel mills and coal mines than 2nd and 3rd generation citizens for a large part of history. I can assure you, English was secondary in most neighborhoods and on the job, until a generation made it's way through. The rest of the nation had the same. I am not willing to turn my back on the system that gave my "DP" (displaced person) great grandparents the opportunity to avoid economic and political suppression of their homelands. There needs to be a point where recourses and land restrict the amount of people. There also needs to be enforcement of existing laws and regulations for immigrants.
Time is the only way to have an integration of nationalities. If we were to eliminate Chinese, Spanish, French, so on, we wouldn't stand a chance in being the world leader in so many things that we are now. Most of these "cultural" areas of our country that so many of our cities either have or once had, are very important to our economy and are what makes our nation so great. Diversity in culture lends itself to many new products, engineering, styles, cuisine, ect. that would all but disappear if you would force a law on official language.
I can only speak English, and do feel rather alienated when I am in an Asian, Hispanic, Muslim ect. neighborhood, that I can not communicate. I am in these communities a good bit, due to my work travels too. Our ancestors very likely lived in communities that reflected their nationality (Polish Hill, Deuschtown, Little Italy, ect.). In the neighborhoods that I work in, I can assure you that those in the first generation removed, are almost always speaking English first language when in public, as our parents and grandparents did (generation removed). Most immigrants speak broken English as your grandfather and my great grandparents did, and usually speak their native tongue when around their immigrant friends and family, as most of our ancestors did. I see no reason to have a LAW saying that people can't speak a different language than English, so basically we English speaking majority don't feel alienated in their communities. I feel confident that English as the unofficial language of business and law, will always be strong. Having a law saying English is the official language, is un-American.
|
Printable Version
RE: Racism/Bigotry - 
. 
New Messages 
Hot Topic w/ New Messages 
Locked w/ New Messages
No New Messages 
Hot Topic w/o New Messages 
Locked w/o New Messages