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Every country is made up of immigrants. Stating this brings nothing to the table. Language is an enormous part of culture and social interaction. It is incumben

Every country is made up of immigrants. Stating this brings nothing to the table. Language is an enormous part of culture and social interaction. It is incumbent upon the people that relocate to a region, country, or community to adapt to those that are already there, particularly if there is a thriving and productive community in place. It would be completely unfair if a bunch of Liberal Americans who are fed up with Trump moved to a small East Asian country and expected them to put English on all the signs just because they were fleeing a political faction they abhorred. This is not a right v. wrong situation; there is a logical process to the civil redistribution of population. If it is not civil (be it desperation ((Syria)), enforced ((German speakers after WWII)), or appropriative ((Europeans in North America))) then this point is moot, but in the 21st century we cannot act like people just accidentally end up in more economically beneficial areas.

stcredzero 9y ago
It would be completely unfair if a bunch of Liberal Americans who are fed up with Trump moved to a small East Asian country and expected them to put English on all the signs just because they were fleeing a political faction they abhorred. Somehow, various Chinatowns in the US seem to do alright, even though many of them have signs in Chinese. There is an amazing amount of wealth generated there, though there's also often a greater degree of squalor. (One exception is Houston's Bellaire, though there may be seedier parts of that I'm not familiar with.)
hippich 9y ago
I think USA is much more `immigrantish` than many other countries. Compare USA to Japan for example. Of course it is expected that most immigrants adopt most of cultural aspects of the new life, but not all of it. And each immigrant brings part of his cultural heritage too. So culture will change over time. Accordingly to this - https://www.migrationpolicy.org/programs/data-hub/charts/immigrant-population-over-time https://www.migrationpolicy.org/programs/data-hub/charts/imm... - immigrants are close to 15% of total population. This chart also does not mention number of children of these immigrants. These are people who do not have this inherited and ingrained guilt for enslavement simply because they did not live here when that was happening, nor their ancestors to tell them stories.
- classicsnoot 9y ago
  To compare the USA and Japan is a pretty huge leap. Better to compare the USA to more similar regions, though i admit this is tough to do. Do you compare them to South Africa or Brazil (they were all three colonies, they were all sources or recipients of slaves, immigrants, and refugees) or do you compare them to Australia and Canada (because White People seems to be both a self identifier and an accepted universal descriptor)? Either way, both yours as well as the other response (which i cannot reply to for some reason...) are missing the point. In his case it is neither the available opportunity for economic advancement nor is it the community posted signs that are relevant; it is the idea of state sponsored dynamic linguistic delivery of statutory information. In your case, you are picking two very disparate points on a continuum as if it were a balanced and logical comparison. More to the granular point, if you delve into Japan's history you will see that immigration and displacement are a relevant and undeniable factor just as they are in literally every recognized country on earth in terms of state formation and identity, be it racial, ethnic, cultural, or regional. The "nation of immigrants" argument is at its core a tautology. Establishing which nation is the most "immigrantish" would be akin to establishing a wetness scale to individual drops of rain. Edit: spelling

stcredzero 9y ago

It would be completely unfair if a bunch of Liberal Americans who are fed up with Trump moved to a small East Asian country and expected them to put English on all the signs just because they were fleeing a political faction they abhorred. Somehow, various Chinatowns in the US seem to do alright, even though many of them have signs in Chinese. There is an amazing amount of wealth generated there, though there's also often a greater degree of squalor. (One exception is Houston's Bellaire, though there may be seedier parts of that I'm not familiar with.)

hippich 9y ago

I think USA is much more `immigrantish` than many other countries. Compare USA to Japan for example. Of course it is expected that most immigrants adopt most of cultural aspects of the new life, but not all of it. And each immigrant brings part of his cultural heritage too. So culture will change over time. Accordingly to this - https://www.migrationpolicy.org/programs/data-hub/charts/immigrant-population-over-time https://www.migrationpolicy.org/programs/data-hub/charts/imm... - immigrants are close to 15% of total population. This chart also does not mention number of children of these immigrants. These are people who do not have this inherited and ingrained guilt for enslavement simply because they did not live here when that was happening, nor their ancestors to tell them stories.

classicsnoot 9y ago
To compare the USA and Japan is a pretty huge leap. Better to compare the USA to more similar regions, though i admit this is tough to do. Do you compare them to South Africa or Brazil (they were all three colonies, they were all sources or recipients of slaves, immigrants, and refugees) or do you compare them to Australia and Canada (because White People seems to be both a self identifier and an accepted universal descriptor)? Either way, both yours as well as the other response (which i cannot reply to for some reason...) are missing the point. In his case it is neither the available opportunity for economic advancement nor is it the community posted signs that are relevant; it is the idea of state sponsored dynamic linguistic delivery of statutory information. In your case, you are picking two very disparate points on a continuum as if it were a balanced and logical comparison. More to the granular point, if you delve into Japan's history you will see that immigration and displacement are a relevant and undeniable factor just as they are in literally every recognized country on earth in terms of state formation and identity, be it racial, ethnic, cultural, or regional. The "nation of immigrants" argument is at its core a tautology. Establishing which nation is the most "immigrantish" would be akin to establishing a wetness scale to individual drops of rain. Edit: spelling