Bush, Synonym for Idiot (Part 2). (May 03 2006)
I really appreciate everyone's feedback on my last post: people's comments were thoughtful and insightful. One main idea that my aunt Linda brought up, as did Kristen, was the idea of conforming to the social majority. But a few ideas might be considered. First, the mentality that non-Hispanic whites have been and will always be the majority. It is true that most of the population speaks English right now, but that could change. As of 2005, Texas' non-Hispanic white population made up less than 50%, with other Southwestern states experiencing similar demographic changes. If or when Hispanics become the majority, what will English-speakers do, if the Spanish-speaking majority decides to be as authoritarian and exclusive as their predecessors? They'd be screwed, because what goes around comes around.
Linda said that learning the language of the host country is a matter of courtesy. I do agree with this. If we say that English is the language of the US (even unofficially, even temporarily as I've discussed above), perhaps it's right that those who come to live or visit here should learn it. Americans are notoriously lacking in this regard as tourists, often loud and largely ignorant of local customs and languages. That aside, I don't think immigrants should have to give up their own native language and culture, even as they celebrate the new one. Nuestro Himno would be a way to universalize the praise of the US. If that's the purpose of a national anthem, I see no problem.
Second, and maybe this is my bleeding-heart liberal side showing, but what is so wrong with letting Mexicans (or Central or South Americans or Spaniards) in, in the first place? Why are people lobbying to build a big, stupid wall in between us? Illegal immigrants are only illegal because we say they are. They come here because they want to work here. What's so bad about that? Are we afraid they're going to take all our jobs? There might be some displacement at first, but I read an article in the Economist recently on this very subject. While a bigger labor supply might initially put downward pressure on wages, it also must be considered that most immigrants would be working in low-skill (and thus low-paying) sectors. Lower wages means that firms have money to invest elsewhere -- in building new factories, for example. And they need people to work in these factories. Labor demand adjusts, wages level out. Here's a graphical representation:
Third, people should be able to sing in any language they like: I believe freedom of speech covers singing, as well. While I don't think Bush is contesting this right, he has been making some inflammatory statements that could be construed this way by a few hot heads.
I'm aware that this jumps from one facet of the argument to another, kind of unrelated. If you guys see any holes in my arguments or just want to shout back more, I'd be delighted to read more stories about hakas and furriners (thanks Grandma and Linda).
10 Comments
Well written. I should have known better than to argue with a smart college student. I?m not sure I could have understood your chart without your underlying explanation. But that being said, let me go ahead and prove how really ignorant I am.
I agree that Americans ARE loud and largely ignorant of local customs in other countries, "as tourists." I remember hearing somewhere that the French dislike Americans so much that they pretend not to be able to speak English just to annoy the American tourists. Are we that way when we emigrate to another country? Possibly, but I would hope not. I would hope since we liked that country well enough to live there, we would try to adapt ourselves to the lifestyle of the natives, including learning the most common language spoken (even if temporarily). As they say, "When in Rome."
I guess my main complaint is how Americans seem to be trying to adapt ourselves in order to accommodate people who speak a different language, mainly Spanish. In south Florida and probably in Texas, probably in south L.A., most public information signs (and a lot of other stuff, too) are posted in both languages, because of the Hispanic population. Again, I say: live in America, learn to speak English. Continue to speak your native language if you want to, but learn to communicate with Americans with the most common denominator: English.
Case in point: As you know, I work for a law firm. We handle a lot of different types of cases, including defending doctors and hospitals in medical malpractice cases. We are currently defending a doctor in a case involving a child born to a Sudanese couple who live in Norfolk (about 100 miles northwest of Omaha). They have lived in America for seven years. The husband works at the IBP plant in Norfolk. The wife doesn?t work, because they have EIGHT children. Their eighth child was born with a malrotated gut, which means the intestines got twisted somehow and the food could not go through. It took 17 days after his birth before they figured out what was wrong with him. (This isn?t the malpractice part. It was 17 days before the mother brought the baby to the hospital to be cared for.) This poor baby had to have an operation to remove most of his gut, leaving him with what they call ?short gut syndrome,? so he had a colostomy bag. The doctors recommended waiting until the baby was about a year old to try to do an intestinal transplant. Because the parents couldn?t care for the baby, he lived at Children?s World here in Omaha and the parents visited him. But my main point in telling the story is that after living in the US for seven years, the parents still did not speak English. Every communication between the nursing staff and the doctors had to have an interpreter. Now, come on. You?ve lived here seven years, you?re in the Midwest. You should learn to speak English.
But to finish this sad story, and it really is sad, when the baby was six months old, he underwent an operation for placement of a central line which required a thoracotomy, and during the procedure, the baby?s superior vena cava was perforated, except they didn?t know it at the time (this is the malpractice part). After the operation, when the baby was slow to respond, they realized something was not right and found that he was bleeding internally. He went into cardiac arrest and was without oxygen for about five minutes, which, of course, caused brain damage. But he didn?t die immediately. In fact, he lived another ten months in a vegetative state and on life support. The parents refused time and again to pull the plug, and also refused the doctors? advice to post a DNR (do not resuscitate) code on the baby. The baby did eventually die. My heart cries for those poor parents, and that poor, poor baby. No one should have to suffer through that sort of thing. Even if they are living in America, refuse to learn to speak English, have too many children to support and are probably on all kinds of American benefit programs.
But back to our real discussion. Your point that it may soon become a reality that the Hispanic population in Texas is the majority may be true, but in how many other states is that a factor? Florida? Yes. But then again, maybe not. There are probably more old people living in Florida than there are Hispanics. (Sorry, Mom.) California? Maybe Southern California, or L.A., but I would not think it would go any farther north than that. So what about the other 47 states? Or 45, if you want to exclude Alaska and Hawaii. Pennsylvania, Ohio, Missouri, Oklahoma, Tennessee, South Carolina, Utah, Wyoming, Colorado, Oregon, Washington. (Those aren?t all the states I can name, by the way. I know several more.) I can?t imagine that any of those states are anywhere close to having a majority of Hispanic-speaking residents.
I remember seeing film clips and stories about immigrants coming to America from Europe (as our ancestors did, senorita). Coming through Ellis Island and not speaking English. Living in New York City, which has its own ethnic districts of the various European immigrants. But didn?t they all learn to speak English? Yes. In their homes, they spoke Yiddish, or German, or Italian, or Spanish. But outside, they learned to speak English. And they WANTED to learn to speak English. It was the language of their beloved adopted country.
Well, I have to get to work, where everyone speaks English, thank God, or I would this very minute be on the internet finding an English-to-Spanish dictionary. I guess you have really won this battle, as I agree with what you wrote. Just don?t ask ME to learn to speak Spanish. I?ll move to Canada and learn to speak French.
What is up with all the question marks instead of apostrophes? I promise you, I did not type it that way. Now you will force me to not use any contractions when I post a comment, as I do not want to appear to be any more stupid than I really am.
I sure wish that I was as smart as you guys. you guys being a typical Yankee expression. And why are folks from the midwest and upper US called Yankees?
to get back to the immigrants subject, I do know that they will take any low paying job just to be able to work and live in America. So who would take those jobs. My Broders grandparents became farmers when they came over from Germany and Denmark. My grandfather was a carpenter and probably didn't know how to go about finding a job as a carpenter. He never really adapted to being a farmer and wasn't really happy dealing with the animals. My brother, your Uncle Bob, always want my Mom to teach him some German and I can't remember them really doing it but I probably was unaware if they did because I totally wasn't interested. now the only german phrase that I can remember Mom and aunt Margaret saying "Vat's Los? when they opened a phone conversation--meaning what's happening or what are you doing?
Note to Linda
Regarding the weird punctuation marks - I'd guess that you're typing your comments in Word, and then pasting them into Movable Type. My friend Brian (http://btc.finagled.info) used to do that and he'd end up with weird results. IF that's not it, then I guess maybe you're an immigrant.
Another note to Linda -
I wish i could be serious for more than 16 seconds at a time, but heckling you has been my lifelong pleasure. It's just something that I'm good at.
Yet ANOTHER note to Linda -
Sorry. It seemed funny at the time...(5:25 AM PST)
You are right. I did type it in Word and pasted it into the comments section.
And you are right that you have heckled me all your life. But you are wrong about being good at it. You're just consistent.
El Hombre. Hmph.
Do you want me to pull this car over? I will if I have to.
Good one, Kay. Had me laughing out loud. And I would use my fall-back reply that I always used with Mom, "He started it," except that it's right there for everyone to see that I heckled him first. But this is the ONLY time that I ever started it.
I'm sorry that I've sidetracked the real reason that we're all here - for Becky. Her writing and reason is always an inspiration to me. We may not always agree - largely because she talks over my head.
And as for you Linda, "why, i oughta..." :-)
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