(May 26, 2014 at 11:30 am)whateverist Wrote: What strikes me as odd in all this is talk of foreigners who come here and make no effort to assimilate into our culture.
I would have thought a 'melting pot' of cultures was a culinary reference. If there is any such thing as a Murican culture surely it would carry traces of all the flavors that go into it.
But I get the impression that some here think think the purpose of the melting pot is to strip away all vestiges of an immigrants old culture. So the melting pot is something like an acid bath.
I'm reminded of that movie "Gangs of New York". There it was easy to see that most of the stress was between those born here and the new arrivals. What a sense of entitlement those who were born here felt. Hazing and exploiting the new comers was part of that. Somehow once a person has been born here then it just seems right that every policy should advantage their kind. Make the newcomers prove themselves worthy by humbly emulating everything about us.
If someone wants to live in a homogenous community which reflects their own origins they have that option here. But if gated, English only, white communities are permitted why not Spanish speaking communities? This is a country of new comers and their descendents. I don't accept the privileged place given to descendents of Pilgrims. The Spanish were in the new world before them. Hell, they were in California before them too. I don't speak Spanish well at all but I respect those who do. I don't ask for any laws that make a virtue of my ignorance.
There, now I feel better. Rant over.
Great but not quite.
Yes yes all well in good origins of speech and what not,
Forgetting the laws, customs, and what not and cutting straight through to the, they were here first.
Were not the Indians here first, we all saw how that worked out.
Funny I always thought of the 'Melting Pot' having less to do with 'hostile takeover of foreign lands and more to a reference of My family came from Germany (LEGALLY), settled into a nighborhood where my neighbors came from (ITALY - LEGALLY) and there friends came from Mexico - LEGALLY, and we all reside here.
I don't recall it meaning that everyone comes over here to this land and refuse to change.
Cool you came from *insert origin* but this is america, where english is the main language, if you wanted to speak *insert language* and live in *insert origin* then this is not the place.
Melting pot never meant to invading and refusing to change to your new land, it meant there was a melting of culture, there was a little of this a little of that, it was not all ONE culture.
Sorry to say but if you want to live, act, and speak like you live in *insert origin* then perhaps you should have stayed there.
What if all the english speaking people ran to mexico, forced their culture on mexico (won't happen, mexico has strict border control). We all speak english, we all act like we are living in america, brought all our tendencies to mexico, sorry can't eat that it doesn't look 'clean'.
Forcing mexico to learn our language because WE decided we didn't want to live in our country anymore.
Same with any country.
