# Ich verstehe heute die Mehrheit Amerikanisch Einwanderer spricht Spanisch. Es bedeute
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ich-verstehe-heute-die-mehrheit-amerikanisch-einwanderer-spricht-spanisch-es-bedeute/361385
**Category:** The BBQ Pit
**Created:** [June 20, 2006, 2:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ich-verstehe-heute-die-mehrheit-amerikanisch-einwanderer-spricht-spanisch-es-bedeute/361385 "2006-06-20T02:13:48Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 5
### Author:  [@duffer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/duffer)
#### Post date: [June 22, 2006, 2:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ich-verstehe-heute-die-mehrheit-amerikanisch-einwanderer-spricht-spanisch-es-bedeute/361385/81 "2006-06-22T02:42:02Z")
> [@Little Nemo](#):
>
> Yes, but it was probably three generations before anyone spoke passable Pequot.
Damn, beat me to it.
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### Author:  [@bdgr](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bdgr)
#### Post date: [June 22, 2006, 2:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ich-verstehe-heute-die-mehrheit-amerikanisch-einwanderer-spricht-spanisch-es-bedeute/361385/82 "2006-06-22T02:50:06Z")
> [@Ponder Stibbons](#):
>
> I’ve always heard that Navajo was a particularly beautiful language. I’ll just zip on over to Border’s and pick up _Navajo for Dummies_. Or maybe _Cherokee for Dummies_, since they actually have this neato alphabet.
>
> If only those native Americans would pick a single native language, then we could make _that_ the official language of the United States!
heeah Ameliga, Tsalagi hinegv
(this is amreica, speak cherokee)
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### Author:  [@duffer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/duffer)
#### Post date: [June 22, 2006, 3:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ich-verstehe-heute-die-mehrheit-amerikanisch-einwanderer-spricht-spanisch-es-bedeute/361385/83 "2006-06-22T03:14:23Z")
> [@bdgr](#):
>
> heeah Ameliga, Tsalagi hinegv
> (this is amreica, speak cherokee)
Or Sioux. Let’s just not fight over it, OK?
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### Author:  [@pulykamell](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pulykamell)
#### Post date: [June 22, 2006, 3:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ich-verstehe-heute-die-mehrheit-amerikanisch-einwanderer-spricht-spanisch-es-bedeute/361385/84 "2006-06-22T03:28:47Z")
> [@Sal Ammoniac](#):
>
> Yeah, while we’re trotting out the ancestors, I’ll point out that _my_ German ancestors were not that quick to embrace English. If it hadn’t been for anti-German sentiment born of World War I, they’d probably still be speaking German. And these are people who came in the 1850s and '60s, mind you.
Hell, my grandfather was _born_ in Chicago, moved back to Poland when he was 4, moved back to Chicago again when he was 50, worked at the Wrigley factory until retirement, is still alive at 94, and I have never in my life heard him utter a word in English. My parents, both born in Poland, never spoke English around the house. Never taught me to read and write English. Only once they got to their 40s did I hear them speak English with any regularity. There was no need for them to learn the language. Economic necessity did not require it. The Polish neighborhoods were (and still are) tight-nit, and fluency in English is not necessary to navigate the waters. Who cares?
The kids pretty much always (if not always) learn the language, and by the generation of grandkids, chances are English is the only language being spoken in the household.
I don’t believe the language issue is any sort of problem. As has been pointed out repeatedly, the evidence is that immigrants nowadays learn the language faster than immigrants of yesteryear. Also, children of immigrants _do_ learn English pretty much invariably. It’s almost impossible not to. I learned English, yet I have no idea how, as nobody ever spoke it to me around the house.
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### Author:  [@Lama\_Pacos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lama_Pacos)
#### Post date: [June 22, 2006, 3:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ich-verstehe-heute-die-mehrheit-amerikanisch-einwanderer-spricht-spanisch-es-bedeute/361385/85 "2006-06-22T03:49:06Z")
> [@](#):
>
> I’ll bow to others’ deeper knowledge on the subject, but I will say that the Spanish speakers that I come across at work not only do not speak English, but also (for the most part) make no attempt to speak English. There can be 14 relatives in the room, and not a one speaks English (I’m a nurse). Sometimes, there is no one around who can speak Spanish. Oh, well. This becomes MY problem at this point-why? Oh, we deal with it–taking care of the pt is my job, but to say it doesn’t cause resentment among the staff would be false.
If learning a language in a short period of time is so easy, and the issue of monolingual Spanish-speakers comes up sooooooooo often at work, why not learn Spanish? :rolleyes:
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### Author:  [@Excalibre](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Excalibre)
#### Post date: [June 22, 2006, 4:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ich-verstehe-heute-die-mehrheit-amerikanisch-einwanderer-spricht-spanisch-es-bedeute/361385/86 "2006-06-22T04:55:50Z")
> [@duffer](#):
>
> Hey douchebag. I met you halfway and admitted it was posted out of frustration. I’ve stressed as much as I’m able that it was borne of no racism, intolerance, bigotry, hatred, refusal to accept immigrants, or any other niche group you have me in as a target of knee-jerk disagreement with anything I say.
Dammit, **duffer** , who has called you a racist? Look, I tried to defend you above, because I don’t think you should have to write a three page essay apologizing for having the wrong opinions. But I’m seriously regretting it now, since you won’t drop this complete bullshit about being called a racist.
Since you’ve been shown quite thoroughly that this imaginary spectre of “people who refuse to learn English and demand that everyone else cater to them” thing is nonsense - it’s pure political propaganda - the fact that you’re still harping on it means that either you’ve got a _serious_ reading problem, or else that the facts don’t really matter at all and you just wanted some excuse to piss and moan about how those immigrants are making you suffer.
> [@](#):
>
> I’m talking about people that just don’t want to bother trying and expect various groups to lobby for them to never have to learn it by trying to force the majority to cater to them.
Trouble is you haven’t proven that such people exist, and others have provided ample evidence that this is an imaginary problem.
> [@](#):
>
> Can you get that through your thick fucking skull? I’m talking about a very small minority, given a loud voice by those that just don’t see anything wrong with a person moving to a country and refusing to attempt to learn the common language.
No, you’re talking about an imaginary group invented by people who have a lot to gain by cultivating xenophobia in the public.
> [@](#):
>
> Again, it’s equivalent to the native English speakers on this board, no matter nationality, all moving to Mongolia and expecting the entire country to just adapt to us speaking English. With no effort on our part to learn the dominant language. (Linguists, go ahead and lay the smackdown, you know what I mean.)
That would be Mongol. And again, no one is trying to defend such people, not least because _they don’t exist_. What in the world makes you think that Spanish speakers are demanding that everyone else learn Spanish? Why would anyone do such a stupid, counterproductive thing? Because they like being poor and having fewer opportunities for social advancement? Because they like having their everyday lives be difficult and unpleasant?
> [@](#):
>
> I will not apologize for an opinion. I will not fall to a hollow challenge to “prove” an opinion with facts. That’s the beauty of an opinion.
That’s your effort to try to avoid any responsibility for what you’ve said. You’ve indicated a fantastic disregard for the truth in this matter, **duffer** , because the blind rage you’ve shown was directed at an imaginary enemy. I don’t think anyone here even disagrees with your opinion, because if there _were_ people trying to move to the United States and demanding that everyone else learn Spanish (or any other language) it would be the most ridiculously arrogant act in the world. No one cares about your opinion on this matter, **duffer** , they care about the facts behind it. And you’ve admitted you don’t have them. So realize you were wrong, and let it go, and next time, pay a little more goddamn attention to the opinions you’re being fed by righty imbeciles.
And the real problem with this bullshit that you’re repeating is that it _does_ come from and feed into people who hate outsiders, who hate brown people, who hate anyone who doesn’t speak English. Those folks are out there, **duffer** , and when you innocently repeat these lies, you’re furthering their cause. You keep insisting that you’re not racist - well, stop helping the racists. And stop absorbing the nonsense that racists spew so they can share their worthless opinions without being held to account.
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### Author:  [@Hostile\_Dialect](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hostile_Dialect)
#### Post date: [June 22, 2006, 5:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ich-verstehe-heute-die-mehrheit-amerikanisch-einwanderer-spricht-spanisch-es-bedeute/361385/87 "2006-06-22T05:01:51Z")
I, for one, though this would be a World Cup thread.
Yeah, my German needs some brushing-up. Sorry, I’m a lazy, ignorant slob. 😉
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### Author:  [@Fish](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fish)
#### Post date: [June 22, 2006, 5:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ich-verstehe-heute-die-mehrheit-amerikanisch-einwanderer-spricht-spanisch-es-bedeute/361385/88 "2006-06-22T05:25:07Z")
Like **eleanorrigby** , I work in a medical facility. I work in the billing office, dealing with customers usually by phone. We don’t have the **ability** to turn away customers, or to just focus on the English-speaking customers we want. We must deal with it somehow.
It **is** extremely frustrating when people ask, “Spee a Spaneess?” or want to know if we have translators for Korean, Tagalog, Vietnamese, or whatever.
We have none. I feel sorry for them: I know that if they don’t pay their medical bills, which they probably don’t understand, that they’ll get sent to a collection agency. That may not bother some of them — perhaps not the hundred-and-one Juan Rodriguezes with no SSN or address or employer, they’ll be hard as hell to track down, probably won’t hurt **them** — but for the many who are legal and/or struggling to be legal, it’s gonna really severely affect their ability to put together a good life here.
Some of them have their kids translate, which is difficult: how’s a kid gonna know what his native-language word for “deductible” is? How can I explain the workings of an insurance denial to somebody eight years old, so he can relay the information to his parents?
But their lack of English skills cuts two ways. I could lose my job for not speaking Spanish to help them — or I could lose my job to them anyway once they learn English. They’re working to increase their marketplace viability, and I’m not.
And that’s not the fault of any immigrant.
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### Author:  [@bdgr](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bdgr)
#### Post date: [June 22, 2006, 7:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ich-verstehe-heute-die-mehrheit-amerikanisch-einwanderer-spricht-spanisch-es-bedeute/361385/89 "2006-06-22T07:10:35Z")
> [@duffer](#):
>
> Or Sioux. Let’s just not fight over it, OK?
Nah…we got the cool written language. and a flag.
but the damn europeans should learn the language in any case if they are going to come to this country.
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### Author:  [@The\_King\_of\_Soup](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_King_of_Soup)
#### Post date: [June 22, 2006, 7:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ich-verstehe-heute-die-mehrheit-amerikanisch-einwanderer-spricht-spanisch-es-bedeute/361385/90 "2006-06-22T07:11:01Z")
Hey, **duffer**! It has been a nice day, thanks.
First off, I think everybody’s been clear from the beginning that you’re an angry, frustrated man, so no points for “admitting” it at this late date. Besides, you’re trying to plead, not to a lesser offense, but to a non-offense, and that won’t do. The problem isn’t that you’re angry, the problem is that you’re baselessly blaming recent Spanish-speaking immigrants for your problems, comparing them unfavorably with your European ancestors, again without foundation, and attributing various other unsavory characteristics to them (don’t want to assimilate/be real Americans) without a scrap of proof. You’ve also postulated a whole fifth column of organizations working to see to it that the right to non-assimilation is written into the constitution, or some such. You offered these items not as opinions, but as facts. That’s what you’ve done, mein Herr: so that’s what you get to answer for.
Also, though, it’s your behavior since enough posters called you on this nonsense to make you rethink your choice of audience. “Forget about it – Moving On?” Good grief, that’s the _laziest_ weaseling out of the wrong side of an argument I’ve ever seen. Gilda Radner’s Emily Litella character exited her stupidities more gracefully. Show some style, at least. Especially if you’re going to keep on spouting the same billingsgate later.
Yes, you’ve certainly cut the purity of your crap with frequent remonstrances that you’re not a bigot. Good for you. If someone hates or despises a particular identifiable group of people because of their race or color or religion or national origin or language, he’s a bigot. If he feels that way for no reason at all, he’s a lunatic. But if he or someone else makes up a legitimate-sounding reason to hate or despise them, and that reason is not true, that is called a pretext. Here’s the tricky part: if he clings to his opinions even after the pretext has been exposed as a lie, well, he needs to pick door #1 or #2, or invent a very plausible third category he can jump into.
Most recently, you’ve tried another limb: defining your target down. You’re only mad at the small, small minority of Spanish-speaking immigrants that just refuses to assimilate or even attempt to learn English and demands that the English speakers they encounter here accomodate them. Everybody else, however poor their English skills, as long as they’re making an effort, you’re perfectly happy with. Right?
Wrong, actually. So, so, so wrong. First off, it wasn’t that long ago that this group wasn’t so small: remember when they were big enough to make it worthwhile for your company to open a new call center in Colorado? Big enough to have their own lobbying groups pushing Spanish accomodation? Second, if you’ll check with the guy who wrote the OP, I think you’ll find that his problem stemmed largely from people who wanted to conduct technical support calls in Spanish (I know: it isn’t _fair_ to drag this back to a point when it pretended to have some basis in reality). It is extremely likely that people who are learning English, even people who have attained some proficiency, are the biggest part of the group that wants this service. Much more so, actually, than people who have no English _at all_ – they’re less likely to own businesses or have a job which would require them to liaise with a technical support company. So while you’re now saying you only have a problem with a few “bad” immigrants, your complaint is actually still about anybody who might prefer to conduct technical business conversations in Spanish – almost all Spanish-speaking immigrants, in other words. Pretty transparent. Third (and the foregoing feeds into this as well), if I rouse a rabble and convince them to stomp “those dirty, scheming Utopian immigrants” and later try to claim that I’m not guilty of the ensuing violence because I specified “only the dirty, scheming ones,” I will deserve to be strung up. Why? Because I targetted a large group identifiable by certain broad characteristics, and qualified it with characteristics that are not readily apparent and which my rhetoric implied might apply to any member of the group. As **Excalibre** has noted, you have made up an imaginary subgroup of Hispanic immigrants and vilified them. This is an attack on the group as a whole, like saying “ **duffer** ’s family is okay by me – except for the cannibals, of course.”
Of course you have a right to your opinion. But it sounds kind of funny to say that it’s your _opinion_ that your company is opening a call center in Colorado, or that there are lobbying groups fighting for the rights of immigrants to live without English – these seem like they’re being offered as facts, and they’re not offered in a separate column from your assertions about immigrants who don’t want to assimilate and refuse to learn English and how they’re threatening your job, etc., etc. But let that pass. The point is not that you don’t have a right to an opinion, it’s that you missed the part about your also being _responsible_ for your opinion: in this case, a repugnant opinion founded on baseless accusations against immigrants. “Forget it – moving on,” doesn’t meet that responsibility. “I was angry,” doesn’t come close. “I’m actually talking about fewer people than I seemed to be at first,” is a clumsy lie, and irrelevant to boot. “I have a right to my opinion,” is a cheap dodge. Of course you have a right to your opinion, to keep it, share it, alter it, disavow it, build a shrine to it. Your opinion stinks, **duffer** , and it defames a particular minority group, and your refusal to either prove it or retract it reflects badly on your character.
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### Author:  [@guizot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/guizot)
#### Post date: [June 22, 2006, 5:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ich-verstehe-heute-die-mehrheit-amerikanisch-einwanderer-spricht-spanisch-es-bedeute/361385/91 "2006-06-22T17:11:57Z")
> [@Fish](#):
>
> It **is** extremely frustrating when people ask, “Spee a Spaneess?” or want to know if we have translators for Korean, Tagalog, …
Huh?!! I thought Tagalog was the Official World Language of Hospitals! :eek:
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### Author:  [@monstro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/monstro)
#### Post date: [June 22, 2006, 9:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ich-verstehe-heute-die-mehrheit-amerikanisch-einwanderer-spricht-spanisch-es-bedeute/361385/92 "2006-06-22T21:51:32Z")
Miami is one of the most bilingual cities in the US. Sometimes it’s frustrating walking into the store and not being able to communicate to the propieter or the salespeople because they all speak Spanish…and sometimes it’s frustrating when people at work spontenously break out into Spanish, leaving me out of the conversation…but I haven’t been crippled by it. I’m the one who feels out of place, like she should have taken Spanish in school (I took Arabic). Here, English-only folks are the minority, so it wouldn’t be realistic or fair for us to create a monolingual environment.
If native-born Americans don’t drop the 'tude when it comes to learning different languages, we’re going to be left in the dust.
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### Author:  [@Will\_Repair](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Will_Repair)
#### Post date: [June 22, 2006, 10:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ich-verstehe-heute-die-mehrheit-amerikanisch-einwanderer-spricht-spanisch-es-bedeute/361385/93 "2006-06-22T22:00:25Z")
Was going to write something about German almost becoming the national language but found out [it never really happened.](http://www.watzmann.net/scg/german-by-one-vote.html)
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### Author:  [@iampunha](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iampunha)
#### Post date: [June 22, 2006, 10:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ich-verstehe-heute-die-mehrheit-amerikanisch-einwanderer-spricht-spanisch-es-bedeute/361385/94 "2006-06-22T22:11:00Z")
I will have worlds more respect for the “Learn English first, immigrants!” **when natives of this country are able to show decent command of the language themselves**.
Unless and until the average American-born person not living in utter squalor but given a fair shot at an education is able to write and speak English well enough to not sound like an utter buffoon, I will continue to find it inherently hypocritical to expect of others what our own have repeatedly shown a lacking in being able to do.
(Not to mention the fact that English is a hell of a lot harder than most languages.)
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### Author:  [@eleanorigby](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/eleanorigby)
#### Post date: [June 22, 2006, 10:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ich-verstehe-heute-die-mehrheit-amerikanisch-einwanderer-spricht-spanisch-es-bedeute/361385/95 "2006-06-22T22:13:12Z")
> [@Unregistered Bull](#):
>
> And there have been Spanish speaking people here, in what is now the United States, since well before then.
Ooh-snap!
That’s put me in my place nicely.
:rolleyes:
I am for everyone learning a foreign language–I took 5 years of German; my kids take French. I have no interest in learning Spanish.
As to the 14 people in the hospital room–our policy is to limit visitors to 2 at a time. God knows how these folks get past security, but they do. 14 is a slight exaggeration, but it is common to see 5-8 at a time. There is no real limit re fire code that I am aware of. Upon a code and death, we often can have 20+ family members in to view the body etc. The most people in one room that I have experienced was 34-for the death of a young pt. Very sad.
I just had a Hispanic female pt last week–she is 21, her husband 22-neither of them speaks English. He says he does, but didn’t understand me past “hello”. Too young to have kids that could help, and no parents or extended family with them. Nobody on the floor spoke Spanish, but I had to teach her about dealing with her congestive heart failure, exacerbated by her pregnancy and subsequent childbirth-this involves diet, meds, fluid restrictions, weighing herself and compliance with follow up with the doc. It’s waaaay past “ola”.
No worries for me-I’m getting out of nursing, but my leaving doesn’t solve the problems presented by ignorance compounded by language barrier. Kudos to all the hardworking legal immigrants here, no matter their country of origin.
Oh, and the Serbian folks I mentioned? They have been here since Jesus left Chicago–they are the last remnants of the post WW2 immigration from that area. For all I know, they still have Serbian newspapers etc. It doesn’t matter–IMO, if you have lived in any country for that many years, you should know at least rudimentary speech in that country’s language.
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### Author:  [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)
#### Post date: [June 22, 2006, 10:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ich-verstehe-heute-die-mehrheit-amerikanisch-einwanderer-spricht-spanisch-es-bedeute/361385/96 "2006-06-22T22:31:10Z")
> [@eleanorigby](#):
>
> It’s waaaay past “ola”.
“Hola.”
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### Author:  [@magellan01](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/magellan01)
#### Post date: [June 22, 2006, 10:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ich-verstehe-heute-die-mehrheit-amerikanisch-einwanderer-spricht-spanisch-es-bedeute/361385/97 "2006-06-22T22:41:34Z")
> [@Excalibre](#):
>
> And the real problem with this bullshit that you’re repeating is that it _does_ come from and feed into people who hate outsiders, who hate brown people, who hate anyone who doesn’t speak English. Those folks are out there, **duffer** , and when you innocently repeat these lies, you’re furthering their cause. You keep insisting that you’re not racist - well, stop helping the racists. And stop absorbing the nonsense that racists spew so they can share their worthless opinions without being held to account.
Do you really believe this? That the “real problem” is not the veracity or reasonableness of his claims, but that they may align with groups who hold those beliefs as a _part_ of their larger distasteful agenda? So, even if his claims could be shown to have more veracity than you would give them, he still shouldn’t dare utter them?
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### Author:  [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)
#### Post date: [June 22, 2006, 11:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ich-verstehe-heute-die-mehrheit-amerikanisch-einwanderer-spricht-spanisch-es-bedeute/361385/98 "2006-06-22T23:26:43Z")
> [@magellan01](#):
>
> Do you really believe this? That the “real problem” is not the veracity or reasonableness of his claims, but that they may align with groups who hold those beliefs as a _part_ of their larger distasteful agenda? So, even if his claims could be shown to have more veracity than you would give them, he still shouldn’t dare utter them?
No, he’s saying that these are lies spread by racists, and that they remain racist lies, even when unwittingly picked up and repeated by a non-racist like **duffer**.
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### Author:  [@bdgr](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bdgr)
#### Post date: [June 22, 2006, 11:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ich-verstehe-heute-die-mehrheit-amerikanisch-einwanderer-spricht-spanisch-es-bedeute/361385/99 "2006-06-22T23:40:36Z")
> [@eleanorigby](#):
>
> IMO, if you have lived in any country for that many years, you should know at least rudimentary speech in that country’s language.
Tsalagis hiwoni?
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### Author:  [@Monty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Monty)
#### Post date: [June 22, 2006, 11:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ich-verstehe-heute-die-mehrheit-amerikanisch-einwanderer-spricht-spanisch-es-bedeute/361385/100 "2006-06-22T23:57:55Z")
> [@iampunha](#):
>
> (Not to mention the fact that English is a hell of a lot harder than most languages.)
Glad you’re not mentioning that as it’s not a fact. It’s a myth.
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