All-purpose news and politics thread: Two Steps Beyond!

[Arundel Armor Hunter]

What you say above basically supports my point; tons of differences by definition mean something is not "uniform". A uniform surface does not have a variety of textures or surface viscosities.

I said the US has common culture, not that it is a uniform culture and it's, the same everywhere.

[TroubleWithTrebles]

The descendants of the Puritans/Calvinists do not consider themselves to be the same culture in any way to the descendants of the Catholic Irish Indentured Servants (e.g. time limited slave labor force used to dredge places like New Orleans so building could commence),

so no.

It neither uniform nor common.

[Arundel Armor Hunter]

The descendants of the Puritans/Calvinists do not consider themselves to be the same culture in any way to the descendants of the Catholic Irish Indentured Servants (e.g. time limited slave labor force used to dredge places like New Orleans so building could commence),

Today? Those descendants know some basic stuff about the Constitution, watch the same innagurations, vote in the same elections and serve in the same army. Also speak the same language. Do you have anything that proves that there is a huge cultural divide like there is between the Luo and today's Mongols or something similar?

[TroubleWithTrebles]

Today? Those descendants know some basic stuff about the Constitution, watch the same innagurations, vote in the same elections and serve in the same army. Also speak the same language. Do you have anything that proves that there is a huge cultural divide like there is between the Luo and today's Mongols or something similar?

Please do not segue from my point.

I have a friend who had a cross burned on her lawn, in the late 1990s, in Kentucky, because her family was Catholic.

I myself have been [literally] spat upon, with phleghm, for attending a Southern Baptist function due to the family being interracial and multicultural. Such things are more than enough of a cultural divide.

[Arundel Armor Hunter]

Please do not segue from my point.

I have a friend who had a cross burned on her lawn, in the late 1990s, in Kentucky, because her family was Catholic.

I myself have been [literally] spat upon, with phleghm, for attending a Southern Baptist function due to the family being interracial and multicultural. Such things are more than enough of a cultural divide.

The Kentucky thing superretro and i don't think it reflects mainstream US society in any way.

Some people acted like jerks/racists to you in that situation. It does not mean the US has no common culture and institutions.

[worstblogever]

Yet people signed up for WW2 and served in the same army like it's one country and reacted to 911 as one country.

I don't want to stir up bad soil and wake leprous rabid sleeping dogs, but you are provably wrong.

Members of the USA culture with a brain in their head did not moronically attack Sikhs in the USA after the assault, since a non dipsh!t knows a Sikh is as diferrent from a Muslim as a Catholic Scotsman is from an agnostic Scandanavian, despite meagre cosmetic similarities.

Yet dumbarses attacked patriotic USA sikhs a lot.

So NO, NOT unified.

It's true, one of the Sikh murders happened about a mile from where I lived after 9-11, because some racist d-bag in Arizona couldn't tell the difference between Osama bin Laden, and a completely different guy, with a completely different religion wearing a turban. Hate crimes against Muslims, and threats did go up after 2001.

And, this ignores the equally ignorant history that Arundel Armor Hunter is pushing through rose-colored glasses. America was so "unified" after Pearl Harbor that the government opened nice little internment camps for American citizens of Japanese descent, and the troops we sent overseas were segregated into units racially, black and white.

[Arundel Armor Hunter]

All of this is true and unfortunate but it does not disprove the existence of an american culture. It's unfortunate, but the majority of americans have/had very basic things in common. You even had Japanese GI's fighting the Nazis.

[worstblogever]

All of this is true and unfortunate but it does not disprove the existence of an american culture. It's unfortunate that the majority of americans have/had very basic things in common. You even had Japanese GI's fighting the Nazis.

I just want to re-frame this so you understand what it is that people are disagreeing with you with.

We're not disagreeing with you that there's an American culture. It's pretty damned clear there is.

You seem to be disagreeing with the rest of the forum by saying it's UNIFIED. The people you're engaging seem to be arguing that America is not a homogenous culture and that in fact, at the times you claim it was most unified, there was systematic racism within a heterogenous American culture.

Now, if you are disagreeing with that, you're wrong. If you agree, just nod your head, and it's dropped.


My argument would be that we're supposed to be a melting pot, but some particularly xenophobic folks tend to run up the side of the bowl in the hopes that they remain a pure metal, and not part of the overall alloy.

[CSTowle]

Wrong. There was only one Timothy McVeigh. The Unibomber did not have an organization around him. 911 was not a isolated group of individuals but they belonged to a large organization that had a philosophy of radical Islam behind it. It's important to know your enemy if you are going to fight him. I don't suggest we overreact, but when someone smacks you in the mouth; react!

Actually there wasn't. He had an organization behind him, and white power/separatist/anti-Federal Government groups have been under investigation for decades because they'd like to be blowing up buildings on a regular basis. Luckily it's a lot easier to infiltrate these groups than it is your al Qaedas and ISIS'. But they're still there, and they'd still like to hurt a lot of innocent people. And they're pretty big on American history and a unified American culture.

[the4thpip]

Sorry for the late reply but I missed this.

If someone doesn't learn English, how do they participate in US culture? They are segregating themselves to only speak to people who know the (currently) minority language. My frustration is not with them, because humans have a inborn need to seek those who are like themselves, but with the politicians, multicultralists, and academics who thought this was a good way to maintain civil society and encouraged this.

Did you just say that things like Latino culture are not parts of US culture?
What is US culture to you then? Pancake and sausage on a stick?

By not learning Spanish, aren't you depriving yourself of the chance to experience more of the US culture experience?

[worstblogever]

Actually there wasn't. He had an organization behind him, and white power/separatist/anti-Federal Government groups have been under investigation for decades because they'd like to be blowing up buildings on a regular basis. Luckily it's a lot easier to infiltrate these groups than it is your al Qaedas and ISIS'. But they're still there, and they'd still like to hurt a lot of innocent people. And they're pretty big on American history and a unified American culture.

They were not only there then, but some of those same sorts of groups JUST had a resurgence a few months ago, at the Cliven Bundy Ranch.

And when they didn't get to have a shootout with the super-fascist Bureau of Land Management (LOL, yeah, because they're clearly the most militant government organization), two of the same sort of morons opted instead to just go on a shooting spree and murder a few police officers in Las Vegas before killing themselves.

[Vibranium]

Did you just say that things like Latino culture are not parts of US culture?
What is US culture to you then? Pancake and sausage on a stick?

By not learning Spanish, aren't you depriving yourself of the chance to experience more of the US culture experience?

deep fry that...and that's as American as it gets

[Jeff Brady]

Oh, come now! You're saying that there is no unified culture in America? Why do we teach American history then?

History is not culture. We teach more than just American history, you know.

[heretic]

Sorry for the late reply but I missed this.

If someone doesn't learn English, how do they participate in US culture? They are segregating themselves to only speak to people who know the (currently) minority language. My frustration is not with them, because humans have a inborn need to seek those who are like themselves, but with the politicians, multicultralists, and academics who thought this was a good way to maintain civil society and encouraged this.

Okay, time out.

Who in the U.S., especially on the Liberal side of the spectrum rather than those who would revoke jus soli citizenship does not want Immigrants to learn English? The 'Multi-Cultis' have an issue with demands that they be punished for not purging their mother tongue from their heads, abandoning their faith, declaring themselves malformed for having the wrong hair/skin/lips/etc., but how any of this translates into refusal to become American escapes me unless there is a very specific idea of what American is.

(I will admit that some of the bilingual education plans have proved ineffective, will rhapsodize at length on the efficiency/effectiveness of the mainstreaming setup at my old high school, and will point out that the loudest voices demanding more effective English instruction are the ones "fresh off the boat"* who barely know English and cannot spare the effort to learn as they are too busy putting food on the table)

(*: yes, that does not literally apply to the people coming from Mexico and points south)

I also note that, in my experience, the illegal immigrants are the ones least likely to live off of welfare, instead working at jobs many a 'real' American will not touch and/or accepting sub-standard wages/conditions American employers are happy to offer. As for your comment on the people who do not think beyond the barrio, they seem to be emulating many a people who have been in the U.S. far longer than your family (Caucasian and otherwise) that thinks the world ends at the next street or hill.

[heretic]

Un. Called. For.

Tackle woman walking on major freeway? Okay. Repeatedly punching her in the head once she is on the ground? No.