4 ms·

I think the biggest question the US needs to ask itself is do we want to be normal like most countries or better?

by jimkleiber 5mo ago

petcat 5mo ago
USA has been far better for over 100 years. But that had to end at some point. So now we're seeing it end.
- huxley 5mo ago
  Nah, there was just more economic activity to draw people in. By every other measure it’s been more hostile than average. But you are right that it is ending, just wrong about what: it’s the high economic activity that attracted people which is disappearing thanks to the same people that hate migrants.
  - woodruffw 5mo ago
    > By every other measure it’s been more hostile than average. I'm not sure there's a "just" here: compared to peer countries, the US is either middle-of-the-pack[1] or significantly more accepting of immigrants[2] depending on which number you pick. (This isn't to somehow imply that the US isn't hostile to its immigrants, because it is. But the question is whether it's more hostile.) [1]: https://www.visualcapitalist.com/charted-the-share-of-foreign-born-population-in-oecd-countries/ https://www.visualcapitalist.com/charted-the-share-of-foreig... [2]: https://www.oecd.org/en/data/indicators/stocks-of-foreign-born-population-in-oecd-countries.html https://www.oecd.org/en/data/indicators/stocks-of-foreign-bo...
    - antalis 5mo ago
      The parent post says it’s the high economic activity that attracted people even though the US has been more hostile than average by every other measure. So it's as if the US was a honeypot with a flyswatter. By the way, your [2] is useless to prove your point: you can't compare absolute numbers (for instance Iceland vs the US).
      - woodruffw 5mo ago
        I don’t think I agree that it’s hostile by every other measure. The US’s immigration system is cruel and capricious, but assimilating into the US seems to be a lot easier than, for example, France or Germany. The US is unusual among its peer countries in not requiring immigrants to speak the “official” language fluently, in accepting public displays of ethnic or religious background that aren’t ambiently European Christian, etc. (Again, I must emphasize that this does not make the US good. Only that the bar is perhaps lower than people who are assimilated into any particular country may realize.)
    - bryanrasmussen 5mo ago
      I would suggest that the proper metric is not the number of immigrants, which after all the parent commentator implied would be the case because of higher economics drawing them in, but a combination of the following 1. the amount of violence directed against immigrants legally allowed in by governmental forces. 2. the chance of legally allowed in immigrants will have immigration status changed without due process. 3. what percentage of Immigrants fear that 1 or 2 will happen to them. I believe these two conditions seem to exist in the United States currently, although not sure how many immigrants it affects. I am unsure if there are other countries that have a similar situation, I would expect if there are they must be relatively few in number. The closest type of situation would be, I suppose, racial oppression focused on particular groups that have become undesirable according to a country's government.
- epistasis 5mo ago
  It did not "have" to end, it's merely a political choice by one political faction being forced upon the entire nation.
  - lazide 5mo ago
    You mean the elected one?
    - deleted 5mo ago
      [deleted]
  - root_axis 5mo ago
    People hate to be reminded of this, but that "faction" is the voters, in record numbers for the party.
    - epistasis 5mo ago
      Not really, voters didn't want this, and they hate it when they are told what's happening. The media silently accepted Trump's lie at face value when he said he knew nothing about Project 2025, despite anybody with half a brain realizing it was a lie. Reporters acted like they had less than half a brain, so that they wouldn't get bopped on their nose by their editors, who in turn were already bowing down to Trump. The "faction" lied about their intentions in order to be elected. That in itself isn't uncommon, but what is uncommon is the degree to which it lied. Most Republican voters, when told about the actual policies being implemented by elected Republicans, don't believe the reports, and assume that nobody would be enacting such stupid policy. Yet the voters keep voting for them.
      - root_axis 5mo ago
        > voters didn't want this Yes they did. Of course they didn't want to be targeted themselves, but the rhetoric was very explicit about what would happen, and they already had a preview of it in 2016 and voted even more favorably for this regime this time around. > The media silently accepted Trump's lie at face value when he said he knew nothing about Project 2025 Not true. The media was very vocal about it, and it was obvious that he was on board with it. > Most Republican voters, when told about the actual policies being implemented by elected Republicans, don't believe the reports, and assume that nobody would be enacting such stupid policy. This isn't true. The recent ouster of Thomas Massie is a clear example of this. However, even if that were true, Republican voters still overwhelmingly prefer this to the alternative (Democrats), and polls show this today. > Yet the voters keep voting for them. Indeed. Not sure how you can acknowledge this but somehow believe it's not what the voters want.
- platevoltage 5mo ago
  DO you have a good reason why?
  - petcat 5mo ago
    Because the industrialization of America is over, and has been for decades. USA doesn't need low-wage, immigrant workers anymore. The railroads have already been built, the fields have been plowed, and now that's all done by big automated machines. Everything that cheap workers used to do that was valuable is now automated.
    - striking 5mo ago
      Who does the farming? Who does the cleaning? Who builds the buildings? Who are the line cooks? That should be obvious. But it should be just as obvious that there are plenty of immigrants who are also necessary because they bring new ideas, their education, their incredible work ethic, to fill in the gaps that the US clearly has. There is one thing that unites all of us (and I do mean us, as I am one of them). We all dream of a society where our hard work can become prosperity for ourselves and for everyone else, a plot of fertile soil that is worth sowing. We all come here with a dream. And I personally don't mind so much that I'm uplifting people that don't agree with my existence. I just wish that they could stay out of our way so we could all benefit.
      - dangus 5mo ago
        You don’t even have to think that hard about it. Without immigration an imminent depopulation crisis is on its way to America. We are actually blessed to be in demand as an immigration destination as well as a culture and infrastructure uniquely set up for it. Squandering that advantage to satisfy xenophobic ideology is yet another demonstration of the Republican Party’s lack of fiscal responsibility. See also: completely random war in Iran, ICE budget increases spent on kicking out taxpayers/customers, tax cuts for billionaires, the current record high budget deficit, $1.8 billion fund for Trump brownshirts, etc.
        5mo ago
- behringer 5mo ago
  Far better than who?
- nephihaha 5mo ago
  A hundred years? Maybe after WW2. The Great Depression was pretty rough over there.
- fcarraldo 5mo ago
  100 years? In the 1920s and 1930s the US had: - Forced labor - Peonage - Debt servitude - Jim crow laws The 19th amendment was ratified in 1920, so that barely missed the cutoff. The US has not been some beacon of moral righteousness for the majority of its existence.
  - petcat 5mo ago
    USA accepted more immigrants between 1900 and 1980 than every other western country combined.
deleted 5mo ago
[deleted]
WesolyKubeczek 5mo ago
At this point the US is the kid eating glue, it looks like.
philipallstar 5mo ago
I think it's more like: the US is the most generous country in the world regarding immigration, funding global health, funding global defence, funding global aid, but Europeans and others (including a lot of the young American left) talk about it as though it's the worst country in the world. So why bother, when you can just spend your money on your own citizens the way most countries do and fund loads of internal benefits?
- jimkleiber 5mo ago
  Because I think we've been generous because we recognize the benefits that come to us for being so generous. Proper generosity recognizes that the other's well-being relates to our well-being. For example, giving funding to USAID to try to stop the spread of Ebola helps people in DRC, Uganda, and other countries directly affected, but can also help the US not have Ebola spread here. Helping Mexico improve their economy can help people in Mexico not immigrate to the US. I believe our generosity also benefits us much more than we can see when our perspective collapses and we see life from fewer and fewer dimensions. And I think we can collapse into the "us vs them" mindset that so many others have collapsed into or we can go the other direction and realize it's "us with them" and then we look at generosity differently.

I think the biggest question the US needs to ask itself is do we want to be normal like most countries or better?

petcat 5mo ago

USA has been far better for over 100 years. But that had to end at some point. So now we're seeing it end.

huxley 5mo ago
Nah, there was just more economic activity to draw people in. By every other measure it’s been more hostile than average. But you are right that it is ending, just wrong about what: it’s the high economic activity that attracted people which is disappearing thanks to the same people that hate migrants.
- woodruffw 5mo ago
  > By every other measure it’s been more hostile than average. I'm not sure there's a "just" here: compared to peer countries, the US is either middle-of-the-pack[1] or significantly more accepting of immigrants[2] depending on which number you pick. (This isn't to somehow imply that the US isn't hostile to its immigrants, because it is. But the question is whether it's more hostile.) [1]: https://www.visualcapitalist.com/charted-the-share-of-foreign-born-population-in-oecd-countries/ https://www.visualcapitalist.com/charted-the-share-of-foreig... [2]: https://www.oecd.org/en/data/indicators/stocks-of-foreign-born-population-in-oecd-countries.html https://www.oecd.org/en/data/indicators/stocks-of-foreign-bo...
  - antalis 5mo ago
    The parent post says it’s the high economic activity that attracted people even though the US has been more hostile than average by every other measure. So it's as if the US was a honeypot with a flyswatter. By the way, your [2] is useless to prove your point: you can't compare absolute numbers (for instance Iceland vs the US).
    - woodruffw 5mo ago
      I don’t think I agree that it’s hostile by every other measure. The US’s immigration system is cruel and capricious, but assimilating into the US seems to be a lot easier than, for example, France or Germany. The US is unusual among its peer countries in not requiring immigrants to speak the “official” language fluently, in accepting public displays of ethnic or religious background that aren’t ambiently European Christian, etc. (Again, I must emphasize that this does not make the US good. Only that the bar is perhaps lower than people who are assimilated into any particular country may realize.)
  - bryanrasmussen 5mo ago
    I would suggest that the proper metric is not the number of immigrants, which after all the parent commentator implied would be the case because of higher economics drawing them in, but a combination of the following 1. the amount of violence directed against immigrants legally allowed in by governmental forces. 2. the chance of legally allowed in immigrants will have immigration status changed without due process. 3. what percentage of Immigrants fear that 1 or 2 will happen to them. I believe these two conditions seem to exist in the United States currently, although not sure how many immigrants it affects. I am unsure if there are other countries that have a similar situation, I would expect if there are they must be relatively few in number. The closest type of situation would be, I suppose, racial oppression focused on particular groups that have become undesirable according to a country's government.
epistasis 5mo ago
It did not "have" to end, it's merely a political choice by one political faction being forced upon the entire nation.
- lazide 5mo ago
  You mean the elected one?
  - deleted 5mo ago
    [deleted]
- root_axis 5mo ago
  People hate to be reminded of this, but that "faction" is the voters, in record numbers for the party.
  - epistasis 5mo ago
    Not really, voters didn't want this, and they hate it when they are told what's happening. The media silently accepted Trump's lie at face value when he said he knew nothing about Project 2025, despite anybody with half a brain realizing it was a lie. Reporters acted like they had less than half a brain, so that they wouldn't get bopped on their nose by their editors, who in turn were already bowing down to Trump. The "faction" lied about their intentions in order to be elected. That in itself isn't uncommon, but what is uncommon is the degree to which it lied. Most Republican voters, when told about the actual policies being implemented by elected Republicans, don't believe the reports, and assume that nobody would be enacting such stupid policy. Yet the voters keep voting for them.
    - root_axis 5mo ago
      > voters didn't want this Yes they did. Of course they didn't want to be targeted themselves, but the rhetoric was very explicit about what would happen, and they already had a preview of it in 2016 and voted even more favorably for this regime this time around. > The media silently accepted Trump's lie at face value when he said he knew nothing about Project 2025 Not true. The media was very vocal about it, and it was obvious that he was on board with it. > Most Republican voters, when told about the actual policies being implemented by elected Republicans, don't believe the reports, and assume that nobody would be enacting such stupid policy. This isn't true. The recent ouster of Thomas Massie is a clear example of this. However, even if that were true, Republican voters still overwhelmingly prefer this to the alternative (Democrats), and polls show this today. > Yet the voters keep voting for them. Indeed. Not sure how you can acknowledge this but somehow believe it's not what the voters want.
platevoltage 5mo ago
DO you have a good reason why?
- petcat 5mo ago
  Because the industrialization of America is over, and has been for decades. USA doesn't need low-wage, immigrant workers anymore. The railroads have already been built, the fields have been plowed, and now that's all done by big automated machines. Everything that cheap workers used to do that was valuable is now automated.
  - striking 5mo ago
    Who does the farming? Who does the cleaning? Who builds the buildings? Who are the line cooks? That should be obvious. But it should be just as obvious that there are plenty of immigrants who are also necessary because they bring new ideas, their education, their incredible work ethic, to fill in the gaps that the US clearly has. There is one thing that unites all of us (and I do mean us, as I am one of them). We all dream of a society where our hard work can become prosperity for ourselves and for everyone else, a plot of fertile soil that is worth sowing. We all come here with a dream. And I personally don't mind so much that I'm uplifting people that don't agree with my existence. I just wish that they could stay out of our way so we could all benefit.
    - dangus 5mo ago
      You don’t even have to think that hard about it. Without immigration an imminent depopulation crisis is on its way to America. We are actually blessed to be in demand as an immigration destination as well as a culture and infrastructure uniquely set up for it. Squandering that advantage to satisfy xenophobic ideology is yet another demonstration of the Republican Party’s lack of fiscal responsibility. See also: completely random war in Iran, ICE budget increases spent on kicking out taxpayers/customers, tax cuts for billionaires, the current record high budget deficit, $1.8 billion fund for Trump brownshirts, etc.
      - 5mo ago
behringer 5mo ago
Far better than who?
nephihaha 5mo ago
A hundred years? Maybe after WW2. The Great Depression was pretty rough over there.
fcarraldo 5mo ago
100 years? In the 1920s and 1930s the US had: - Forced labor - Peonage - Debt servitude - Jim crow laws The 19th amendment was ratified in 1920, so that barely missed the cutoff. The US has not been some beacon of moral righteousness for the majority of its existence.
- petcat 5mo ago
  USA accepted more immigrants between 1900 and 1980 than every other western country combined.

deleted 5mo ago

[deleted]

WesolyKubeczek 5mo ago

At this point the US is the kid eating glue, it looks like.

philipallstar 5mo ago

I think it's more like: the US is the most generous country in the world regarding immigration, funding global health, funding global defence, funding global aid, but Europeans and others (including a lot of the young American left) talk about it as though it's the worst country in the world. So why bother, when you can just spend your money on your own citizens the way most countries do and fund loads of internal benefits?

jimkleiber 5mo ago
Because I think we've been generous because we recognize the benefits that come to us for being so generous. Proper generosity recognizes that the other's well-being relates to our well-being. For example, giving funding to USAID to try to stop the spread of Ebola helps people in DRC, Uganda, and other countries directly affected, but can also help the US not have Ebola spread here. Helping Mexico improve their economy can help people in Mexico not immigrate to the US. I believe our generosity also benefits us much more than we can see when our perspective collapses and we see life from fewer and fewer dimensions. And I think we can collapse into the "us vs them" mindset that so many others have collapsed into or we can go the other direction and realize it's "us with them" and then we look at generosity differently.