'National' or 'common'? Senate ponders what to call English
Here's this stupid issue again. English is the language of America, because that's historically what most of our population has spoken. If an immigrant comes here from anywhere, he will have a greater chance of success and prosperity if he learns English. But some statute that grants English some sort of official status is stupid.
What are the things which bind Americans together? I would say in general that it's a sense that at a basic level we share the same values. (How we interpret and implement those values is another whole discussion). There is an American culture, but that culture is made up of many other cultures as well. Trying to enforce, however passively, some sort of American assimilation just makes us all smaller. Acceptance of diversity makes us stronger.
I've heard people bitch about stores where the employees only spoke Spanish, or places where signs are printed in two languages. Big fucking deal. Being American doesn't grant you the right to feel comfortable everywhere you go. If there's not a language barrier, there could be something else. And all that doesn't even address the underlying racism in the proposal. I'm sure there are people who think English should be the national language for some sort of cultural reason, but I suspect that many supporters of this kind of thing just want to make sure that if the brown-skinned people have to come here, they damn well better learn to be just like us.
4 comments:
We are not racist. In fact such a statement indicates the ignorance of the speaker. People that speak Spanish are Black, White, and Brown depending are their country of origin.
Yeah, but most of the ones people complain about are the non-white ones, strangely enough.
English is one of the unifying elements of our country. Yes it is harsh that we require people learn a common language for public speaking so we can all speak with eachother.
Some vague designation of English as an official language does not in any way accomplish this.
Consider the current situation, A Spanish speaker gets license because the test is in Spanish but when they have an accident they can not explain what happened to any one.
Which would change to a Spanish speaker gets license based on learning enough English to pass the test, then has an accident and still can't explain what happened. What's the benefit?
In America it was accepted for decades that you could speak Klingon in your own home and make signs in any language for your store but in public discussions especially government you speak English.
Yes, we do speak English in public discussions, except in all the cases where people publically speak in some other language. In the government, as you say, we already speak English, so what's the problem? In any other cases, if people are speaking a different language, it's probaly because their audience understands it. Again, what's the problem?
As for values, bull, you and I can not even agree on what the Bill of Rights means. Do we translate the Constitution into Spanish and have it next to the original?
I think the Constititution is filled with some pretty good ideas, that should be shared with as many people as possible, even if they don't happen to speak English. I'm sure there are Spanish translations of it available already. Again, what's the problem?
Bush should strike down Clinton's executive order in connection with the mandate to provide a translator
Yeah, because that will make people stop speaking other languages. Praticality be damned!
we want English as the official language because it should be
Este es la lógica circular.
A Canadian has to smile at all this stuff. We had the same crap vis-a vis French some years ago. There was even a group dedicated to saving English from extinction. We all get along much better now.
But the reasons most of the people pushing this want it are based on bigotry, racism and xenophobia. Also, I don't think that doing pointless things is ok just because the government does a lot of other pointless things.
Also, I'm not sure that is doesn't harm anyone, since it embraces the idea that people who speak English are superior to those who don't. There's no reason for us to have an official language, so don't do it.
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