should the usa have one official language?
RavennaSeattle1911
Posts: 478
RavennaSeattle1911
Posts: 478
RavennaSeattle1911
Posts: 478
Comments
http://forums.pearljam.com/showthread.php?t=272825
yes, I think english should be the official language
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However, I think making an official language kind of takes away from the melting pot idea which is associated with the USA, and I think Americans are proud of.
That's the only reason i could think someone would be against doing this. Cause in all practicality everyone speaks English anyway, the only change will be on a piece of paper and some encyclopedias.
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http://forums.pearljam.com/showthread.php?t=272825
Furthermore, bilingual people statistically score higher on IQ and other intelligence tests because we use different parts of our brain to process and learn languages. I think it is only beneficial for us to learn new cultures and languages rather than conform to one standard alone.
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no, you did. he's the one not making sense. culture is as human as walking upright. it's been with us since we crawled out of caves.
First off, let me just say what has been described as culture:
"Our history". Culture is not history. History is the recording of events. History exists with or without culture.
"Our beliefs". A more accurate interpretation of this is: "The beliefs that I'm supposed to have according to.....whomever.' They aren't your beliefs. They're the beliefs of the majority representing what you believe to be your "tribe". You adopted those beliefs because you weren't capable of or were too scared to form beliefs of your own.
"Our language". In a perfect world, there would be no language. We would all be telepathic. Language is the communication of ideas and thoughts just as homing pigeons are the couriers of messages. One person's homing pigeon is another person's cell phone. If you got used to using a cell phone, then homing pigeons are about as useful as culture.
What I'm saying is that people are stupid, mindless, tribal creatures who don't know a thing about who they really are deep down, so they rely on totally superficial and self-limiting identifiers known as cultures.
Cultures fuel the belief that people from certain parts of the world should act a certain way. It is one of the major inhibitors of free thought.
Here's an example of the sheer stupidity that the observance of "cultures" breeds: A co-worker of mine the other day, after finding out that I'm Japanese/German, asked me, "What culture do you identify with more?"
If you don't think that is the most ignorant, stupidest, naive, and just outright closed-minded question you've ever heard, then omfg you need help. But, it's the kind of question that I'd expect from people who observe "cultures".
Let me also give the example of Barak Obama. Even if you don't believe he is presidential material, I'm sure we can all agree that he is at least a very intelligent, motivated, and mentally stable person.
Yet, in his autobiography, he admits to becoming a cocaine addict because he had difficulty struggling with his "identity". This need to "identify" was forced on him by the collection of imbeciles known as our "society", which is too narrow minded to understand the various intricacies of the human personality without the aid of a "culture" to make it real nice and simple.
http://forums.pearljam.com/showthread.php?t=272825
this is one of the most simple-minded things i've ever read. anyone who values their ancestry is too stupid and scared to think for themselves? the world you talk about would be so dull as to be meaningless. there would be no point to ever go to rome, or la, or tokyo, or anywhere outside your hometown becos everything everywhere would be exactly the same. the people would all think the same, speak the same, act the same, etc. this is the scary school of liberal thought... they aren't really fighting for diversity or respecting differences, they are fighting to eradicate all differences and make everyone exactly the same. "when in rome do as the romans do" would make no sense, becos you're saying you want the romans to do the same things the americans do who are doing the same things the japanese do. but the japanese ARE different from the americans and that makes me happy, cos it makes this world pretty interesting. sure, the downside is occasionally you will have ethnocentrism or racism or conflict, but those things will not go away if you eradicate cultural differences.
you're talking about the kind of world the nazis dreamed of... one language and everyone from the same background. they tried getting there by killing people who were different, you're talking about getting there by encouraging people to give up all their differences or pretend they don't exist. they do.
there is nothing stupid about that question. if someone asked me which culture i identify with more (irish or french) i would hardly be so outraged (irish by the way). apparently oh my fucking god i need help... so explain to me, what is so god awful about that perfectly legitimate question? how is it any different from asking what your religion is? political affiliation? career? it's just one of many factors that plays a role in who you are.
With the absence of cultures, the world would be as "dull and meaningless" as individual people. If you find individual people to be dull and meaningless if they are not defined by a certain culture, then you are exactly the kind of mindset that I am describing. Cultures are the suppression of original thought. And this suppression exists because people like you think it's "interesting". It's entertaining for you to see people act and live a certain way, even though that way of acting or living might have little to do with who those people really are.
Again, I'm not saying that everyone should be the same. That's what cultures dictate, except on a smaller scale. I'm saying people should be who they are. People don't know who they are. People for centuries have been born and raised knowing very little about what actually makes them tick.
This kind of ignorance to the infinite variations of people is what leads to the observance of cultures. Cultures are microcosms of the very suppression of individuality that you think the absence of cultures would result in.
You keep implying that because I don't observe the value of culture, I must therefore want to see them eliminated. What I want is for people to ignore the value of culture if that is what they feel inclined to do. I think people feel obligated to identify with certain cultures, and what I want is for there to be that option -that awareness- to disregard identity altogether.
BTW, the nazis valued the white germanic culture. So that example is totally irrelevant because that's still the observance of a culture. The absence of culture allows for the inhindered expression and observance of individual characteristics to infinite degrees.
Consider the context. I merely told her what my bloodline was. She immediately assumed that I identified with one or the other. She immediately drew herself into categorizing me by my bloodline. Should it not occur to her that my belief system has a likelihood of being independent of either?
If she had asked, "Do you identify with either of those cultures?", then it would've been a different story.
http://forums.pearljam.com/showthread.php?t=272825
1. if not for culture, we'd still be living in trees and flinging shit at each other. it is our ability to put our selfish desires in the backseat and come together around our commonalities that allowed us to accomplish the most dramatic evolution of the last 10,000 years.
2. culture demands nothing, it is simply a part of where you came from. i was raised catholic. i found it didn't jive with who i was, so i walked away from it. just becos i consider the catholic culture to have played a part in me becoming who i am or identify it as a major part of my cultural background does not mean i am ruled by it in any way. culture is not some overbearing oppressive state, it has no power that you do not give it. it's a descriptor, not a determiner. it describes the shared habits and values and practices of groups of people who have much in common. it does not say all the people in that group are the same. what you are ranting about is peer pressure.
3. cultures do not oppress original thought. this is simply ridiculous. the only thing that can suppress original thought is the thinker's fear of exploring it.
sounds like you're insecure and looking for reasons to be offended and prove how "independent" and not ruled by the man you are. that context adds nothing. if you don't identify with either you could easily say that. so who was suppressing your thought? her and her simple oversight, or you and your fear of rocking the boat by expressing a third and potentially unpopular opinion?
What you're talking about is simply the concept of teamwork. And if you attribute teamwork to culture, then what you are implying is that people can only observe teamwork with people they culturally identify with. What you're talking about is pseudo-racism. You just haven't realized it yet.
But, you're not wrong in the sense that, yes, cultures allowed for said teamwork. This is because, as I said, of the sad, sad fact that people for centuries haven't known dick squat about who they are deep down. They really can't see the commonalities of their fellow man without said superficial indicators of culture. Very sad. Hopefully we will evolve someday.
Yet you say that Japanese people really are "different". You contradict yourself. What you have to realize is that they aren't different. They just have a different culture. If we suddenly erased the japanese culture from their memories, they would be people, plain and simple.
If you are not convinced that people in general are terrified of exploring who they are independent of social norms, then we have a lot of ground to cover.
If you think there isn't a massive misconception out there that one has to identify with culture and heritage in order to be a moral/complete/stable person, then where have you been? It would be like me saying that I'm an atheist. Such honesty would get me fired in no time -especially in Orange County, which is the conservative republican catholic stronghold of california.
Not to mention, after I explained to her that I identified with neither, she went, "Oh, 'sigh of relief' because I've been to japan many times and the japanese culture is to be snotty."
I'm not insecure. I'm just sick of people thinking that culture has anything to do with personality. And, frankly, I was expecting her to make that very statement. I'm not even kidding. I've heard it made so many times around me that it's not even funny. People do find japanese people to be snotty.
And, it's true. The japanese culture is typically intolerant. But, it's the culture, not the people themselves, that promotes this intolerance. Correction: It is the desperation to preserve their culture that promotes said intolerance. That's one of the reasons why culture is stupid.
You say that it's possible to observe the differences in cultures without a negative connotation. But, as long as people believe that cultures make people different, there will always be negative connotation. That's something you'll just have to figure out because I'm afraid it will take a very long time to explain it to you.
http://forums.pearljam.com/showthread.php?t=272825
i implied no such thing and if you can show me where i did ill give you a nice shiny nickel. i simply said that culture helped foster teamwork in our development. it has started to disintegrate here in america... the old forms of culture based on ethnicity are less important (people know they are irish or polish but what that means is usually nothing) only to be replaced by other kinds of culture based around this teamwork... democrats and republicans, or corporate culture (i assume you've heard that term) or suburban. anywhere there is sustained collective teamwork, culture will spring up. that is essentially all that culture is...norms that spring up around collective efforts to ensure efficiency. and it is not as static or oppressive as you want to act like it is, it adapts to changing circumstances. see the japanese after ww2, or the indians after the introduction of the horse to north america. the thought that the emperor was not divine or that a more nomadic lifestyle was very original to those groups, yet they adopted them.
this is large scale/small scale meaningless dichotomy. on the whole, the japanese culture operates differently. on the personal level, sure i've got a lot more in common with a given japanese person than i have at odds with him. and for every japanese person i find who is different from me, there are 10 catholic ohio boys who are also different from me. people are not identical though... culture does not mean automatically that person x is different from person y becos of their cultures. but it does mean that there are certain social behaviors that most people of culture x practice that most people of culture y do not and it is interesting to observe those differences and learn from each other for both sides. it does not mean that i make blanket judgments about every japanese person i meet, just that id love to go to tokyo and see how things work there as opposed to how they work in ohio.
social norms are a totally different topic from culture and will ALWAYS exist. humans are social animals and will always have rules in place to influence behavior. what do you think laws are? the inscribed enforcement of social codes of behavior. if you do away with "culture" in the ethnic sense, it will spring up in other forms... music tastes, religion, political views, clothing style, job, income level. the innate human drive to find a sense of belonging with a group of his fellows will never go away. this is why america has the highest rates of drug abuse and depression and suicide... the "group" is too big and tenuous to provide that needed sense of community. you live next to a neighbor whose only commonality with you might be your favorite tv show. it's not enough to build a meaningful sense of community upon and humans, like it or not, need that. sure we have a lot in common as humans, but think of your friends... some are closer than others and some people you just don't get along with. the ones you are closest to mean the most to you. culture is just a more abstract and big picture label for this community of common interests. it can apply just as well to emo and grunge, or southern bapitst and environmentalist as it can to japanese and american.
these kinds of norms and labels will always exist and the people who are so afraid of violating them will have that fear even if you manage to wipe out your narrow definition of ethnic culture.
wow, that musta been pretty traumatic for you. need counseling?
i didnt say cultures had no negative connotations. i said that, like everything in this world, there is good and bad. culture offers a lot to people, and yes there are negatives that go with it. but as long as the positives outweigh the negatives, it will exist. and since it has existed since the dawn of human thought, im thinking that could be a while. now im sorry it's made you angry becos you have to deal with such horrible negative effects like people asking if you ID more with germans or japanese or fearing that you might be snotty becos of the latter, but in the grand scheme of things, that's a rather petty concern and if there were no such thing as japanese or german culture, that chick still woulda found a reason to question your character becos you like "grunge" and she's heard weird things about thos grunge fans... becos that is the PERSON she is.
You said that culture allowed for teamwork. How much more direct can I get? You said that without culture we'd all be flinging shit at each other because we would be unable to identify commonalities that exist beyond cultural similarities. If you want me to say that you didn't say that, then I don't know what else you want me to point out for you.
And..now I see you are acknowledging that cultures based on ethnicity are relatively unimportant nowadays. That's what I'm also saying too. Remember this thread is about language. Language differences are typically attributed to ethnic cultural differences. So, you are at least finally agreeing that ethnic cultures are irrelevant. Thank you.
One more thing: bi-partisanship. This happens when a people of a certain political affiliation resist the influence of another just for the sake of maintaining their political (ie cultural) significance. This means they violated their own system of beliefs for the sake of maintaining their identity. You call that efficiency? Well....you do for the sake of trying to have the last word.
But, my point is that those similar mannerisms that they observe are being observed out of their observances to culture. Without culture, they would be forced to contend with their individual characteristics absence of the norm.
You just keep missing the point that these "interesting" differences between culture A and culture B are the result of a lack of self-awareness, and that this lack of self-awareness is thrown into perpetual motion by the observance of culture. You find that entertaining. I find it sad.
AkA defeatism. Thank you. At least you admit that. You know a few hundred years ago, people would never have thought of deviating from their chosen religion, ethnic cultural structure...etc. But, now they do so often. You mean to say you can't imagine this trend being taken to another level in a hundred years from now?
I see. So, if I am concerned about factors that play a role in my job security, I must therefore be overly sensitive? I need counseling because I worry about how I will pay my bills?
In the grand scheme of things, it is a petty concern. This is because in the grand scheme of things, how I pay the bills every month is a petty concern.
I think you're under the impression that I care about whether or not people like me. I do, but only in the sense that this subjectivity is a huge determiner in job security in just about every organization in existence. So, yeah, I snivel about knowing whether or not I have a job.
But, did you make me angry? No. When I did I get angry at you?
And before you go on and on about political, religious, musical,...etc. cultures, be sure to remind yourself that this is a thread about language, and that language is a factor in ethnic cultures. Therefore, this thread is about ethnic cultures. And you've already said that ethnic cultures are not relevant. So you've already proven my point.
here it is in case you forgot:
To a lot of people, they mean SOMETHING. And that's what I'm talking about.
http://forums.pearljam.com/showthread.php?t=272825
Peace and Love
Deni
you're just desperate for validation arent you? can't resist a single instance of smug self-congratulation can you?
i never said culture is irrelevant, i said your idea of culture is narrow-minded. it embraces much more than simple ethnicity. that aspect of it is waning, i never said it is irrelevant or that it is bad and should go away. just that's it's one aspect of culture that seems to be growing less important as other expressions of culture take its place. i said the development of culture allowed us to descend from trees yes. teamwork will always produce culture. so no matter what kind of teamwork you have, it's going to produce some sort of culture. we would not have left the trees without teamwork, and that teamwork inevitably would have produced some sort of culture. it wasn't even ethnic culture then. my point is, the two are inseparable for all practical purposes. you cannot have one without the other.
you're so wrapped up in how the man is telling you how to act... maybe if you worried less about whatever it is you think "culture" is forcing you to do and a little more on doing what you like, you'd find that it's as easy to be an original thinker now as it ever has been. nobody would think of deviating from their ethnic constructs until 100 years ago? how egomaniacal of you. the founding fathers were prototypes of this. christianity caused one of the largest cultural upheavals ever and islam is doing the same right now. darwin advocated evolution which rocked the world. feudalism gave way to the renaissance. the british empire gave way to industrialism. history is full of massive shifts in culture. if this were not the case, nothing would have changed in the last 9900 years. but go ahead, pretend you're the first generation to ever buck the man if it makes you feel special.
also, if you truly think someone asking you that question jeopardized your job security, you REALLY need counseling to fix that persecution complex you've got going.
you just dont care if the culture of the english /american etc people is minimized and while places in florida and california and texas have spanish only and arrogantly dont care if they knOw spanish only and while places in usa put up on gov biulidings only the mexican flag and ban english books in public libariries - THIS IS ACTUALLY HAPPENEING!1DO YOU CARE?!!WAKE UP!
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I'd also like to see the picture of the U.S. government building flying the Mexican flag, if you have that.