See the pattern
May 31, 2006And so the US shows its true colours. The debate on minorities (esp. Latinos) is hot in the US, and as clearly shown by the reaction of the right-wing part of that country, the US isn’t even remotely as free anymore as the founding fathers had in mind. You see, the US has never had an official language– many think it’s English, but it’s not. The Federal government has no official language. I personally find this silly; I’m proud of the Dutch language, and a country without an official language really isn’t as much a country as one that does have an official language. But that’s just personal.
Anyway, the founding fathers of the US believed that having an official language probably intervened with the concept of freedom (or something). Even though I’d disagree, I do get where they’re coming from. Basically, the founding fathers didn’t give a rat’s ass as to what language an American would speak.
However, Spanish is now gaining ground fast in the US. Every true American patriot (I think I’m gonna be sick) should welcome this, and eventually, not give a rat’s ass about this, right? The problem is– they do. They want to make English the official language, and thereby deviate massively from the founding fathers’ ideas.
This goes to show that the freedom you as an American have is absolutely worthless. The moment that that freedom gets in the way of the rich, white part of the country, it is easily brushed aside. Tapping phones, censorship of words, censorship of images and information from warzones, and now this. All of those threaten the rich white part of the American populace.
Even laws get brushed aside easily. For instance, US law prohibits any financal or material aid to countries that do not sign the Nuclear Prolifiration Treaty– guess which country gets the most financial and material aid from the US– that same country has in fact not signed the NPT (guess the country and get a cookie). This means the US government has continiously been breaking the American law for 50 years.
You see the pattern? In the US, freedom ends where it threathens the white populace. Scary.
I don’t agree with you at all. Having an official language is a GOOD thing. Why? Because then everyone can have a language where they can speak with others and understand each other. You see, today in California there are many people who don’t speak english at all. They don’t care to speak it because they go to spanish schools, or because they never go out of their neighbour. But when these people come of age, and they seek jobs in a store or elsewhere outside of their little community, it’s very difficult to give them the job –even if they are hard working– because simply they can’t talk to the customers. ALL citizens of a country must speak the official language, which ever that language might be.
Alternatively, you can have 2 official languages, just like the Swiss have 3. But not having any at all, is problematic. I for one, hail English becoming the official language here and having all citizens speak it.
Comment by Eugenia — June 1, 2006 @ 1:14 am
The country is Israel and the Western Worlds bias towards it is well known.
You owe me two.
Comment by ajww — June 1, 2006 @ 5:32 am
Eugenia, read more carefully. I am a PROPONENT of having official languages. I said that VERY CLEARLY in the blog post.
What I wanted to show with this blog post, was that freedom in the United States ends there where it threatens the rich white people. This language thing I mentioned was just proof of this.
ajww: Yup, here’s your cookie.
Comment by Administrator — June 1, 2006 @ 8:01 am
The real problem in my opinion is integration. US are a country of immigrants. What’s different is that until now, the waves of immigration have been integrated into society. Right now, the wave is so big that people don’t feel the need to adapt. They can easily get along by speaking Spanish only, from school to grocery shop, to job etc. And this isolates them and creates social problems for us all. And it’s nothing racist behind this, more prejudices exist in Europe, and I say this as an European.
Comment by stefan — June 2, 2006 @ 3:10 am
Sorry to be a little pedantic, it’s the “Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty”…
International relations is completely hipocritial. Mind, that Israel is basicly a fortress-state, since it’s been attacked/threatened numerous times by its neighbours, ever since it’s conception.
As far as I see it, an “Official language” doesn’t really matter, so long as there is a de-facto language that most people know (and governmental and other mainstream institutions use it)… In East-Timor, the Government chose Portugese, which was a wrong move, since only an elite few speak it. Contrast to the US, where most speak English (and it’s unlikely that it will loose it’s role as lingua franca in the US for a while at least).
Comment by Lucas — June 11, 2006 @ 3:17 am
The US has a rather long history of non-integration, we integrate/adapt to cultures that bring monetary wealth and northern european heritage with them and pretty much fcuk over everyone else. I like your views Thom, maybe because i was brought up by good socialist Dutch immigrants :) keep up the great work at osnews!
Comment by phil — June 11, 2006 @ 8:12 am
Comment by ToeKnee — June 12, 2006 @ 5:04 am
well, all my quotes disappeared from my post above (need a “preview” function) - let’s try it again with simple italics so it makes better sense:
———–
Anyway, the founding fathers of the US believed that having an official language probably intervened with the concept of freedom (or something). Even though I’d disagree, I do get where they’re coming from. Basically, the founding fathers didn’t give a rat’s ass as to what language an American would speak.
I’m not so sure you (or even I, a U.S. citizen) are quaified to speak to the founders intent by not specifying an official language for the U.S. But I think it is more likely that it did not seem to be an issue at that time, since nearly all of the “voting” citizens of the time spoke English as a first language.
In addition, as a decentralized republic, it’s likely that it was an issue thought best left to the states. And, as it turns out, more than half of the states have legislated English as their official language. The U.S. Constitution does say that any powers not expressly granted to the Federal Government are reserved for the states (and/or the “People”).
This goes to show that the freedom you as an American have is absolutely worthless.
Seems to me like you’ve reached a conclusion based very weakly on fact. It’s OK. I spent more than my fair share of time at universities in the U.S. and in Europe, and I know how it works. I’d recommend, however, that you spend more time postulating about things you know based on experience, such as operating systems and other technical subjects, and stay away from the topics which require more research than reading headlines and chatting with friends in the coffeehouse over a spacecake and a latte.
In the US, freedom ends where it threathens the white populace. Scary.
Not as scary as the Internet trend that anyone with a weblog is an expert on anything!
P.S. oh, and the whole Israel NNPT thing would require many pages to do it justice. It’s a lot more complicated than your terse summary.
Comment by ToeKnee — June 12, 2006 @ 5:13 am