Champas Socialist

Join Date 07/2004

Our Multicultural Nation: Love it or Leave It!

;> Dr, I've got whiplash

I grew up a very proud Australian. I learned Aussie slang terms that are becoming obsolete, I deliberately developed a broad Aussie accent and I became one of the very few who knows the 2nd verse to the national anthem.

I grew up under the Hawke-Keating Government. Although I’m old enough now to recognise the emptiness of some of their words, it was largely their example that made me proud. They spoke of reconciling our differences, of breaking down the barriers and tensions that exist between Aboriginal people and Australia’s more recent arrivals. We acknowledged the special history and culture of the most ancient surviving culture in the world. We also acknowledged that the land of Australia was not our ancestors’ to take for us and so we gave native title rights to those who should have inherited the land from their parents and grandparents. It wasn’t just that Hawke and Keating said all this, but that they regularly reinforced these messages as an important part of what it means to be an Australian. It was something we were proud of and it was something that was reinforced to me as a child. This was the example I wanted to follow.

Hawke and Keating also spoke of learning to value the knowledge offered to us by our people’s diverse backgrounds. They spoke of celebrating the many different cultural practices that exist in Australia.

I learned from this example. It made me proud to be an Australian. To me, being an Australian meant trying to put a few past mistakes right. It meant abandoning the mistake of the White Australia Policy and openly embracing a multicultural future. It meant celebrating our differences as something that makes us unique and interesting.

Unlike many other countries who force their citizens to adhere to specific cultural and religious practices, we valued our right to be different from each other. Unlike other countries who engage in a monoculture, we were a shining example to the world of how people of differing backgrounds could love living together.

Australia has a culture of its own. We aren’t dull, and we aren’t brash. We are an honest, fair-minded, hard-working people. That’s what we have in common. But within the geographical boundaries of this island, there is room not just for the cities, but also for Aboriginal camps and villages who adhere to a more communal lifestyle than the Anglo inhabitants. There is room not just for farming communities, but for foreign language speaking immigrants to speak a variety of languages. There is room for people of varying religions to practise and there is room for Chinatowns, where I love going. There is room for us all to learn about each other’s cultures and languages.

And that’s what I love about multicultural Australia. I love having friends who are Muslims, Trinidadian, Aboriginal, Italian etc. I love finding out about the special things they know because of their backgrounds, that I could never learn otherwise. I love walking the streets and hearing all sorts of interesting sounding languages. I love practising French when I meet French immigrants.

And that’s AustraliA. Australia IS Multicultural.If you don’t love it, LEAVE!

That includes you, John Howard!

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I'd like to know where he got those stats because the Aborigines actually represent 2% of the population. Without adding in the Africans etc.

But yes I will say that part of my impressions of Australia are based on having grown up in canberra. In Brisbane I find it a little uncomfortably monocultural.

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To quote our Government's website:

http://www.immi.gov.au/facts/04fifty.htm

People from around 200 countries have migrated to Australia. Today, about 23% of our population was born overseas and more than 200 languages are spoken here.

At least 17 per cent of Australians come from a non-English speaking background and speak another language at home. In Australia, over 200 languages are spoken including 45 Indigenous languages.
Today, nearly one in four of Australia's more than 20 million population were born overseas. New Zealand and the United Kingdom are the largest source countries for migrants, but other regions – notably Asia – have become more significant.
Currently more than 100 000 migrants each year are granted visas under the Skill and Family Streams of Australia’s Migration Program. More than 150 000 people now receive temporary entry visas to Australia each year, to undertake specific work or business, or to entertain, play sport or have a working holiday. In addition to these numbers, around 13 000 humanitarian entrants will also travel to Australia each year to rebuild their lives, having fled persecution or suffering.
It has gone from an almost total Aboriginal population to predominantly Anglo-Celtic (by 1900) and on to its present mix of about 74 per cent Anglo-Celtic, 19 per cent other European and 4.5 per cent Asian.
In Australia today, nearly one in four people were born overseas, 43 per cent of all Australian’s were born overseas or have at least one parent who was born overseas and in recent years, people from around 185 different countries have made their home in Australia.

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Oh and just checked the Australian Bureau of Stats site for a sec and found:

To arrive at an estimate of the size of the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander population using the Census count (on a usual residence basis), allowance is made for net undercount, and for instances in which Indigenous status is unknown. While each Census aims to count every person in Australia once, some people are inevitably missed and some are counted more than once; the net effect is referred to as undercount. In addition, Indigenous status is unknown in some cases, due to the Indigenous origin question not being answered, or the inability to obtain a Census form from persons who were identified in the field. A proportion of records in both categories will represent Indigenous residents. Population estimates for dates other than the Census date must also take account of births, deaths and migration in the intervening period.

At 30 June 2001 the experimental estimated resident Indigenous population of Australia was 460,140, or 2.4% of the total estimated resident population of Australia.

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Australia is 95% white, 4% Asian, and 1% everything else which includes the aboriginals that survived Australia's genocide attempts.

White isn't a culture it's a colour(same goes for the term Asian for that matter). Many of those white people are first or second generation immigrants from non-english speaking countries such as Italy, Lebanon, and Greece (those are just examples not necessarily representative) with entirely different cultures (as compared with Anglo whites). So that 95% white is misleading. There isn't complete assimilation as Draginol would imply many of them stick to their own kind. Not to put a too fine a point on it he has no idea what it is like in this country. Australia is by no means a monolithic culture and I should bloody know because I grew up in a culturally mixed family myself. In short you can't judge culture diversity by race type diversity. See how long it takes for your head to get punched if you tell a Japanese person that they are the same culturally as a Chinese person or that Serbians are the same as the Lebanese.

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Eloquently put Tobler1 Kanobe. And while some of Draginol's comments are not undermined by these stats and Toblerone's point, his credibility on the issue is a bit. As I've said before, we still have plenty of people in this country having a whinge about enclaves of certain races.

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Tobler1 Kanobe

Cool, does this mean I get a cool purple light sabre?

As I've said before, we still have plenty of people in this country having a whinge about enclaves of certain races.

Indeed we do, that's why I'm getting my father deported, the black bastard

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This impetus to dismiss a whole race of people's cultural significance, just because they may represent only 1% of the population is embarrassing, particularly knowing that they are the remnant population of our culture's genocide. CS, I don't want you to think that all Americans are as blatantly racist as this previous responder is to your post. Admittedly, there is a very racist segment of our population, and I find them to be an American embarrassment and shameful. We do what we can to work against such a backward and shameful mindset.

We have an ugly past also. A virtual genocide of some populations of Native Americans and slavery are but two examples. At present, we're not doing so well, either. Steered and segregated housing and schools, and aversion to languages other than English come to mind. We are not doing very well, at all. And we Americans seem to have some real neocon racists at the helm of this country. So, even though I admittedly do not know very much about Australian politics, I think I know what you're saying.

For some reason, this world seems to be going a bit nuts. Ultra conservatives, and christo-fascist are prevailing. I say Christian, because these fascists are using religion, particularly Christianity, as their rallying cry. Don't get me wrong. I'm not anti Christian. But, I am adamantly against these people who are using Christianity as the tool by which they gain power, and they are actually subverting our Constitution in the process.

What I find interesting is that it seems that Communism is anti religious at its core. It forcefully attempts to ban and marginalize, and eventually eradicate all religion, and doing so in a dictatorial way. Not good.

Fascism, on the other hand, is all about religion, and particularly Christianity. It divides and marginalizes religions, pitting one against the other, using it to grab power, and doing so in a dictatorial way. Those of us who are not Christians feel this in a particularly cutting way. They say they are not racists, yet support fascism by calling "cultural values and morality". They even are now saying that this country was based on Christian morality. Bullshit. It's racism at it's most insidious.

Democracy does not include religions in any sense. It serves to keep religion completely out of government, basing decisions, laws, judicial decisions, etc. on social morality and best practices established for an even handed government. This is the basis of our American Constitution. It is about allowing all citizens, and even non citizens equal protection under the law; about the right to practice religion freely, and without interference from government. This is not to say that it's all perfect. And fact is you just can't please all of the people all of the time.

The world, and what seems like most countries, seems to be leaning towards religion as the basis for their governments. This can only have one outcome. Marginalization, humiliation, segregation and racism can only result in war, of which the extreme examples have been genocide. More people have died in the name of religion than any other reason, except maybe the Black Death. Religion is often the basis of racism, and brought into government, is the basis of dictatorship and the creation of oppression. In steps the dubya dummy and all his neocons.

I take it that John Howard wasn't your first choice. Nor was the neocon, christo fascist, deathmonger George Bush mine. We're stuck with these idiot for now. We do our best to uphold our values of inclusiveness and fair government, and hope like hope itself that this too shall pass. The pendulum does swing back. Maybe, with some luck, it will find its democratic center.

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dabe, I've heard a lot of things said about you lately, mostly derogatory. All I can say is I see little evidence of what you are often accused of in this well-thought out response. Equally, LW has controlled herself quite well on my blog. Actually, whenever she makes it over to my blog, I've felt she's done quite a nice job of coming across as a calm person.

"immigrants from the UK and New Zealand when quoting diversity figures"

I wasn't saying that makes us diverse. That's the 74% Anglo-Celtic. I was just giving you the whole picture. I'm not going to lie and say we're all black and yellow skinned. Whities breed like rabbits.

"95 out of 100 people you meet are going to be just like you"

I hardly find the French to be much like the English. Watch them spit on you as you say it. And if they are so alike, then why do you hate them so much?

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Your condescending attitude towards LW and your slavish fawning of Dabe not with standing, I would hope that by opening this can of worms, you can at least discuss it intelligently.

That being said, if you are going to micro-slice every nationality into its own subculture (with some degree of justification), then Australia still falls a very poor second (if that) to the US.

I could go on and on and on, and did. If you want to read the rest of the response, look here:

http://drguy.joeuser.com/index.asp?AID=72938

And really open your mind as you say you do, instead of trying to damn others for your own sins.

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Similar sorts of articles are easily found in today's United States by supporters of George W. Bush who have this "If you don't like it, leave" mentality, as if they are the sole proprietors of a nation's criteria for allowing persons to remain. The only difference is that the intolerance comes from the opposite side of the political spectrum. Either way, it's still intolerance and doesn't look pretty on anyone, nor does it reflect well on the country whose residents impose it on others.

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Champas just said that we are a multicultural nation. He never said that it was a more culturally diverse nation that the US or that we aren't a mostly white nation, but Champas and I have lived most of our lived in a fairly culturally diverse town and so our perception is quite understandly coloured *snicker* by this. Here is a more comprehensive set of stats from the 2001 census before i expalian further:

The 2001 Census results released today by the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) reveal a nation of rich cultural diversity.

Ancestry

There were over 200 different ancestries reported, with up to two ancestries recorded for each person. The most common ancestry was Australian, with 6,739,594 or 35.9% of all people choosing this as one of their responses; next most popular were English (6,358,880 or 33.9%), Irish (1,919,727 or 10.2%), Italian (800,256 or 4.3%) German (742,212 or 4.0%), Chinese (556,554 or 3.0%), Scottish (540,046 or 2.9%) and Greek (375,703 or 2.0%).

Birthplace

Just over one fifth of Australia's population (22%) was born overseas, which is about the same as for the 1996 Census. Of those born overseas, the three main countries of birth were United Kingdom 1,036,245 (5.5%), New Zealand 355,765 (1.9%), and Italy 218,718 (1.2%).

There were 2,133,676 people born in Europe (including UK) or 11.2% of the population, 982,519 were born in Asia or 5.2% of the population and Middle East and North Africa accounted for 213,942 people or 1.1% of the population.

Western Australia has the highest proportion of its total population born overseas (27%). New South Wales and Victoria have equal proportions of overseas born people (about 23%), followed by the ACT and South Australia (21% each), Queensland (17%), NT (14%) and Tasmania (10%).

Language

Italian, with 353,605 speakers, is the most popular language other than English spoken at home, followed by Greek, 263,717, Cantonese, 225,307, Arabic 209,372, and Vietnamese with 174,236 speakers.

You may notice that the ACT where Champas and I grew up has third highest proportion of population born overseas (21%) of all the states and territories. The ACT is also the smallest of the states and territories (look at a map it's tiny, the populated region is even smaller). This relatively high proportion of foreigners is because Canberra (the Capital city of a Australia in the ACT) is home to the Embassies and the ANU and hence attracts both lots of international students and diplomats and their families not mention various other immigrants. I would take a guess from experience and say that probably more of our immigrants are non-european than in the other states.
I'm just telling you this so you have some context to where Champas is coming from literally speaking.

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MW, I agree with you but I think it a pity that you couldn't se the point I was making in using that phrase. (That is why I included the subtitle. It's a subtle, ironic reference to Doc Miller who titles his blog "America: Love It or Leave It" (And yes the 2nd half is a refernce to LW, but I wrote this article long before our clashes over this)). This blog is an attempt to point out that I feel just as proud to be an Aussie as any bloody racist does and I'm sick of being told I'm unAustralian for my pro-multicultural views. Regrettably I do believe in the Racists' rights to stay here, but I just want them to know that I can mount an argument for them needing to leave as they can about me needing to leave because I don't like the PM.

When McDonald’s succeeds in foreign countries, many people complain about American culture infiltrating their own culture and destroying it. The JU Right run the defence that Maccas has succeeded economically and so it’s too bad. Yet....

“If you have tens of millions of people who have the same preferences, you can become economically and culturally independent to the degree that you don't have to assimilate to survive and prosper. You have enough power that companies and governments will put in serious consideration into your needs.”
_______
“If you said the same about darkies, wouldn't that be a racist remark?”

Breeding like a rabbits is a bad thing in your country? Must be a cultural difference thing. Over here it’s official Government policy that we should do it. They even pay you for every time you breed now. $600 baby bonus since the last budget.

And I am WHITE! I can make a few self-deprecatory comments about whitefellers, pinkos, vegos and middle-class people if I want. Is that OK with you?

“I simply see the value of ALL the inhabitants of a particular nation learning a single DOMINANT language in order to be able to communicate with each other.”

The Indians got by without the need for every tribe to speak their language, so why can’t you? In fact, across the world, that used to be the norm, to have lots of languages and dialects in small areas. Deal with it. You don’t need to speak with everyone in the country and if you don’t want to live somewhere, leave.

"Actually, whenever she makes it over to my blog, I've felt she's done quite a nice job of coming across as a calm person."

Is that condescending, Dr Guy? I thought I fawned over dabe and LW equally there. I just happen to agree more with dabe, even if they are both running a little off-topic.

"This saves the herculean effort of a Frenchman having to learn German, Dutch, Italian, Spanish, Swedish, etc, in order to be able to communicate with others that share their part of the world. They all speak different languages, but they all speak English as well."

Many Europeans (and I) would argue that you vastly overestimate Europeans' ability with English and underestimate their abilities with German, Italian etc. I met a lot of Europeans who claim to speak English, but when you speak to them, it's extremely limited.

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You accuse me of not practising what I preach.Well in a fairly short time on Earth (much of which I have spent being extremely shy), I have been good friends with all of the following types of Australians:

• 2 Indians
• 2 Aborigines (One of whom could speak Aboriginal English)
• 1 Trinidadian-Australian
• 1 Muslim Malaysian
• 2 Indonesians
• 7 or so French
• 2 Czechs
• 1 Vietnamese
• 2 Belgians
• 1 German
• 2 Sri Lankans
• 1 Swede
• 1 Argentinian

I suppose it’s a bit rich for me to count Sri Lankans and Indians as part of diversity (they follow the same religion as most Australians - cricket - and most of them speak English fluently), but hey. According to LW’s view of the world, there are only 6 cultures: European, African, Oceanian, North American, Asian, and South American.

And what I speak of above is the sort of cultural diversity that some people in my country complain about, and I’m sick of it. I’m sick of people saying we are in danger of being swamped by Asians. I’m sick of people who complain about the grocery store owners and secretaries who only speak minimal English. I’m sick of people whinging about street signs in Chinatown written in Chinese. I’m sick of people who say it’s a grave sign when you come across stores that only accept Yen. And I’m sick of TV current affairs shows that speak of the horror of finding doctors who barely speak English.

I’m tired of that being the dominant discourse. I’m tired of having a Prime Minister who’s old enough to remember the good ole days of assimilation and the White Australia Policy. I’m tired of having a PM who, like his hero, Bob Menzies, seems more patriotic about the British monarchy than he does about Australia. And I’m tired of having a PM who sees me and my fellow Australians for nothing more than our economic value.

I think it’s time to stand up to these racists and say where we stand. To say what we want for Australia. What we want in OUR future, not what the 65 year old PM wants from HIS past. I think it’s time that those of us who believe in that sort of Australia stood up to be counted and said proudly again that we bloody well want to live in a multicultural nation, because that’s what makes us proud to be Australian. I’m bloody proud to be part of a culturally diverse Australia and anyone who isn’t is bloody unAustralian in my view, not the other way around. I think it’s time we reclaimed the right to be proud Australians who want to reaffirm their love of multiculturalism.

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'I for one would like to see any doctor treating patients in the US be required by law to be absolutely fluent in English.'
So, tough sh*t for those Americans for whom English is NOT their first language, I guess. Oh no, of course - they're going to have to shape up and 'convert' to English too.

Why do you appear so scared of diversity, LW? There is a huge richness to be found, both in the similarities within and the differences between the various languages of the world. Imposing a monolingual culture in any particular corner of it is ostensibly forcing a specific, restricted, culturally dictated view of the world upon its members. Think of Newspeak from George Orwell's '1984'. The result would be impractical at best, hugely damaging to cultural richness at worst. Why on earth would you even want to attempt to do that?

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Many Europeans (and I) would argue that you vastly overestimate Europeans' ability with English and underestimate their abilities with German, Italian etc. I met a lot of Europeans who claim to speak English, but when you speak to them, it's extremely limited.

Reading comprehension is more like it. I can speak French, written that is. I do not have the ear for it, but can do very well when I have to time to carefully read it.

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In fact, across the world, that used to be the norm, to have lots of languages and dialects in small areas.

And first, steamships, then the airplane and finally the Internet is erasing that. This is not a diabolical scheme, it is just the fact that no longer do just diplomats need to communicate with one another, so to do ordinary people.

And of course as LW points out, the lack of communication was often the catalyst of some of the worst wars this planet has ever seen or will see (in scale).

No one is legislating a single language. Necessity is causing it.

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Why do you appear so scared of diversity, LW? There is a huge richness to be found, both in the similarities within and the differences between the various languages of the world. Imposing a monolingual culture in any particular corner of it is ostensibly forcing a specific, restricted, culturally dictated view of the world upon its members.

For crying out loud, buy a fucking plane ticket and go take a vacation. Go to China, go to Japan, go to the Congo, go to Syria, go to Italy, go to Brazil, go to Mexico, and go to Indonesia. You're not going to find any of your beloved diversity if every country has to be equally diverse within itself.

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'as they are here at our invitation'

And here's the key. LW appears to see two distinct strata of citizenship - (1) her use of 'we' / 'our', identifying supposedly bona fide citizens, and (2) immigrants. The former (however they might actually be identified; maybe we should ask the native Americans or the aboriginal people of Australia) 'invite' the latter to come and live with them (hmm, I don't remember the native Americans or the aboriginal people of Australia doing very much of THAT, but never mind), whereupon the latter are obliged to spend an indeterminate amount of time grovelling in gratitude.

Needless to say, I don't start from that premise, so I don't arrive at the same conclusions. I'm can't even get angry about it - actually, I'm really rather sorry for LW, because she has an opportunity to make her world fundamentally richer, but her fear prevents her from doing so.

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And here's the key. LW appears to see two distinct strata of citizenship - (1) her use of 'we' / 'our', identifying supposedly bona fide citizens, and (2) immigrants. The former (however they might actually be identified; maybe we should ask the native Americans or the aboriginal people of Australia) 'invite' the latter to come and live with them (hmm, I don't remember the native Americans or the aboriginal people of Australia doing very much of THAT, but never mind),

Funny, I don't recall the "Native Americans" ever thinking of themselves as one people. Or possessing 7 million square miles of land between 7 million people by racial birthright.

I also wonder if those Siberian nomads asked the permission of those people here before them.

Who were the first Americans?

Study: "Native Americans" Weren't the first

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'Funny, I don't recall the "Native Americans" ever thinking of themselves as one people. Or possessing 7 million square miles of land between 7 million people by racial birthright.'
Hooray. My point exactly.

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I also wonder if those Siberian nomads asked the permission of those people here before them.

--I remember reading somewhere that out of every "native american" tribe that lived in north america...less than 1% are actually originally from N.A., that they didn't migrate from where ever....

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'--I remember reading somewhere that out of every "native american" tribe that lived in north america...less than 1% are actually originally from N.A., that they didn't migrate from where ever....'

You may well be right. The history of the world is one of migration and cultural flux. Therefore, particularly in light of the 'shrinking world' phenomenon arising from advances in transport and communication, for Australia / America / anywhere else you care to mention to suddently start getting puritanically defensive about THEIR land / culture / language is not only futile, but just a few thousand years too late, don't you think?

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First of all, I'm sorry I didn't reply to the replies till now. I was out of town. But, following is my response to all the crap that followed.

Whipsy dipsy doodah quoted this draginol gem:

Australia is 95% white, 4% Asian, and 1% everything else which includes the aboriginals that survived Australia's genocide attempts. So while there may indeed be African descendents in Australia, there aren't bloody many of them. Certainly not enough to make that critical mass required to have a distinct and seperate, independent culture.

It was this quote that got me a bit off track here, Champas, but I had to respond. First of all, it doesn't matter if there is only 1% or 3 people. A separate and distinct and independent culture is a culture nonetheless, and no less worthy of recognition and respect. To think that we, as European decendents could wipe out most of a culture, then say not enough exists to be recognized is fucked up. It was dumbass on drag's part, and totally moronic for the dippy whip to quote it.

Then the moron goes on.........

dabe, dabe, dabe...whatever are we going to do about you?

My response: F*cking nothing, you condescending lowlife sack of racist crap. You espouse a superiority to anyone other than white, just because our country, which we stole from the Native Americans is now predominantly white. That's how I come to the conclusion I come to, and why my responded to Champas Socialist's article, which, by the way, was excellent, but you had to go and pollute with your bull.

And do you think that maybe just once, on a topic having nothing to do with Bush, you can get through a post without using the terms facism,deathmonger, christo-facist, neocon death cult, or without engaging in Bush bashing?

Nope, not when you go and pollute with your white trash garbage.

Champas replies.........

dabe, I've heard a lot of things said about you lately, mostly derogatory. All I can say is I see little evidence of what you are often accused of in this well-thought out response.

Thanks, Champas. I did try to write a coherent response. And, I do stand by what I wrote. It did digress from your original topic, but it's what came to my mind at the time.

Then, the guy dope steps in........

Your condescending attitude towards LW and your slavish fawning of Dabe not with standing, I would hope that by opening this can of worms, you can at least discuss it intelligently.

Oh please, you can't be serious. It's way to easy to condescend to whipsh*t. Champas opened an excellent topic, and discussed it intelligently. Your remark adds absolutely nothing to the discussion, other than to come to the dipshit's aid.

He goes one to blabber.............

No, you slammed LW (at least leading up to that point) and fawned over Dabve, whose point was stupid and wrong to say the least. it was Anti American, and so you immediately liked it. That is who Dabe is. If it is Pro America, it must be bad. I think it has something to do with self loathing, but then I am no Psychiatrist.

Guy, as far as I know, I have never personally attacked you. Till now. How dare you call my point, which was very well thought out, stupid and anti-American. You stick to your fascist, racist buddies, and call any dissent from your sicko bushie bull anti-American, because you cannot stand to see a differing opinion. It apparently makes your head explode. What kind of idiot do you think you are? You, you ain't no shrink, but you sure can shirk a sane response. There is nothing self-loathing about me. I am American. A proud one, but not like you and your jingo jerk buddies. I see our government gone awry. I fight to set some things straight. You apparently think trashing the environment, killing Iraqis, redistributing wealth upward, and using religion to further your dubya buddies' fascist and racist causes, is acceptable behavior. You are so wrong.

This country was built with immigrants, not meaning to dismiss the genocide perpetrated against Native Americans. It will always have immigrants. Some will learn English. Some won't. Some will take advantage of what our society has to offer; some won't. Just like our own native born Americans. Some will be white; others will be people of color. Just like our own native born Americans. Some will practice Christianity, some Judaism, some Buddism, some Islam, etc. Just like our own native born Americans. Etc., etc., etc. Whether you like it or not, we are a diverse nation. Whether you like it or not, Champas is proud of his nation's diversity, regardless of whether it is as diverse as the USA. That's immaterial. For cryin' out loud. And, HOLY SHIT.

Guy goes on............

And of course as LW points out, the lack of communication was often the catalyst of some of the worst wars this planet has ever seen or will see (in scale).

I beg to differ. It's not the language barrier that causes war. That is such a specious argument. In fact, more wars have been fought over religion and land grabs and water, and now oil. Not language. And, to advocate diplomacy now, after supporting the invasion of Iraq, killing thousands and thousands of people, all based on lies, just because we didn't want to practice any more diplomacy, even though the weapons inspectors were doing their jobs, even though other countries were pleading with us not to abandon diplomatic actions and economic sanctions, and not to say diplomacy and a single language is the answer is so mindboggling hypocritical. Shocking even. Again, HOLY SHIT! What is wrong with you righties?

Now, in closing, I'd again like to applaud Champas for this article, for Furry's replies. Good stuff.

and thank yous go to whipster, dimguy, and ED for showing us yet again what lowlife, racist, jingoistic nonsensical small-minded, parochial, narrow little mindless wonders they really are.

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Okay LW, brief responses only warranted here, I think:

'I'm bi-lingual myself, (German, and of course, English) and the fact that I learned how to speak German has had zero effect on my "world view." I suppose I could learn Japanese, French, or any other language with the same effect....zero.'
Again, I'm sorry for you, because in having such a closed mind approach, I believe you're missing out big time.

While you and others are busy trading insults, I'd still like an answer to my question. How does learning a second language force "a specific, restricted, culturally dictated view of the world upon its members"?
I didn't say that. I said that forcing everybody to communicate using a single language does this.

And do you truly believe that people engaged in decisions of life and death importance should not be able to communicate with the vast majority of the people they treat?
I didn't say that either. Yes, communication is important. But depending upon the part of the USA in which you live and work, you might just find 'the vast majority' of the people you treat more comfortable speaking Spanish (to cite just one example).

Should Americans have to learn various Indian dialects in order to be sure they recieve proper health care?
I didn't say that either.

And do you truly believe that learning a second language restricts a person, rather than expanding their horizons?
I didn't say that either.

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'And making fluency in English a legal requirement to practice medicine in a predominantly English speaking nation is not "forcing" anyone to do anything, really. They could refuse, and be refused a license to practice.'
I guess we're all square, LW. Apparently, I don't inderstand the word 'fluency', and you don't understand the word 'forcing'.

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