It is possible to idealize earlier waves of immigration too much. The Irish, Jews, Chinese and Italians were certainly discriminated against and tended to live in their own ghettos. The Scandinavians not so much because they tend to move to sparsely populated in the Upper Midwest. The Germans were already here in substantial numbers even in colonial times so new immigrants had a similar community to ease assimilation. The speed and manner of assimilation varied. The Irish tended to assimilate via public employment in the military, police, urban political machines but maintained strong ties with the old country to the point of supporting Irish struggles against England. Even in my time there were IRA bars what would financially support (cough, cough) Noraid. The Italians and Jews had their own ghettos in East Coast urban areas. They also had organized crime. How the Jews got lumped into the Mafia is probably worth a book but they did. Again, discrimination persisted into my times and then in the case of the Jews came roaring back in the last couple of years. Not so much connection to the old country in these cases. Chinese, of the frontier days, were widely dispersed across the West mainly in mining and railroad building. The city of John Day, OR (current population about 1700) once boasted the largest US population of Chinese outside San Francisco and the first Asian car dealer in the country. They are all gone now. Other places like Tombstone and Pendleton had substantial Chinese populations too. For some reason, they seemed to retreat to the urban areas later. But until recently, they were concentrated in Chinatowns. Varying degrees of intermarriage with existing populations though it is not clear whether the intermarriage or the lessening of discrimination came first but more begat more. Seeing that with Hispanics today.
Jews and Chinese were very into education as a way to assimilate. Irish and Italians not so much.
One key difference that earlier waves were discriminated against while the current wave is discriminated for.
another key difference is that all previous groups weren't immediately offered government welfare programs. None of the those Irish immigrants were put up in $300/night NYC hotels.
Another facet of this 'newer' immigration is that in the first couple of decades in the 20th century, parents & those from the old country WANTED and ENCOURAGED their children to learn how to speak English properly in order to 'BE an American'. That was the whole reason they came here.
More recent immigrants resist that path forward. They proudly - sometimes loudly, sometimes obnoxiously - insist that it's not enough to continue their traditional ways but that we Americans MUST engage in their culture & language to the detriment of our own.
They don't want to 'BE an American' - they want Americans to embrace THEIR ways.
The culture & language will evolve on its own, naturally, and in its own time, thereby creating the melting pot.
The German farming community in Central Texas is an excellent example. Up until WWII they were still speaking German, still had their own schools, taught in German, and churches preached in German.
An old lady told my Grandfather that he and my Father were going to Hell for speaking English to each other.
Then WWII came along and suddenly it was extremely unfashionable to speak German. Everything quickly switched over to English -- although my grandparents still said grace at teh dinner table in German.
As a boomer and a second-generation American I didn’t see many Jews getting involved with the Mafia. Sure, some did but the vast majority went on to successful white-collar and other careers largely through success in education. In fact, many Italian Americans I knew were extremely resentful of the Jews who they saw as an equivalent immigrant group but one who became “more successful” in WASP America than themselves. But the point is that everybody learned English, got educated to the best standard they could and considered themselves Americans.
Jews were hugely influential in the mob. Meyer Lansky, Bugsy Siegel, Dutch Schultz, etc. They cooperated a lot with the Italians and ended up basically merging into the Italian mob, and when they went clean in the 60s they basicallly built Las Vegas. That’s what the entertainment and gambling business in that city is: laundered Jewish (and Italian) mob money.
It is important we outlaw anchor babies. I think we should also consider stripping citizenship from naturalized citizens when they commit serious crimes or willfully and repeatedly violate their oaths as the Soros family has.
This is "nice" but I have a friend who was born and lived in Switzerland 64 years and he is "Italian". Also doesn't sound very fair or at least then don't pay any tax...
As a naturalized AMERICAN citizen in the early 1960s, George Soros SWORE to "uphold the United States Constitution." In reality, Soros has IGNORED his oath and funded every Communist front group within the USA - with ONE goal in mind: The complete destruction of OUR Republic and flip it into a SOCIALIST Democracy.
Hopefully our New Attorney General - Pam Bondi - will at some point strip that asshole of his US citizenship and DEPORT that despicable bastard to N. Korea.
An important description of different types of assimilation in the US context that I hadn't considered before. Woke assimilation captures AWFLS and unfortunately second-third generation Americans who take their privileges and their grandparents/parents struggles for granted. The Woke have distorted the English language to create their own cultural/cultish lexicon to facilitate indoctrination and assimilation. I wonder what will happen to the rate of Woke assimilation/de-assimilation after Trump's inauguration.
If they don’t like American culture, then they should return to their original countries. Absolutely !
Came to the US 20 years ago, became a citizen, and knew English before I came. To my surprise there are German, Italian, and lots of South-American pockets, where no English is spoken at all. There is a large pocket of Italians in Belgium that refuse to integrate. I think it might be better for those to get back 'home' because they do not belong in the country. It should not be allowed to make ghettos of a certain ethnicity, only Native Americans can do that as they were the original inhabitants, and I would encourage them, to learn their native languages again and re-enter their own culture.
For all the rest of the immigrants, I think it should be required to speak English that other English speakers can understand ! (after 20 years I still have an accent, so be it, but everyone understands me).
I hope Learner Tien isn’t woke, rooting for him big time.
A pretty wild, true assimilation story from a family I know. The children grew up into adulthood, one of the grown children was reading a popular book about WW2, I don’t remember if it was Schindler’s List or some similar bestseller, and a picture of one of the saved people looked familiar… and that’s how this man learned, as an adult, that his father was a Jewish refugee. The kids hadn’t even known they were Jewish! That’s taking assimilation a little too far…
One thing I wish were more widespread, even among assimilated immigrants like me: gratitude to the point of keeping our mouths shut about immigration etc. like, be so so grateful you’re here, understand it’s a gift and a privilege, now STFU about the immigration debate and let the Americans who’ve been here for generations debate about it… just my two cents
You have a lot to add from experience. Keeping mouths shut was a measure of shame for immigrants trying so hard to melt into the pot that they obliterated their own history. That doesn’t help future generations figure out their own story.
Trump built the wall in the wrong place. It needs to be on the eastern border of Californistan. As a Texan, I would prefer more Mexicanos to more Californians. ^_^
A possible middle ground would be to revoke local voting for 5-10 years. People who move for more favourable lives will recognise the political foundation and be happy to wait. People who find this outrageous will search elsewhere.
The whole notion of a 'hyphenated' citizen has destroyed the original meaning of being a citizen or a member of a tribe. It is why I tend to call myself more a Quebecois these days on account of the fact that I'm more French than anything else and to most a Canadian is an Anglo-Saxon of Canada (an honourable and magnificent thing to be). But I"m somehow different.
That said, in America it should be American and that is all. By brining in all this other baggage they have effectively destroyed what it means now to be a citizen.
Language is power, and language binds a tribe together by warping it the tribe/clan has been warped. This is why the people need to regain control of their language, just as they must in France, in Germany, Japan and so on. The globalists have completely subverted it in recent years.
Got to take the profit motive out of being woke. Affimative action and anti discrimination law should be limited to the descendants of those conquered or forcibly brought here.
Those who came here voluntarily despite the racism of the time knew what they were getting into and came anyway because it was a better deal than what they had at home.
Some gentle antitrust measures and making it easier to go into business for yourself would accomplish what affirmative action is supposed to accomplish. Every workplace is hostile to somebody.
I will be writing on these things when I get to Rule 13.
Historically, many immigrants who added most benefit to America came here with a nickel and a dream. There was no measure for some transient definition of merit! Are you establishing The Border Merit Agency? Are they to look into souls (for characteristics they don’t possess). You’re getting a little uppity and exclusionary and pompous, dare I say.
My region actually has what’s called “lettuce curtain” divided by economics = hospitality and farm workers on one side, wealthy landowners, property owners on the other side to this day. The wealthy divide resources, own politicians, and make rules for their benefit, and have for 100 years. Some stole ranch land, some from the oil and railroad robber baron era who stole labor from the Chinese, some who profited from slave wage salaries of dust bowl refugees, made this divide and their descendants maintain it.. Who “assimilated”? The successful capitalists or those who made them rich with their labor?
The whole point of a border and a nation is to be exclusionary. What makes the various peoples of the world who they are is the differences between them. If you can’t define who you do and don’t want to allow into your country (and you’re not obligated to allow in anyone at all), your position defaults to borderless globalism and your country becomes an identity less blob.
“Various peoples” don’t draw borders. Political leaders do, at the point of a gun, with blatant disregard for social characteristics or geography, but based on resources they wish to capture.
Also, regarding the education within the USA, THAT is ground zero for young minds to begin to be brainwashed with (initially) subtle MARXIST BULLSHIT; and continues by degree right up to Harvard, Yale, Princeton, Stanford, Columbia ( virtually ALL "higher Education" - with the exception of Hillsdale College in southern Michigan), thence straight into US federal government employment as well as international corporations and FAKE NEWS media.
Until ALL US teachers colleges (and) EVERY US college that sucks up federal (read TAXPAYER DOLLARS); and EVERY K-12 school district have TOTALLY extirpated ALL forms of MARXIST "education" - including teachers and professors - and OUTLAWED the NEA and AFT teachers UNIONS, NOTHING WILL CHANGE in American education.
Understand, that it will take at least TWO generations of young American children schooled in reading, writing and mathematics - and the beginnings of critical thinking carried into adulthood - or NOTHING will change and the USA will fade into history as another failed state.
I agree wholeheatedly! I have been saying this for more than a decade having watched our education system taken over by the union leaders that hate America. I think this may have been more widely recognized during the pandemic when teachers demanded schools remain closed and vacationed oversees while our kids were supposed to learn via Zoom. There is a shortage of good teachers and the requirements to become one have been badly denigrated. Hell I could pay $800 and become a teacher in a few months. Until we have our children taught the three R's, civics and patriotism instead of CRT, we are racist country and a colonizer of oppression etc. we are in deep trouble when these 5 year olds become our lawyers, doctors and politicans in the future.
The Communist takeover (from WITHIN ) STARTED within the American academy BIG time during the 1960s - and now the MarxOzombies are controlling levers of power throughout the US. MARXISM truly IS a TOXIC mental disease.
Hopefully the so-called "Department of Education" will be one of the FIRST bureaucratic monstrosities to be abolished!
It is possible to idealize earlier waves of immigration too much. The Irish, Jews, Chinese and Italians were certainly discriminated against and tended to live in their own ghettos. The Scandinavians not so much because they tend to move to sparsely populated in the Upper Midwest. The Germans were already here in substantial numbers even in colonial times so new immigrants had a similar community to ease assimilation. The speed and manner of assimilation varied. The Irish tended to assimilate via public employment in the military, police, urban political machines but maintained strong ties with the old country to the point of supporting Irish struggles against England. Even in my time there were IRA bars what would financially support (cough, cough) Noraid. The Italians and Jews had their own ghettos in East Coast urban areas. They also had organized crime. How the Jews got lumped into the Mafia is probably worth a book but they did. Again, discrimination persisted into my times and then in the case of the Jews came roaring back in the last couple of years. Not so much connection to the old country in these cases. Chinese, of the frontier days, were widely dispersed across the West mainly in mining and railroad building. The city of John Day, OR (current population about 1700) once boasted the largest US population of Chinese outside San Francisco and the first Asian car dealer in the country. They are all gone now. Other places like Tombstone and Pendleton had substantial Chinese populations too. For some reason, they seemed to retreat to the urban areas later. But until recently, they were concentrated in Chinatowns. Varying degrees of intermarriage with existing populations though it is not clear whether the intermarriage or the lessening of discrimination came first but more begat more. Seeing that with Hispanics today.
Jews and Chinese were very into education as a way to assimilate. Irish and Italians not so much.
One key difference that earlier waves were discriminated against while the current wave is discriminated for.
another key difference is that all previous groups weren't immediately offered government welfare programs. None of the those Irish immigrants were put up in $300/night NYC hotels.
Another facet of this 'newer' immigration is that in the first couple of decades in the 20th century, parents & those from the old country WANTED and ENCOURAGED their children to learn how to speak English properly in order to 'BE an American'. That was the whole reason they came here.
More recent immigrants resist that path forward. They proudly - sometimes loudly, sometimes obnoxiously - insist that it's not enough to continue their traditional ways but that we Americans MUST engage in their culture & language to the detriment of our own.
They don't want to 'BE an American' - they want Americans to embrace THEIR ways.
The culture & language will evolve on its own, naturally, and in its own time, thereby creating the melting pot.
True but the fault is the Establishment in the modern era vs the Establishment in the earlier years.
Totally agree.
The German farming community in Central Texas is an excellent example. Up until WWII they were still speaking German, still had their own schools, taught in German, and churches preached in German.
An old lady told my Grandfather that he and my Father were going to Hell for speaking English to each other.
Then WWII came along and suddenly it was extremely unfashionable to speak German. Everything quickly switched over to English -- although my grandparents still said grace at teh dinner table in German.
That book about Jews getting mixed up with the Mafia would be a very short read that even a kindergartener would understand.
It would be a title and nothing more:
M-O-N-E-Y.
As a boomer and a second-generation American I didn’t see many Jews getting involved with the Mafia. Sure, some did but the vast majority went on to successful white-collar and other careers largely through success in education. In fact, many Italian Americans I knew were extremely resentful of the Jews who they saw as an equivalent immigrant group but one who became “more successful” in WASP America than themselves. But the point is that everybody learned English, got educated to the best standard they could and considered themselves Americans.
Jews were hugely influential in the mob. Meyer Lansky, Bugsy Siegel, Dutch Schultz, etc. They cooperated a lot with the Italians and ended up basically merging into the Italian mob, and when they went clean in the 60s they basicallly built Las Vegas. That’s what the entertainment and gambling business in that city is: laundered Jewish (and Italian) mob money.
I guess you've seen The Godfather then.
Omg. You're one of them? Or you're joking?. 😂
Very important. Language in particular. Without a shared language it is impossible to share time-experience with others.
Here's America's melting pot formula:
Imitation-->Assimilation-->Innovation.
It's what makes us exceptional.
Time to look forward by looking back to our roots.
Nicely and succinctly put, Ryan.
Very good summary.
It is important we outlaw anchor babies. I think we should also consider stripping citizenship from naturalized citizens when they commit serious crimes or willfully and repeatedly violate their oaths as the Soros family has.
nationality should be determined by the parents, not where the child is born! French parents have baby born in USA is French, not American!
This is "nice" but I have a friend who was born and lived in Switzerland 64 years and he is "Italian". Also doesn't sound very fair or at least then don't pay any tax...
He pays taxes and gets something back for his taxes. Paying taxes doesn’t buy him the right to participate in Swiss politics.
Living in someone else’s country doesn’t make you a member of their tribe, no matter how long it’s been.
As a naturalized AMERICAN citizen in the early 1960s, George Soros SWORE to "uphold the United States Constitution." In reality, Soros has IGNORED his oath and funded every Communist front group within the USA - with ONE goal in mind: The complete destruction of OUR Republic and flip it into a SOCIALIST Democracy.
Hopefully our New Attorney General - Pam Bondi - will at some point strip that asshole of his US citizenship and DEPORT that despicable bastard to N. Korea.
Just going back to the old system will help. Family goes back home, kid determines citizenship at 21.
An important description of different types of assimilation in the US context that I hadn't considered before. Woke assimilation captures AWFLS and unfortunately second-third generation Americans who take their privileges and their grandparents/parents struggles for granted. The Woke have distorted the English language to create their own cultural/cultish lexicon to facilitate indoctrination and assimilation. I wonder what will happen to the rate of Woke assimilation/de-assimilation after Trump's inauguration.
If they don’t like American culture, then they should return to their original countries. Absolutely !
Came to the US 20 years ago, became a citizen, and knew English before I came. To my surprise there are German, Italian, and lots of South-American pockets, where no English is spoken at all. There is a large pocket of Italians in Belgium that refuse to integrate. I think it might be better for those to get back 'home' because they do not belong in the country. It should not be allowed to make ghettos of a certain ethnicity, only Native Americans can do that as they were the original inhabitants, and I would encourage them, to learn their native languages again and re-enter their own culture.
For all the rest of the immigrants, I think it should be required to speak English that other English speakers can understand ! (after 20 years I still have an accent, so be it, but everyone understands me).
I hope Learner Tien isn’t woke, rooting for him big time.
A pretty wild, true assimilation story from a family I know. The children grew up into adulthood, one of the grown children was reading a popular book about WW2, I don’t remember if it was Schindler’s List or some similar bestseller, and a picture of one of the saved people looked familiar… and that’s how this man learned, as an adult, that his father was a Jewish refugee. The kids hadn’t even known they were Jewish! That’s taking assimilation a little too far…
One thing I wish were more widespread, even among assimilated immigrants like me: gratitude to the point of keeping our mouths shut about immigration etc. like, be so so grateful you’re here, understand it’s a gift and a privilege, now STFU about the immigration debate and let the Americans who’ve been here for generations debate about it… just my two cents
Learner and Alex Michelsen are making American tennis great again!
Tien beating Medvedev at his own game was something to behold. I'm very excited about this young American prospect. Great composure and tennis smarts!
I know. I was pumped watching it.
Make Tennis Great Again!
You have a lot to add from experience. Keeping mouths shut was a measure of shame for immigrants trying so hard to melt into the pot that they obliterated their own history. That doesn’t help future generations figure out their own story.
We see the assimilation problem on a smaller scale, when people leave California for red states, then vote blue
Trump built the wall in the wrong place. It needs to be on the eastern border of Californistan. As a Texan, I would prefer more Mexicanos to more Californians. ^_^
Maybe all the way up to Canada ...
The reason why Californistan became Californistan is because of all the Mexicanos they let in, who vote majority Blue.
Eh... there is poquito difference:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QrH_cPby2Ug
🙌
They shouldn't even be allowed to vote.
A possible middle ground would be to revoke local voting for 5-10 years. People who move for more favourable lives will recognise the political foundation and be happy to wait. People who find this outrageous will search elsewhere.
It used to be - a long time ago - that the vote was given to property owners - probably on the idea that they had more to win or lose.
I like this: the "resistance"-industrial complex. Appropriate term for the multi-billion-dollar DEI, ESG, BLM, Sanctuary, etc. grift.
The whole notion of a 'hyphenated' citizen has destroyed the original meaning of being a citizen or a member of a tribe. It is why I tend to call myself more a Quebecois these days on account of the fact that I'm more French than anything else and to most a Canadian is an Anglo-Saxon of Canada (an honourable and magnificent thing to be). But I"m somehow different.
That said, in America it should be American and that is all. By brining in all this other baggage they have effectively destroyed what it means now to be a citizen.
Language is power, and language binds a tribe together by warping it the tribe/clan has been warped. This is why the people need to regain control of their language, just as they must in France, in Germany, Japan and so on. The globalists have completely subverted it in recent years.
Got to take the profit motive out of being woke. Affimative action and anti discrimination law should be limited to the descendants of those conquered or forcibly brought here.
Those who came here voluntarily despite the racism of the time knew what they were getting into and came anyway because it was a better deal than what they had at home.
eliminating all affirmative action based on race and gender is the only reasonable course of action at this point.
But is it politically feasible?
My proposal gives certain voters reason to be MAGA.
maybe low income can still receive some help. Let's have equality under the law as per the Constitution and see if that's popular.
Some gentle antitrust measures and making it easier to go into business for yourself would accomplish what affirmative action is supposed to accomplish. Every workplace is hostile to somebody.
I will be writing on these things when I get to Rule 13.
big government loves oligarchies and does everything it can do to crush their smaller competitors via regulations and red tape.
Historically, many immigrants who added most benefit to America came here with a nickel and a dream. There was no measure for some transient definition of merit! Are you establishing The Border Merit Agency? Are they to look into souls (for characteristics they don’t possess). You’re getting a little uppity and exclusionary and pompous, dare I say.
My region actually has what’s called “lettuce curtain” divided by economics = hospitality and farm workers on one side, wealthy landowners, property owners on the other side to this day. The wealthy divide resources, own politicians, and make rules for their benefit, and have for 100 years. Some stole ranch land, some from the oil and railroad robber baron era who stole labor from the Chinese, some who profited from slave wage salaries of dust bowl refugees, made this divide and their descendants maintain it.. Who “assimilated”? The successful capitalists or those who made them rich with their labor?
The whole point of a border and a nation is to be exclusionary. What makes the various peoples of the world who they are is the differences between them. If you can’t define who you do and don’t want to allow into your country (and you’re not obligated to allow in anyone at all), your position defaults to borderless globalism and your country becomes an identity less blob.
“Various peoples” don’t draw borders. Political leaders do, at the point of a gun, with blatant disregard for social characteristics or geography, but based on resources they wish to capture.
Only legit resistance movement in the US of A now is MAGA, we need them weirdos to get in line and assimilate
Well, for historical/constitutional reasons, New Mexico has Spanish-language ballots. But otherwise, make them English only.
The first criterion for citizenship: do you hold these truths to be self-evident?
Also, regarding the education within the USA, THAT is ground zero for young minds to begin to be brainwashed with (initially) subtle MARXIST BULLSHIT; and continues by degree right up to Harvard, Yale, Princeton, Stanford, Columbia ( virtually ALL "higher Education" - with the exception of Hillsdale College in southern Michigan), thence straight into US federal government employment as well as international corporations and FAKE NEWS media.
Until ALL US teachers colleges (and) EVERY US college that sucks up federal (read TAXPAYER DOLLARS); and EVERY K-12 school district have TOTALLY extirpated ALL forms of MARXIST "education" - including teachers and professors - and OUTLAWED the NEA and AFT teachers UNIONS, NOTHING WILL CHANGE in American education.
Understand, that it will take at least TWO generations of young American children schooled in reading, writing and mathematics - and the beginnings of critical thinking carried into adulthood - or NOTHING will change and the USA will fade into history as another failed state.
I agree wholeheatedly! I have been saying this for more than a decade having watched our education system taken over by the union leaders that hate America. I think this may have been more widely recognized during the pandemic when teachers demanded schools remain closed and vacationed oversees while our kids were supposed to learn via Zoom. There is a shortage of good teachers and the requirements to become one have been badly denigrated. Hell I could pay $800 and become a teacher in a few months. Until we have our children taught the three R's, civics and patriotism instead of CRT, we are racist country and a colonizer of oppression etc. we are in deep trouble when these 5 year olds become our lawyers, doctors and politicans in the future.
SPOT-ON, Deborah!
The Communist takeover (from WITHIN ) STARTED within the American academy BIG time during the 1960s - and now the MarxOzombies are controlling levers of power throughout the US. MARXISM truly IS a TOXIC mental disease.
Hopefully the so-called "Department of Education" will be one of the FIRST bureaucratic monstrosities to be abolished!
Well said by both you & T. Roosevelt.