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> Better access for US citizens to universities and healthcare will not be gained by importing ever cheaper highly skilled labor I believe I already stated tha

> Better access for US citizens to universities and healthcare will not be gained by importing ever cheaper highly skilled labor I believe I already stated that more immigration is not the solution, in my first comment in this thread. > especially labor that like you is here to take what they can, selfishly, before they jump ship. What's with the hostility and personal attacks? I'm paying the same taxes are everyone around me, but without the right to influence the system because I can't vote. So I can't see what makes me selfish, except the fact that I plan to "jump ship", as you put it. I came to this country with high hopes and expectations, with the idea that I can not only enrich my life and that of my family, but also work on marvelous tech and make the world better. What my actual experience turned out to be is out of scope of this discussion, but would certainly be a prerequisite for judging me fairly.

DataWorker 8y ago
I’m not judging you. You came here because you had personal desires that, noble or not, were not fulfilled. And you will leave for that same reason. That seems like pretty common human behavior to me and so I make no judgements about your morals, but I will point out that a less selfish way of seeing the world might lead you to ask yourself how you can have a positive impact and make your new home a better place. Perhaps that sense of personal responsibility is an American affectation. As one of our leaders once said, ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country. That seems even more apropos for those who have made the conscious decision to adopt this place as their home.
- leetcrew 8y ago
  > Perhaps that sense of personal responsibility is an American affectation for all the talk of "liberal snowflakes", i do find that americans possess a decent amount of personal responsibility, insofar as they will take action to improve their own lives. as for improving their home country, i don't really see many americans doing much other than talk. the only people i see taking action in this way are members of marginalized groups working to improve things for their group and my white liberal friends taking selfies at protests.
- CodeMage 8y ago
  > I’m not judging you. Again, I might be wrong, but every time I've read or heard the word "selfish", it was always used as a judgment. > ask yourself how you can have a positive impact and make your new home a better place I was under the impression that having a discussion about how to improve things with a group of people who might be in a better position than average to help improve them was also a way of working towards that goal. > Perhaps that sense of personal responsibility is an American affectation. This is the third country I've lived in, including my own country of birth. My experience is limited, but it's still more than the average person gets. From that experience, it seems to me to be a generational thing, much more than cultural. It can be seen in different attitudes that different generations adopt towards their employers: generally older generations see their employer as part of their life and a kind of a "family", whereas younger generations view it as a business transaction with severe imbalance of power. I expect same thing happens with patriotism. There does seem to be at least one cultural aspect to it, though. Americans, as well as citizens of other countries where capitalism has advanced to similar extremes, seem to view things with a sense of "personal responsibility" rather than collective or communal responsibility. > As one of our leaders once said, ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country. That seems even more apropos for those who have made the conscious decision to adopt this place as their home. Why would it seem "even more apropos" for immigrants? I honestly don't understand this logic: why would you expect guests in your home to take better care of it than you do yourself? And I use the word "guest", rather than "fosterling", because not all immigrants come here immediately convinced that this will be their new home. Here's a truth about a lot of us immigrants: we come here with a hope, but not with a conviction. We would have preferred to live a happy, fulfilled life in our own country and we tried, but for whatever reason we couldn't and we decided to leave. The definition of insanity, as they say, is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results. Besides, we're not talking about what the country can do for me. We're talking about what the country can do for its future generations. I already have an excellent education. But I have a much bigger responsibility to my own son, than to your country or even my own.
  - howlgram 8y ago
    > as well as citizens of other countries where capitalism has advanced to similar extremes, seem to view things with a sense of "personal responsibility" rather than collective or communal responsibility. that's wrong, what you are referring to is "individualism vs collectivism", there's definitely very developed countries who favor collectivism, the perfect example is Japan.

DataWorker 8y ago

I’m not judging you. You came here because you had personal desires that, noble or not, were not fulfilled. And you will leave for that same reason. That seems like pretty common human behavior to me and so I make no judgements about your morals, but I will point out that a less selfish way of seeing the world might lead you to ask yourself how you can have a positive impact and make your new home a better place. Perhaps that sense of personal responsibility is an American affectation. As one of our leaders once said, ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country. That seems even more apropos for those who have made the conscious decision to adopt this place as their home.

leetcrew 8y ago
> Perhaps that sense of personal responsibility is an American affectation for all the talk of "liberal snowflakes", i do find that americans possess a decent amount of personal responsibility, insofar as they will take action to improve their own lives. as for improving their home country, i don't really see many americans doing much other than talk. the only people i see taking action in this way are members of marginalized groups working to improve things for their group and my white liberal friends taking selfies at protests.
CodeMage 8y ago
> I’m not judging you. Again, I might be wrong, but every time I've read or heard the word "selfish", it was always used as a judgment. > ask yourself how you can have a positive impact and make your new home a better place I was under the impression that having a discussion about how to improve things with a group of people who might be in a better position than average to help improve them was also a way of working towards that goal. > Perhaps that sense of personal responsibility is an American affectation. This is the third country I've lived in, including my own country of birth. My experience is limited, but it's still more than the average person gets. From that experience, it seems to me to be a generational thing, much more than cultural. It can be seen in different attitudes that different generations adopt towards their employers: generally older generations see their employer as part of their life and a kind of a "family", whereas younger generations view it as a business transaction with severe imbalance of power. I expect same thing happens with patriotism. There does seem to be at least one cultural aspect to it, though. Americans, as well as citizens of other countries where capitalism has advanced to similar extremes, seem to view things with a sense of "personal responsibility" rather than collective or communal responsibility. > As one of our leaders once said, ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country. That seems even more apropos for those who have made the conscious decision to adopt this place as their home. Why would it seem "even more apropos" for immigrants? I honestly don't understand this logic: why would you expect guests in your home to take better care of it than you do yourself? And I use the word "guest", rather than "fosterling", because not all immigrants come here immediately convinced that this will be their new home. Here's a truth about a lot of us immigrants: we come here with a hope, but not with a conviction. We would have preferred to live a happy, fulfilled life in our own country and we tried, but for whatever reason we couldn't and we decided to leave. The definition of insanity, as they say, is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results. Besides, we're not talking about what the country can do for me. We're talking about what the country can do for its future generations. I already have an excellent education. But I have a much bigger responsibility to my own son, than to your country or even my own.
- howlgram 8y ago
  > as well as citizens of other countries where capitalism has advanced to similar extremes, seem to view things with a sense of "personal responsibility" rather than collective or communal responsibility. that's wrong, what you are referring to is "individualism vs collectivism", there's definitely very developed countries who favor collectivism, the perfect example is Japan.