To be clear, I don't identify as Right-wing, nor do I think the Left will cause any kind of Communist uprising or some batshit nonsense like that. All I'm saying is that society functions better when its citizens are roughly homogeneous, so that you don't get violent, racist in-group/out-group divides inside your own damn country. And, unfortunately, the Left (for whatever fearful reason) is now in open opposition to the notion of limiting immigration, and forcing immigrants to integrate, which is only going to cause the country more harm down the line.
Yeh, for the most part people are identifying their own fixes to the same problems. Shit on the ground for working class Americans right now is tough, myself saying this from the trenches of that same world.
Largely I think immigration reform is a big red herring. First, because it is a recurrent problem for us (fun-fact: Prohibition started out with an anti-immigrant aspect, since the immigrants at that time were the Irish and Germans) Second, the right's plan is mostly an impractical populism. We'd have to go full on Iron curtain to pull it off, and I cannot imagine that being worth it. We've never had a homogeneous society; this immigration issue is one of our oldest, predating the Civil War. We won't get rid of it without losing ourselves in the process. Saying we'll force the immigrants to integrate is like saying we'll force the drug dealers to stop dealing. To do either you'll need a full fledged police-state to pull it off. The United States as it operates now, within the delicate borders of public opinion and constitutional law (in theory), is somewhat limited in how they can prosecute a war on Hispanics. Do we... go door to door checking papers like the Gestapo? Road blocks in East LA? Police profiling? We can build a wall, and then what? That'll up the premium for Coyotes to do their work, all the while we spend shit loads of cash on a massive back-drop for folk singers to use in politically conscious music videos.
There is no such thing as a simple fix. Immigration is with the US, like or not, so long as we remain a legalistic society. All we can do is work within reason to stem the flow, and focus our attention to integration not so much by force (heh, put a gun to a kids head and force him to watch Oprah or whatever), but by doing our best to increase the resources available to bring people who want out of the ghettos out of the ghettos. The weird half-system we have now, where we paint abuellas with the same brush we do drug-peddlers, is only increasing the tension and pushing out the divide. You either suspend the constitution or you work with people, but trying to run a self-hating police state is impractical.
But I don't really have to say it is impractical, because being empty populism, nobody will go very far with it. This specific round of know-nothingism has been around for at least as long as I have, though it could very well be longer (I guess when the Unions stopped blaming the Japanese for taking our jobs? I don't know, I always remember the Mexican immigration problem being bandied about. I can remember as a kid my grandma saying how she really wants to go to the border and help shoot Mexicans. Going back the the entire "The left is worried about a pogrom" thing, well, that concern didn't pop up out of thin air.) Republicans have been in a position to deal with it in the past and they haven't, and I suspect it's the same reason Dems won't do anything about it, and why Trumps answer is so shallow. It isn't something they can answer because the laws are already in place (hence it being
illegal immigration), but the problem isn't some easy fix.
Also, for the record, I think illegal immigration is important for the culinary health of the nation. Best Mexican joints are the ones where only one employee
kinda speaks english, and serves as the liaison for the rest of the employees.
Are you telling me Turks and Russians aren't largely integrated into Anglophonic society? I don't know what part of the world your from, but in my experience, you don't tend to have a problem with segregated Russian ghettos forming, where people only speak Russian, businesses only hire Russians, the signs are in Russian, and they lash out with violence at non-Russians. Likewise with Turks. I could be wrong, but these aren't things I've seen.
Meanwhile, there are larger sections of America (mainly California and New Mexico), where you can't so much as get a job if you can't speak Spanish, where there are entire cities and districts forming around Mexican culture, populated only by Mexicans, where non-Mexicans suffer violence and theft when attempting to pass through.
When was the last time you turned on Russiavision, an America-based TV station that broadcasts only in Russian, by Russians, for Russians, or went to Russiatown, to get some Russian food at the Russian market?
And Native Americans have largely chosen to segregate themselves from Western civilization, remaining on reserves. They intentionally attempt to avoid integration, and yet unevenly consume elements of Western production and culture, like alcohol, leading to severe self-harm and social problems. Others, that integrate into society, often remain resentful of most Americans/Canadians, for perceived historical injustices, and attempt to flaunt their different culture when able. Not all, of course, but you can't deny that the trend exists.
Ooooh. I thought you were arguing that Russia and Turkey were anglicized, as in the countries had slipped into Englishness.
I think this is more of a numbers game. Not enough Russians and Turks coming into the country to coalesce into noticeable groups. There are places in the US where Russians hang out amongst themselves, in those little European enclaves that pop up in more vaguely defined areas that I think most people probably can locate if they live in a major enough city. I know a New Yorker with a very Italian mom who's mother complained their old neighborhood was overrun with Russians, for instance. But this is small. I suspect if Mexicans stayed more along the border, like you were only seeing Mexicans piling up in Texas and California, it wouldn't be as noticeable. Case in point, the Germans and Irish did the same thing back in the 19th century. They immigrated in large enough numbers to freak the neighbors out and you ended up with the "Know-Nothing" movement.
Mexicans, however, are a
massive migratory group. They had been there before, and a lot of those places in the southwest have been Mexican-cultured since we took them from Mexico (at least those clinging to the border), which makes it easier for those Hispanic immigrants to jump the border without jumping the culture.
I have been to a Russian market by the way, or at least Eastern Bloc Market, because a big chunk of the stuff was in Cyrillic with English stickers stuck over the nutritional info. If they are in Missouri they are surely elsewhere. I found a Kinder Surprise there, which is interesting because they are one of those things famously illegal in the US for some reason, so I bough a bunch of them to give out to people.
As for Turks... you know, I don't think I've met a Turk. Or if I did, they didn't identify openly. Though from what I have seen of Turks online, meeting one that didn't identify openly would seem unlikely.
Chapatrap
Timemaster
