immigration frustration

(Yet another) depressing tale of how the people of Arizona march toward state-directed enforcement-only measures that hurt themselves in the long run.

Yale law prof Amy Chua writes a ridiculous op-ed in the Post that is beneath her intelligence, giving some support to Huntington-esque nativism about our national cultural identity. Look: the U.S. has no national ethnic identity, and that's awesome. Anything you're sure is our culture is a soft-focus old-timey picture that was never fixed in time - it was changing even then. Chua even makes it sound like it's outrageously easy for U.S. citizens to get their brothers and sisters green cards, when actually, it now takes 11 to 22 years for those numbers to come up.

But the most offensive part of the op-ed is the English-only section, where she adopts the often-used logic that since English-speaking is key to our national identity (whatever), we need to make it the national language, and that will somehow, magically, make more people learn English.

This ignores large chunks of reality, namely that a) immigrants really, really want to learn English, but it takes time, is hard, and is expensive, even more so when local governments continue to cut resources for ESL classes that are already packed to the gills, and b) it is widely documented that the second generation speaks very good English, so chill out already. She even throws in a line about how bilingual elementary education is "the wrong kind of indulgence," evincing an ignorance of what bilingual ed is that I don't have time to rant about.

I also can't get into my feelings on her ending comments that it's a problem, specifically a threat to our "ethnically neutral identity," that most of the U.S.'s immigrants come from the populous poor countries geographically close to us (shocker!) and we need to cut back on them and get more Estonians and Burmese people. Gaaaaah.

I'm so tired of the scapegoating - and, on the campaign trail, the open pandering to white middle-aged voters who are really uncomfortable with immigrants who don't look or sound like them, even by politicians who know a lot better:

Then [Edwards] added a final point, one that, he acknowledges, is "a little more controversial - If you want to become an American citizen, you ought to learn to speak English." The nearly all-white audience burst into applause.

English IS a requirement for citizenship, you menso. Real controversial.

Comments

[New Duck]

It's so frustrating to read this crap (I mean her op-ed, not your post). It seriously cracks me up when people who have never been out the U.S. say that the English language is going to disappear because of "all those damn immigrants coming here and making us speak Spanish." Step outside our borders for five minutes and you realize that English is slowly becoming the universal language. The idea that it could be lost is a joke, and is used as a tool to scare ignorant people (Oh my Gawd Vernon, we're all going to be speaking Spanish! Quick, vote Republican!).

[PT-LawMom]

(*&^(*#%^^!(^!!!!!! F*)(.

[Directora]

I am still in shock from your last post. When I get there I will bar the door so you can't go outside and fall again!!

[AR]

:(

I hate my state's immigration and criminal procedure stances, and I know our intersecting interests mean you have to excoriate it, but *sigh*. It's just kind of embarassing.

[Cait]

I need to find the study I read a year or so back showing that current immigrants are learning English at the same rate as past immigrants did. It's one of my favorite answers to the "well MY ancestors learned English and assimilated!"

Ignorance reigns supreme. I'm always irked when third or fourth generation immigrants (okay, so they are citizens due to accident of location of birth) talk about how their people learned English. What a crock. How would they know? They are no longer in the ethnic enclaves their great-grandparents were in where no one had to speak English, just like today. I would guess that a select group..English, Irish (to some extent) came here speaking English, but they don't represent all the kids I went to school with: Armenians, Italians, Germans, Japanese, Russians who didn't. Don't get me started.

[FPF]

A relative told me once about some parents in Ft. Lee, NJ, who were demonstrating against Asian immigrant kids because they were spending too much of their spare time studying and that it was messing up the marking curves and requiring the teachers to assign more homework. I remember hearing those kind of comments about Jewish kids in the NY schools when I grew up.

Human nature will always lead a certain percentage of people to make "I'm entitled to success" excuses for their failures. Don't waste your time on them.

But you're right, Dre, go after the ones who should know better.

[FPF]

By the way, New Duck, this isn't a Republican-Democrat issue. Contrast McCain and Edwards.

[Proto Attorney]

Where I'm from, those speaking English as a second language usually have a much better grasp on the grammar than the natives, and speak with clearer diction. How many times have I heard some idiot complaining about not being able to understand "them foreigners," when you can barely understand what HE'S saying in the first place? Maybe we should start administering the TOEFL to all native-speakers of English and if they don't pass, then revoking their citizenship. Seems only fair.