Immigration

[GothicGothicness]

Racial integration is barely an issue now and though equal rights has not been fully achieved, it is far better than it was due to the efforts made to enforce integration.

I am impressed by how well USA manages it mix of population ( except for the spanish speaking part appears to split the US ) Looking at my own country Sweden, you hardly ever see a black business man,,,, and now you guys have an almost black guy running for president. In france you see all the black people working in MCDonalds while all the white ones are at big high paying companies in US it is a much more exotic mix...... We are going way off-topic now though!

 

[Eliaures]

I am impressed by how well USA manages it mix of population ( except for the spanish speaking part appears to split the US ) Looking at my own country Sweden, you hardly ever see a black business man,,,, and now you guys have an almost black guy running for president. In france you see all the black people working in MCDonalds while all the white ones are at big high paying companies in US it is a much more exotic mix...... We are going way off-topic now though!

Nah, not by much and I'm the more guilty since I was the thread starter and I took it off topic. The difficulties with the Spanish speaking population is a fabrication by right wingers in my opinion. They can't get their base as excited about terrorism any more, so they've picked this xenophobic trigger to get them riled up. The irony is, the problem of illegal immigration is a result of free trade policy. The loss of jobs in the US that is being blamed on immigrants is due to outsourcing; and the devastation of Mexican farms from the import of cheap, subsidized corn and soy from the US caused massive joblessness in Mexico.

I live in Texas and there is little friction with latinos. The friction that is apparent is that many immigrants are no longer just moving to border states. They are now also going to mid-Western states which have had little contact with brown folks and non-English speaking people previously. They are basically freaking out and are prime for the demagoguery being spouted by right wing water carriers.

 

[Zaleukos]

I am impressed by how well USA manages it mix of population ( except for the spanish speaking part appears to split the US ) Looking at my own country Sweden, you hardly ever see a black business man,,,, and now you guys have an almost black guy running for president. In france you see all the black people working in MCDonalds while all the white ones are at big high paying companies in US it is a much more exotic mix...... We are going way off-topic now though!

Give it some time. We've only had immigration from outside Europe for about 35 years. Kids of foreign descent only really started studying in numbers about 20 years ago, and there's been a significant increase in non-whites in senior positions in almost all sectors just in the last ten years. Heck, just looking at a cross-section of silly celebrities or TV ads now compared to in 1990 is almost like looking at two different countries ethnically I'm optimistic even if we still have a long way to go.

 

[vanedor]

A good side effect here is that we see muslim people getting more used to this kind of «offense». No massive parade in the streets of Islamabad or beiruth. «l'abcès a été crevé», juste like here christian are getting so used that we make fun of their religion, I think that eventually, muslim will come to accept that in occident, especially outside the USA, religions are something we can make fun of. Like basically anything.

 

[Squeek]

You folks from outside the US (ex: Sweden, Canada, Texas) really out to come visit and see what America's like firsthand.

 

[dteowner]

Careful there, Squeek. Most people would put California in those parentheses before most any other state.

 

[Corwin]

Yeah, but I've been told California is the closest state to what it's like in Oz, so it can't be too bad!!

 

[Eliaures]

Harumph! California is granola land - full of fruits, nuts, and flakes.

 

[Squeek]

Actually, we're full of people from every other part of the country (including Texas). Statistically speaking, we probably represent the entire US better than any other state.

 

[Eliaures]

Actually, we're full of people from every other part of the country (including Texas). Statistically speaking, we probably represent the entire US better than any other state.

Oh, I know that. Wow, I was looking at immigration stats, you guys get many, many more immigrants than any other state, New York included. I guess they don't know about the earthquakes, wildfires, and mudslides.

I was being mock offended. Actually most Texans are rather proud of our "outside" status and point proudly at our Constitution that provides for the state to leave the US and return to its original sovereignty.

 

[The Hulk]

Nah, not by much and I'm the more guilty since I was the thread starter and I took it off topic. The difficulties with the Spanish speaking population is a fabrication by right wingers in my opinion. They can't get their base as excited about terrorism any more, so they've picked this xenophobic trigger to get them riled up. The irony is, the problem of illegal immigration is a result of free trade policy. The loss of jobs in the US that is being blamed on immigrants is due to outsourcing; and the devastation of Mexican farms from the import of cheap, subsidized corn and soy from the US caused massive joblessness in Mexico.

I live in Texas and there is little friction with latinos. The friction that is apparent is that many immigrants are no longer just moving to border states. They are now also going to mid-Western states which have had little contact with brown folks and non-English speaking people previously. They are basically freaking out and are prime for the demagoguery being spouted by right wing water carriers.

I know this is a thread about a Danish Muhammad cartoon and do not wish to take this thread off topic, but I just wanted to respond to someone who posted above. Perhaps if people want to respond to my post, they could start a new thread about illegal immigration and we could discuss it there.

I have been studying the illegal immigration issue in my spare time for years now and I think there is legitimate concern over too much hispanic illegal immigration since hispanics make up about 80% or more of the illegals that are coming in, asians are around 9%, white around 5% and blacks around 4%. With such a huge imbalance there, its no wonder why some people see that as being unfair and wanting to change things. They say NAFTA and CAFTA are causing much of the illegal immigration, unfortunately, the presidential candidates who wanted to repeal those bad free trade deals could not get elected, and only Pro NAFTA and CAFTA presidents can get elected it would seem. Also, only presidents who are soft on illegal immigration, ones who have no real desire to stop it, only make token efforts to enforce laws against illegal immigration, and who advocate endless amnesties as the solution, thereby making the problem progressively worse(like Reagan did in the 80's)have been able to get elected.
Personally I am pro-legal immigration(all races) but anti-illegal immigration(all races), as are most citizens of the U.S. Personally, I think we need more asian immigrants in this country, as they are underrepresented and don't have a voice the way blacks and hispanics do. Blacks were the dominant minority in this country, but recently hispanics have surpassed them due to illegal immigration thats been out of control for decades now. Also, many blacks have been and are being pushed out of lower end jobs by illegal hispanics who will work for less.
In the coming decades, hispanics are set to become the new majority in the U.S. and eventually spanish set to become the new official language of the U.S., if things keep going the way they are going and hispanic illegal immigration continues to flood out of control. You have to remember, the illegal immigration is coming from predominantly from Mexico, Central America, Cuba and South America which are predominantly hispanic countries with millions and millions of poor people who are enticed to come to America illegally to get the better paying jobs up here. They also have a higher birthrate than other races. This flood of illegal immigration will also eventually go northward to Canada(when space and jobs in this country start to become more scarce), some already do go to Canada, but in smaller numbers currently, and hispanics will eventually become the majority in Canada(unless they get serious about stopping illegal immigration too) and spanish will also become the dominant language there. Of course if the U.S. could ever elect a president who'd be serious about stopping illegal immigration(the last one we had who was even half serious about trying to stop it was Eisenhower, and the bush's and Clintons, mcain and obama have no real desire to stop it) and fully enforcing laws on the books necessary to stop it while increasing security, then when illegal immigrants could not illegaly get jobs here anymore or get welfare, most would leave the country on their own over time and then we could largely solve the problem and then have a balanced legal immigration program(we currently take in over a million legal immigrants per year, more than any other country in the world)that does not allow one ethnicity to overwhelm all others, make english the official language of the U.S. to help unite us as Americans better(which Teddy Roosevelt, who always stressed the importance of immigrants to America to learn and become proficient in english, should have done long ago but never managed to do it), and move on to fixing other problems in this country without having to focus on illegal immigration any more.
I went into this issue in some detail in the Ron Paul for president thread, so I'm repeating myself here with some of this stuff.
There is an asian american woman(born of Chinese parents, who saw what severe overpopulation was doing to China) from California named Yeh ling ling who wrote some very eye-opening articles about the problems of overwhelming illegal immigration(and even problems associated with too much legal immigration) from one ethnic group. Here's a link to her bio at the site she works for. http://www.diversityalliance.org/docs/DASA-BoardBios.html
I've learned a lot about illegal immigration from reading her articles.
Here are some articles she wrote
http://www.hlrecord.org/media/paper...shtml?norewrite&sourcedomain=www.hlrecord.org
(The above article mentions Juan Hernandez, who thinks mexican immigrants in America should think "Mexico first". He is now part of the John McCain campaign, which can't help but tell you something about John McCain.)
http://www.diversityalliance.org/docs/article_2004winter.html
http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=50050
http://www.diversityalliance.org/docs/article_2007mar12.html
We all know there are white racists like the kkk that should be denounced and marginalized, but racists come in all colors.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GIW-BZ8oLrk
Many quotes from the above video were verified by snopes in the link below
http://www.snopes.com/politics/quotes/hispanic.asp
I know much of the info above shows the dark side of illegal immigration, but this is stuff you never see in the mainstream media like abc, cbs, nbc t.v. news stations which millions of Americans rely on to be informed of whats goin on in this country and around the world. Media like that will hardly ever talk about the illegal immigration issue, and when they do, usually they focus on the positive aspects of it and show poor hispanic people looking for work, albeit illegally looking for work, which makes most Americans who rely on mainstream media for their news feel that illegal immigration is nothing to be concerned about and amnesty is the best plan. Sure, if you watch one of the rare people in the mainstream media like Lou Dobbs on CNN, you will learn about some of the nagative stuff associated with illegal immigration, but even there there is stuff they will not dare to show or talk about, such as some of the inflammatory comments by hispanic activists such as Jose Angel Gutierrez.
Taking into account all the above info, can you really blame Americans for being concerned about illegal immigration and wanting to stop it? Granted, most Americans don't even know about much of the info provided above, so they are largely in the dark and have no idea what's really going on. If they did, maybe we'd finally get a president in office who'd solve the problem. But the ones who are aware and do know whats going on, I can't blame them for being concerned and speaking out about it, since I am aware(though I'm sure there is still much I've yet to learn about) and speak out about it too.
On a different note, I have read that muslims will eventually become the majority in much of europe if trends continue, with a large number of them being illegal immigrants. I wondered what Europeans think of this? Or do they even care? Here are a few articles I found
http://lawofnations.blogspot.com/2006/01/muslim-immigration-changing-face-of.html
http://www.express.co.uk/posts/view/32867/Europeans-think-Islam-is-dangerous
http://www.canadafreepress.com/index.php/article/1443
http://www.stanfordreview.org/Archive/Volume_XXXIX/Issue_6/World/world2.shtml

 

[Zaleukos]

That Europe will have a muslim majority any time soon is blatant scaremongering by those who promote a certain political agenda, and has rather limited bearing on reality.

EDIT: Even assuming that the difference in birth rates remain, that muslims who come here dont become secularised at all, and that immigration pressure stays the same (e g that the islamic world wont sort out it's issues in the short to medium term) it'd take a very long time for those predictions to come true. It's propaganda based upon bogus extrapolations.

 

[blatantninja]

Careful there, Squeek. Most people would put California in those parentheses before most any other state.

I take no offense! As a Texan, I generally consider an outsider among other Americans. Especially up here in NYC! When I travel outside the country and people ask me where I am from, I never even think to say the US, I always say Texas! (As if they couldn't tell from my accent though!)

To the original topic, I will say that I agree that free expression is the cornerstone of the modern society. While there must be some limits (the FIRE in a theater example), I don't think these extend to simply offending people, whether it be religion, nazism, or indecency (and I mean this in terms of speech, not acts). While some of those things I would prefer not to hear, and I would even go as far as to say that they should not be allowed in a perfect world, we have to ask ourselves, which would you rather have: a world that offends some people or a world in which freedom of expression is restricted to a point that the essential exchange of ideas is at risk?

We will never reach the perfect balance between freedom of expression and limits of that freedom, there is just too slippery a slope for it to happen. As such, I would rather err on the side of having too much freedom of expression and living with the consequences of such.

 

[Squeek]

I meant the Texas comment as a joke (of course). The illegal immigration problem on our southern border predates NAFTA by decades, btw.

 

[Eliaures]

Heh, heh. Does anyone want to move these last few posts and make a new thread?

Well of course illegal immigration has been a problem for decades, but it's been exacerbated both by NAFTA and the xenophobic drum beating by the fringe right. Some statistics show that we need immigration to maintain a workforce in this country. I haven't studied the issue, I don't know, but immigration was not really an issue until Lou Dobbs, the hypocrite, and others started their demagogic campaign which is touching many folks that are seeing "brown people" for the first time.

I doubt few are for illegal immigration. Most "illegals" are probably not terribly fond of it. What the real argument is, is how do we address it. Do we build a fence and then deport millions? We need to deal rationally with the problem and reflect upon the lives of real people, many who have lived here for years now and many that have been born here but hold illegal status because of how their parents arrived.

 

[Corwin]

As suggested I've moved these to a new thread!!

 

[blatantninja]

The people that just want to seal of the border have little grasp of the economy IMO.

The simple fact is that to have avoid a massive depression, we simply have to have a growing labor supply. There are only two ways to get that: breed it or import it. And since birth rates in the US aren't particularly high, it seems we have made our choice.

There is nothing more detrimental to long-term economic growth than an aging labor force and that's exactly what we have. Entitlements like Social Security and Medicare are absolutely dependent on an ever increasing labor force.

 

[Squeek]

Blatantninja, who wants to seal the border? Thousands of people cross the border legally every day (in both directions), and as far as I can tell, no one is objecting to that. The issue is illegal immigration, isn't it?

 

[blatantninja]

Blatantninja, who wants to seal the border? Thousands of people cross the border legally every day (in both directions), and as far as I can tell, no one is objecting to that. The issue is illegal immigration, isn't it?

I don't mean seal as in completely cut off all immigration. I mean seal as in cut off illegal, but not raise the amount of legal immigrants each year.

 

[The Hulk]

So, taking into account we take in over a million legal immigrants each year, and the various foreign worker programs that exist, how many more million legal immigrants per year do you feel we need in order to avoid economic collapse?
Personally, I think talk of economic collapse if the illegal immigration is finally solved, is just a way to scare people into not opposing illegal immigration. If you magically stopped it overnight there might be one, but if its stopped gradually over a period of years, I don't see an economic collapse.