Tars, touche!
People seem to be ignoring something that has been said. large parts of the USA belonged to maexico and have populations of native born US citizens whosae primary language is Spanish.
They are US citizens. Their primary language is Spanish. There is zero justification for forcing them to vote or do anything else in any other language than their own.
sailor said
ruadh said
These are more-or-less contradictory positions. If sailor is right, we already have separatism in this country.
>> These are more-or-less contradictory positions
No they are not. Not in the least. Not in any way that I can see. That there are many native born US citizens whose primary language is Spanish is a fact which I cannot see how it contradicts the affirmation that “the idea that bilingual ballots will lead to a Mexican separatist movement is completely spurious”.
evev seven:
Umm… no. It should be the responsibility of the citizen to make sure that they are capable of participating in the election process.
According to Tar Tarkas:
Irrelevant. Settlers came here and created their own society, they didn’t come here specifically to become Indians. If they had come here in order to become Indians, though, then it’s reasonable to expect that they would have learned the language. With regards to your house, did you move into a vietnamese-speaking house, and demand that the other residents learn english in order to relate to you? If so, pardon me, but you’re pretty darn rude. I’m assuming, though, that that isn’t the situation.
Quoth Airbeck:
If the population in the US isn’t allowed to become hugely multilingual, this won’t be a problem for us. And here, if this accomodation mentality continues unchecked, we’re not going to have a problem with just two conflicting languages. If we start going bilingual, who’s to say it’s going to stop there? Imagine the Canada problem with half a dozen languages instead of just two.
Why would a rational person be made to feel inferior by having a nation require that they speak the national language? (No, it’s not “officially” the national language, but if anyone can’t see that English is the de-facto standard here, they have issues.) When an American goes to France and expects the citizens to accomdate his inability to speak French, he’s the subject of harsh criticism and outright rudeness - as well he should be. Why should it be different here?
Also, I don’t buy that the US has always been a “multilingual” country. In the sense that lots of people from all over the world come here and speak different languages, then yes. But in the sense that we try to accomodate all the other languages and don’t expect them to conform to our culture at least to the extent that they can speak our language, no, that’s not the case at all. The fact that there’s not been a problem with national unity is because there hasn’t been a wide-scaled effort to not require immigrants to learn our language. Once we start encouraging people to not bother with our language (which is what multilingual ballots will do), we will begin to see these problems.
Jeff
Why only Spanish and Chinese? And by the way, which type of Spanish?It might not be terribly expensive to print ballots in two additional languages, but what about a city like NY? I remember reading that something like 200 different languages are spoken by NYC public school children
That may well be true, but the fact that a native born citizen’s primary language is Spanish (or any other) does not mean that the citizen is not also fluent in English. I don’t think there is a large population of native-born citizens who grow up not learning English except maybe in Puerto Rico. (And I’m not even sure about there, since every Puerto Rican I’ve met who finished high school speaks English quite well, far better than I speak my high school Italian))
By that logic, it would be the citizen’s job to make sure they could pass an IQ test or a property requirment. Frankly that attitude is not consistant with democracy and I suggest you look for some other form of government to espouse.
It is the job of the government department in charge of voting (who’s name escapes me now) to make sure that voting is as accessible as is possible. Voting is a fundamental part of democracy, and is not the place to enforce your particular social agenda. Is speaking English mentioned in the constitution? Because voting is.
Remember, we are living in a country where half the people don’t even bother to vote. Surely anyone voting, even in Spanish or Chinese, is a better citizen than the English speaking person that decides they would rather watch MTV than go to the polls.
(BTW, you don’t happen to be the El Jeffe I know, from Cordova High School, do you?)
Some people feel very inclined to spout off about Quebec without living in the same country as it, let alone the same province. I don’t know whether to be amused or irritated. A lot of this material sounds like it dates back to a CNN backgrounder circa 1994.
It’s ludicrous to think of French being “imposed” on people. Having “arachides” on your ingredient list so that a Francophone won’t kill herself with a peanut allergy is not an imposition.
Furthermore, what the Quebec government is supposedly imposing on anglophones, with the exception of minor sabre-rattling from time to time, is arrant nonsense. In no other province can the minority of the other official language receive anywhere near as many services in that language. I have never felt the slightest bit oppressed in this province, even when I didn’t speak fluent French, but I would hate to be a Francophone in Saskatoon. (While the federal government is officially bilingual, all the other provincial governments are anglophone except for New Brunswick.)
I’m not sure to what extent this is applicable to the Spanish situation; unlike certain people, I try not to spout conclusions about the linguistic politics of countries I don’t live in. But I just wanted to correct some of the sillier misconceptions about Quebec and language politics in Canada.
I said that the French speaking majority was being imposed on by the English speaking minority. You have it reversed. I never implied that the English speakers were being oppressed. That’s why the French speakers wanted to secede. Makes sense, right?
I myself have never been to Quebec, but I took a linguistics course with a professor that is an expert in these issues. I am basicly only summing up what I learned from him on this topic.
I wasn’t referring to you, Airbeck, but to the others in this thread, such as (much as it pains me to use these two names together, believe me) december and gobear.
matt,
Methinks you left out one territorial government that certainly isn’t solely anglophone.
I said “provinces”.
I know what you’re referring to (my dad was at its founding), though. While you’re at it, I learned recently the NWT apparently has a large number of Dene and Athapaskan languages, as well as Inuktitut, as at least quasi-official, but I don’t know how far that goes.
Ah, so you just ignored the territories in toto, hey? 
Just joshin’ you on that one.
I think you need to look up the meaning of the word “separatism”.
Doreen:
That’s quite possible, but I doubt that anyone would think there was a need for 200 languages on the ballot. Many of these children’s parents are not citizens, after all. It’s something local officials are quite capable of determining on their own. Of course there are always going to be small groups of people left out because they aren’t numerically significant enough, but that doesn’t justify leaving out the groups such as Spanish and Chinese which obviously are.
As for “which type of Spanish”, give me a break. Dialect differences between the various hispanophone countries aren’t that significant. There is no more need to distinguish between types of Spanish than there is for English services in non-anglophone countries to be translated into British, American and Australian.
That depends on whether a non- English speaking citizen has a right to a ballot in their native language, or whether it’s provided as a courtesy. If it’s a courtesy, certainly numbers are significant. But if it’s a right, it doesn’t matter if only one citizen needs a balllot in that language.
One more point. As I touched on earlier, I’ve read that the exact wording of ballot issues is sometimes wrangled over to present the issue in a light that is at least tolerable to all sides. Assuming we have multi-lingual ballots, and that those who’ve made the law do not speak the all of the languages they’re being translated to (I’m pretty sure Pittsburgh’s Mayor Tom Murphy doesn’t speak Slovak, although plenty of other Pittsburghers do), I can see there being disputes about the wording of the translated ballots if people don’t vote as expected. As in “Hmmm, the Slovak vote went heavily against the new stadium, while the rest of the city voted for it. The ballot must have been worded wrong.” “No, I think the reason they voted heavily against is because it would be built right in the middle of the biggest Slovak neighborhood in town.” A couple of years ago, I would have thought this far-fetched myself, but after the battle in Florida over butterfly ballots, I’m not so sure.
Just a couple of notes about finances and logistics. When I interned as a translator, it paid about 10 cents a word. I believe what such companies charge now is closer to 20 cents a word, but I could be wrong. I’ll concede that cost is minimal, but each language the ballot is printed in increases the size of the ballot by a factor of 1, ie. if the ballots in 2 languages, it will need to be approximately twice the size of one printed in 1 language; if in 3 languages, it will be triple the size. If you’re going to use the argument print about same number of ballots, but divide the run up by percentage of language used, i.e. (I’m making these numbers up) 80% English, 10% Spanish, 5% Slovak, 4% Hindi, 1% Laotian, what happens if you get the numbers wrong? What would you do with someone who speaks Slovak, but gets there after all the Slovak ballots have been handed out?
Actually, as I write this, I’m realizing it doesn’t work with the voting booths I’ve been in in Hawai’i and Pennsylvania. In both states, when you walk into the booth itself, there have been 2 or 3 rows of questions with levers underneath them. The questions are identical to the ones which appear on the ballot, and the levers either have the candidates’ names, or “Yes” or “No” for ballot issues. After pulling down the individual levers, you pull a master lever to record your vote. In Hawai’i they did use a paper ballot which is drawn into the machine when you pull the lever; in Pennsylvania, I never got a paper ballot.
One final note. I hereby disqualify myself as translator for elections in Pittsburgh – neither my Japanese nor my German dictionary has the word “prothonotary” in it.
Also, no disrespect for Slovaks whatsoever was intended in this post.
CJ
Of course it isn’t the situation. But to make it relavent to the topic, they do not force me the outsider to learn vietnamese to function in the house. granted, i can’t understand what the singers are saying in the vietnamese concert videos Mom watches or know what everyone says to everyone else (especially when conversations can switch languages mid-sentence). I’ll probably pick up some vietnamese and not even realize it (already taking Japanese classes as well otherwise i’d probably just take some vietnamese ones).
The own society part, do you consider places such as Chinatown its own society? Immigrants tend to stick to neighborhoods where others speak the language, creating their own mini-societies. I doubt all of them come here to become assimilated into our culture. Granted, their children and grandchildren usually are abosorbed into American culture while still maintaining some cultural awareness. Forcing Americans to all do stuff the same way is counter to the principals the USA was founded on.
Yes, it seems possible theoretically. But I haven’t heard of it ever actually being a problem in the many jurisdictions which do offer bilingual ballots. The many officially bilingual countries also don’t seem to be falling apart over this issue. So I think we can dismiss this one as a red herring.
Tars Tarkas
Ouch, Tars, if righteous indignation was worth its weight in rubies you’d be a trillionaire by now. It is especially galling since I retracted my views on ballots 7 posts above your post addressed to me.
Irrespective of that, I still do take issue with a couple of things in your post.
Never said they weren’t, if you’re trying to paint me as a bigot you’re going to have to gather a little more ammunition than my (subsequently retracted) opposition to Spanish ballots.
Um, yes they are. Well, point of fact they’re lost adults but if they can’t speak a word of English and they suddenly wandered off the beaten track and found themselves in an area populated mainly English speakers where everything was signposted in English then lost is most definately what they would be. That is why immigrants and asylum seekers should be taught English before they are granted citizenship. So they don’t get lost.
Well, I do know about them. Because ruadh told me. I retracted my position as soon as I was made aware of the existance of these alternative news outlets. It seems you were so blinded by your own ire that you missed that. Either that or your desire to give me an upright and proper liberal tongue lashing was too great to resist.
Oh fer Chrissakes give me a break. My entire position was that if one cannot speak a word of English then one has little or no way of gleaning the relevant facts to make an informed vote. You’re attacking an exaggerated misrepresentation of my position. There’s a name for that, I believe…
Also, I made this statement before I was made aware of the existance of Spanish and Chinese news outlets! If some foreign settler has managed to get his hands on the political facts in his own language then of course his vote is valuable.
No, I sneezed and missed it :rolleyes:
The ability of Chinese immigrants to waltz into a polling station and cast a vote Gore is irrelevant. What is relevant is that unless they have access to the facts in a language they can understand their vote is utterly worthless because their vote will be based on nothing. The prevalence of multilingual news outlets renders this objection moot, as I stated several posts above your post addressed to me. If you insist on being so sanctimonious, please ensure you keep up to speed on what I’m actually thinking.
Even sven says:
Umm… lost me there. What does a property requirement have to do with voting? I think giving everybody the opportunity to vote, contingent upon certain reasonable requirements, is legitimate.
Okay, so to what extent do we make sure that it’s as accesible as possible? It certainly isn’t now. I’d prefer if someone came to my house, asked me what I wanted to vote on, recorded it for me, and left me dinner as they departed. What about people who can’t read? What about people who don’t know anything about the issues or candidates? The voting process is certainly inaccessible to the illiterate and the ignorant.
And no, speaking English isn’t in the constitution. Neither is the requirement that ballots be provided in a multitude of languages, though, so your point is irrelevant.
Nope, t’ain’t me. I hail from sunny (ha ha) Salinas.
Jeff