Quote:
Originally posted by BB/Mike*MFA*
America was established because of the religious and social intolerances of the Church and England and The British Monarch, it was a place where people could come a practise their traditions and religion freely. Although now it seems that the US has truned into what it was established to get away from, that is, unless you are part of the majorty then you will be "persecuted" for it.
Any american resident/citizen has the right to communicate in whatever language they want, the declaration of independance states that "all men are created equal" which means you are not superior, and hence not in a position to tell other to learn a language because it pleases you.. Its called the freedom of speech, 1st amendment....
Immigrants have done alot for the United States, think about how much richer your life is just by being exposed to the foods of different cultures, but according to the arguments here, thats a moral outrage, immigrants should conform to american traditions, its a travesty that they eat foods typical of their culture, if they want to live in America they should eat purely amercian foods! 
BD, the labels of native-american, latin-american etc etc is something largely promoted by the government for use in things like census data and the like and not by people of the groups themselves, even so, its not a bad thing that people want to be associated with race as well as country, it makes sence that they are proud of their heritage as they are of being american. I see no difference between that and say, describing yourself as english, irish, scottish or welsh as opposed to being from the United Kingdom...
I better stop there...
|
Once again Mike I'm aware of the points you make but I can see how many people here in the United Kingdom and in the United Staes do feel a certain resentment at the concessions that are made to many immigrants that come to our shores.
We have absorbed many people into the British isles and for the most part there are very few problems between the various racial, ethnic gropus who live side by side in the U.K.
We do expect them to respect our culture and traditions as we respect theirs and at thsi time of year we happen to be looking forward to celebrating Christmas and as such we do not want to refer to it as !midwinter fest" or what ever because it might offend some muslims or who ever!
Live and let live by all means but if you choose to come here then please live by our laws and rules of conduct, make a new home for yourself in a very liberal and tolerant country by all means but don't expect us to accept what is acceptable in the country you originate from as it might not be acceptable here.
Warm Regards
