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AspieUtah
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17 Feb 2015, 1:28 pm

GoonSquad wrote:
By good old racism and natural antipathy for the different other.

Source (click)

[...]

We would NEVER tolerate this kind of crap here in the US. As bad as race relations in the US can be, Europe, on the whole, is much much worse. They simply don't have a tradition of immigration and they mostly don't know how to deal with it at all.

I opposed that religious-clothing prohibition when it happened. I am surprised it is still enforceable; I had presumed it would have been repealed.

And, we actually do tolerate religious discrimination in the United States that is probably more egregious than a head-scarf ban. Under the ubiquitous IRS rules, churches may not engage in political advocacy. But, under the George W. Bush administration, the president's Faith Based initiatives tried to broach the "separation of church and state" by enticing churches to do what the government desired them to do. Under the Obama administration, the president IRS has harassed and audited churches, leading to congressional investigations.

For those few churches who choose to abandon their IRS nonprofit determinations and engage in political advocacy as any other corporation or group of individuals may do, even then they are still required to "show their papers" to engage in free speech.

In my opinion, at least, it is much more egregious than a prohibition of religious clothing, however repugnant it is.


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AspieUtah
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17 Feb 2015, 1:35 pm

GoonSquad wrote:
Please. name the current immigrant group that isn't contributing to the economy--especially since modern immigration is pretty much TOTALLY driven by economic factors.

Really, I'd like to hear this because that point seems completely baseless. Enlighten me.

Well, "[a] 2004 study found that over 60% of the 16.5 million Latin American-born adults who resided in the United States at the time of the survey regularly sent money home. The remittances sent by these 10 million immigrants were transmitted via more than 100 million individual transactions per year and amounted to an estimated $30 billion during 2004" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Remittanc ... ted_States .

As a constitutionalist, I support the legal ability to remit whatever amount of their income they choose to send to other nations. Heck, people who contribute to "buy a tree in Israel" charities do much the same thing. But, I believe that, when it amounts to tens of billions of dollars lost to our annual economy, leaving an economic vacuum that isn't replaced, it does damage to our economy; and suggests a doubtful loyalty to the nation that feeds the contributors.


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GoonSquad
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17 Feb 2015, 2:12 pm

@AspieUtah,

I gotta say, I think both your points are incredibly weak.
Concerning churches, they enjoy tax exempt status because they are seen as being, primarily, religious charities. Once they start using church resources for non-charity things like politics, they should be subject to tax. Sure corporations (who are people too, my friend) engage in political activity, BUT they are already subject to tax--at least in theory.

There's nothing to stop a bunch of like-minded religious folks from the same church from forming a PAC to influence politics. So, go do that, if you feel the need to mix religion and politics.

As for immigrant workers sending money out of the country.... Well, that money has already "trickled down" about as far as it ever could. According to right wing economics, it has done it's job. :roll:

At any rate, we live in a global economy. So, according to all the Republican and Democrat free traders, we'll still get our share of that money back via our participation in the global economy...

Also, don't forget, those immigrant workers make a huge contribution to our local economy by keeping local goods and services cheap!

The issues of immigration weave a rich tapestry my friend. Don't let the scales of xenophobia on your eyes blind you to it's great beauty! :D


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17 Feb 2015, 2:19 pm

Jacoby wrote:
The Chamber of Commerce loves it and so do our politicians, we all know they have the best interests of average everyday Americans at heart.


lol, that's laughable, that they have the citizens best interests at heart....also though I bet they sure as hell don't have the best interests of the immigrant population either.

Jacoby wrote:
I don't fear diversity or demographic change, I grew up in an area that was very poor and mostly non-white. Most of these Hispanic immigrants are good people that just want a better life but I do worry about what effect it has my life and whether or not these people can and are willing to assimilate. Creating poverty stricken ethnic enclaves isn't a recipe for success, how does this migration help and hurt poor people already in this country? Is there a limit? What is the line?


I do get some concern on how it can effect things economically, I mean in some sense a lot of them might be more willing to take under the table jobs or low pay jobs...so that might take away from other people getting those jobs and might cause government assistence to be stretched more thin...those are the two concerns that make sense to me. As for whether they assimilate or not....I guess I don't see that as important, its not like we have a rich defined culture here in the U.S to even assimilate to.


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17 Feb 2015, 2:23 pm

Jacoby wrote:
lostonearth35 wrote:
That sounds really racist even if you say you love all races. I sometimes think being white is something to be deeply ashamed of, that we really are nothing but evil white devils who slaughtered the Natives, enslaved Africans and infected tribes with our many filthy European diseases. But I was born this way so what can I do?


Genocide, enslavement, and disease are hardly exclusive to Europeans. The slaves that we brought to this country were sold into slavery by other Africans, Indians were killing Indians long before they ever saw a white man, sickness has existed since the dawn of our very existence. Don't be ashamed for things you had no hand in, collectivized guilt is how racism and hatred in general has been spread all throughout human history. We are individuals we make our own decisions and with our own values, I don't care what some weirdo from the 16th century did as it wasn't me.

^this


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17 Feb 2015, 2:30 pm

kraftiekortie wrote:
I would say you're right about turning away Columbus.

The Europeans didn't mean to do this: but most of the native peoples passed away because of their lack of immunity to European diseases.

My words do not convey the impact this must have had upon the native populations circa 16-17th centuries.


Uhh didn't Columbus, allow for a bunch of natives to be killed...or called for it or something. I know the having them catch diseases over not being immune was not so intentional, more ignorance/lack of knowledge. But pretty sure the Europeans actively kind of annihilated their entire way of life, killed many intentionally ect...it wasn't all just a big accident.


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17 Feb 2015, 2:34 pm

eric76 wrote:
What we really need is for immigrants to assimilate and add to the culture instead of holding themselves apart maintain their old culture. When someone comes to the US, it should be to become Americans, not to try to try to force Americans to become part of their culture. Keep the best of both cultures.

Remember that when you go somewhere, it is your job to adapt, not everyone else's job to adapt themselves to you. That applies whether it is a school, a job, a club, or another country. If you aren't willing to become part of the new culture, then you should just stay home.


And do tell what is our 'culture' here in the U.S?....and I think it would be funny to see a white person eating mexican food complaining about how those damn mexicans need to assimilate, so I can laugh my a** off.

Also one does not have to entirely reject/shed their initial culture to assimilate somewhat...even so what even is there to assimilate to that is a constant?...only think I can figure is learning english since that is the main language and makes communication more effective but aside from that we don't have a defined culture to assimilate to.


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kraftiekortie
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17 Feb 2015, 3:09 pm

Hey Sweetleaf:

Of course Columbus did what he did.

I just wanted to highlight another truth.



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17 Feb 2015, 3:44 pm

Sweetleaf wrote:
eric76 wrote:
What we really need is for immigrants to assimilate and add to the culture instead of holding themselves apart maintain their old culture. When someone comes to the US, it should be to become Americans, not to try to try to force Americans to become part of their culture. Keep the best of both cultures.

Remember that when you go somewhere, it is your job to adapt, not everyone else's job to adapt themselves to you. That applies whether it is a school, a job, a club, or another country. If you aren't willing to become part of the new culture, then you should just stay home.


And do tell what is our 'culture' here in the U.S?....and I think it would be funny to see a white person eating mexican food complaining about how those damn mexicans need to assimilate, so I can laugh my a** off.

Also one does not have to entirely reject/shed their initial culture to assimilate somewhat...even so what even is there to assimilate to that is a constant?...only think I can figure is learning english since that is the main language and makes communication more effective but aside from that we don't have a defined culture to assimilate to.
I would say that our culture is mostly based on the better parts of the culture of many countries. Often times it has come together so much that many people may not even realize how different they are.

What we don't want is more or less isolated communities made up with people who want to completely retain the culture of their home countries (including the worst parts) and not adapt at all to being Americans. We have always had some and always will, but they at least, for the most part, are limited and do not pose a threat to this country.



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17 Feb 2015, 3:53 pm

GoonSquad wrote:
AspieUtah wrote:
GoonSquad wrote:
^^^ You're wrong about Paris and Muslims in France.

Those people are not integrating into French society mostly because French society excludes them....

How are new French immigrants being excluded?

By good old racism and natural antipathy for the different other.

Source (click)

This is just a single example of how Muslims are excluded and discriminated against in France and greater Europe...

Quote:
In the name of “strict secularism” (or laïcité), France has imposed severe limitations on children’s fundamental rights to develop their internal belief systems and identities while communicating those beliefs in the marketplace of ideas.

On a more practical level, this policy interferes with a student’s fundamental human right to an education and the parents’ fundamental right to direct the education of their children in a manner consistent with their value systems.

By marginalizing members of minority religious groups, France, as the U.S. commission on international religious freedom (USCIRF) put it, has forced students to make the “untenable choice between practicing their faith [and] obtaining a proper education.” That is a Hobbesian choice that no child deserves to make.

France has consistently demonstrated its utter refusal to address this violation by enacting and proposing heightened restrictions on religious expression. In 2011, the country’s lawmakers doubled down on their restrictions on expression, banning the wearing of full-face veils. Though neutral on its face, the national debate leading up to this legislation and the variety of exceptions make it clear that France was targeting the Islamic burqa and niqab. Recently, President Fraçois Hollande has also called for extending the “headscarf ban” to private employers and universities.


We would NEVER tolerate this kind of crap here in the US. As bad as race relations in the US can be, Europe, on the whole, is much much worse. They simply don't have a tradition of immigration and they mostly don't know how to deal with it at all.


They don't have a tradition of immigration because most Europeans never wanted immigration at all. The guest workers were not immigrants when they arrived, everyone expected them to go back when they were done working. They were not expected to assimilate because everyone assumed they would leave. The European countries were mostly set up as nation states, a state based on ethnicity. The headscarf ban is ridiculous, but I think we will see more of this type of nonsense as populist/nationalist anti-immigration anti-EU parties are growing larger.
But I think most of it is not race-based, but it's about religion (Islam). Most of the populist parties are very anti-Islam and anti-EU, the Europeans hate each other almost as much as they hate foreigners.



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17 Feb 2015, 5:37 pm

eric76 wrote:
I would say that our culture is mostly based on the better parts of the culture of many countries. Often times it has come together so much that many people may not even realize how different they are.

What we don't want is more or less isolated communities made up with people who want to completely retain the culture of their home countries (including the worst parts) and not adapt at all to being Americans. We have always had some and always will, but they at least, for the most part, are limited and do not pose a threat to this country.


Many people who immigrate to the US seek to adopt a lot of parts of American culture while retaining their roots. If you think about it, many us-born citizens do that as well, but probably in a more complex way. I am "Irish-like whoa" with my family immigrating not that many generations back and am constantly seeking to find out more about my Irish heritage, it's actually really important to me. I think there are some things that I appreciate about that that others don't and obviously don't identify with. I'm also American and am aware that there are certainly some cultural things that differentiate me in that way from the rest of the world.
I'm ALSO from Boston, which has a distinct culture from Chicago or Miami or the whole of Vermont. New England is very culturally different from the midwest.

The truth is there are a few different cultural layers going on in the US- that is partly because of our long history of immigration but also because we are a large country with very different geographical characteristics. There are people in the US who have never seen snow and I have 7 foot walls of snow on either side of my sidewalks right now- weather helps to form culture.

I mean we talk about American culture, and how it may be diluted, but what is that really? That's not really a strong argument. America is constantly in flux whether we slow immigration or not- our country is highly susceptible and vulnerable to the changing global atmosphere in terms of identity in a lot of ways. It is almost defined in contrast to other countries. America is often compared to other countries to demonstrate what it is NOT [as seen in this thread].

We don't lose that because other peoples come in. I would argue in a lot of ways we actually retain it.
[to clarify that was more of a response to kind of add, not like... I'm totally arguing what you've said exactly]


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17 Feb 2015, 6:29 pm

SignOfLazarus wrote:
Many people who immigrate to the US seek to adopt a lot of parts of American culture while retaining their roots.

[...]

We don't lose that because other peoples come in. I would argue in a lot of ways we actually retain it....

That depends largely on how the U.S. government and various state governments choose to recognize federal and state constitutional rights as they apply to all people who are lawfully in the United States regardless of citizenship, or to recognize foreign laws which are sometimes at odds with U.S. law and culture.

In my opinion, there was no retention of U.S. law or culture when a New Jersey judge deferred to Islamic Sharia law in a 2008 case for a restraining order based on repeated spousal rape within the marriage of a Moroccan couple who had moved to the United States http://www.volokh.com/2010/07/23/cultur ... -on-appeal . Luckily, the court opinion was reversed on appeal by the New Jersey Superior Court of Appeal http://www.americanthinker.com/articles ... haria.html which based its opinion on several U.S. Supreme Court precedents.

This is an example of the cultural and legal shifting that many in Europe and the United States consider risky to long-established norms and precedents that I intended in my post about the Disney-fication of Paris, New York and Hollywood.


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17 Feb 2015, 6:48 pm

AspieUtah wrote:
SignOfLazarus wrote:
Many people who immigrate to the US seek to adopt a lot of parts of American culture while retaining their roots.

[...]

We don't lose that because other peoples come in. I would argue in a lot of ways we actually retain it....

That depends largely on how the U.S. government and various state governments choose to recognize federal and state constitutional rights as they apply to all people who are lawfully in the United States regardless of citizenship, or to recognize foreign laws which are sometimes at odds with U.S. law and culture.

In my opinion, there was no retention of U.S. law or culture when a New Jersey judge deferred to Islamic Sharia law in a 2008 case for a restraining order based on repeated spousal rape within the marriage of a Moroccan couple who had moved to the United States http://www.volokh.com/2010/07/23/cultur ... -on-appeal . Luckily, the court opinion was reversed on appeal by the New Jersey Superior Court of Appeal http://www.americanthinker.com/articles ... haria.html which based its opinion on several U.S. Supreme Court precedents.

This is an example of the cultural and legal shifting that many in Europe and the United States consider risky to long-established norms and precedents that I intended in my post about the Disney-fication of Paris, New York and Hollywood.


Point taken but I guess it depends on how you look at it- deferring to religious tenants is in no way a new practice in the US. This particular religion may be, but that bit has changed over time again and again. However, as you said, it was overturned. So I guess it depends on what part of the situation one wants to look at really. There is not one way to look at it. I don't participate in one culture. America is not one state. On and on and on.


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17 Feb 2015, 6:54 pm

All in all, in my experience (and I have lots of experience knowing immigrants. My wife is an immigrant), I believe most immigrants to the US want to better themselves, and to better their families down where they originated, as well as those who come with them to the United States.

While it might "take money away from Americans," I believe these immigrants are pragmatic and practical people, rather than a drain upon our economy.

There are some "bad apples" among the immigrants, just like there were "bad apples" during the "golden age of immigration" (circa 1880 to 1924, when quite restrictive immigration legislation was passed).

But there are "bad apples" amongst every ethnic group.

There are "bad apples" among people who have been American for generations.

In truth, the whole premise of the United States, in essence, is that it is a refuge away from places which stymie human progress.



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17 Feb 2015, 7:30 pm

kraftiekortie wrote:
All in all, in my experience (and I have lots of experience knowing immigrants. My wife is an immigrant), I believe most immigrants to the US want to better themselves, and to better their families down where they originated, as well as those who come with them to the United States.

While it might "take money away from Americans," I believe these immigrants are pragmatic and practical people, rather than a drain upon our economy.

There are some "bad apples" among the immigrants, just like there were "bad apples" during the "golden age of immigration" (circa 1880 to 1924, when quite restrictive immigration legislation was passed).

But there are "bad apples" amongst every ethnic group.

There are "bad apples" among people who have been American for generations.

In truth, the whole premise of the United States, in essence, is that it is a refuge away from places which stymie human progress.

Indeed. But, with our current federal immigration laws (or lack thereof), how might we distinguish between the apples, good and bad? Finding out later wasn't an option in the Ellis Island years, and I suggest it isn't an option now with our nation in the economic position it is in currently. The reason that immigration laws are restricted for some years and unrestricted for some other years has been historically due to the periodic necessity of more or less immigrant citizens in the national economy. When jobs are less available to everyone, increasing the number of immigrants would cause even fewer employed workers, and make matters worse. Between 1880 and 1924, there were about a dozen economic recessions that cause some unemployment https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_r ... ted_States .

I believe that the economic influence of remitting more than $30 billion annually to residents of other nations is a net negative to the U.S. economy because, once that cash is transferred off-shore, its recipients have few chances to return much if any of it to U.S. businesses, even if they were so inclined. So, it is, by default, a revenue vacuum that further implodes our economy. There is a reason economists refer to the amount of free-flowing cash as "revenue." It is expected to remain within the economic pool, not jump to another pool where it becomes a net gain for its recipient nations.


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17 Feb 2015, 7:46 pm

I get what you mean....the money could be used for our poor citizens.

I guess I'm too much of an Internationalist at heart! My wife, who is not originally American, also believes I'm too much of an Internationalist.