Why, why, why does McDonalds have a "Now Hiring" sign in both English AND Spanish? I'm going to play the obtuse card here and try and figure this one out.
We live in a country where the vast majority of the population speaks English (or at least a very limited version of it). It's been that way since about the time the Constitution was finally ratified. Why then, are we pandering to people who refuse to learn English? Maybe its naivete on my part, but if you are going to leave your country of origin and move to a completely foreign country, shouldn't you at least attempt a basic grasp of your new country's language? I mean, if I were to pick up and move to France (not that I ever would...EVER) then I would damn well make sure that I could speak passing French. 'Cause I'm damn sure that French businesses wouldn't be accommodating to my lack of language skills. Sure, tourists get an out because they are only there for a short time, but a permanent resident? Yeah, I'd be about as popular as small pox.
So why are we enabling these immigrants to continue to withstand learning a new language? Hey, I know that English is a tough language to master (don't believe me? Try to have an intelligent conversation with a 17 year old. That's an exercise in futility). But where is the problem in asking someone who wishes to live here to learn to speak the lingua franca?
Now, I'm not one of these "patriotic" (re: insane zealots) types who is endorsing a government edict creating English as the national language. But I don't think its too much to ask that if you move to this country, you speak the language that 90% of the rest of us are conversing in (bad grammar and all). Simply put, learn the language or take the boat back home, jerky.
Maybe businesses should start putting up signs that refuse service to people who can't speak English. Yeah, that's a tough stand. It's tough world. Quit bitching. Keep your religion, keep your customs, but dammit, speak to me in English.
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2 comments:
There's a good reason that sign is also en espanol. It's because a lot of hard-working people in this country are MEXICANS. Duh.
Do they all speak english? Not necessarily. Are they all capable of working at McDonalds? Absolutely. In fact, odds are your Spanish-only employee is going to work harder than most 16-year-old English speakers. That's a generalization, yes, but ask anyone who works with the Mexican workforce: they bust their asses. So much so, it's worth it to the employer to learn a little Spanish. (Scary, huh?)
It's sad, because your boy George W. Bush actually DID make English the national language not too long ago. Since 1776 we didn't need a national language -- after all, this was a nation based on liberties, including the freedom to speak Spanish, French, German, Klingon, whatever. Just like it was a nation to keep people from thrusting their religions on us. If you can get by as a Muslim, fine. If you can get by as a Christian, fine. If you can get by speaking Arabic, fine.
But there are the xenophobes among us that think, because they hear a different language in their area, that those people are WRONG. SPEAK ENGLISH, FOREIGNERS! Odds are, these people are as American as you or me.
One thing that is really sad about the above fear of foreign language is that so many of our world competitors speak more than one language fluently... as Americans, we're falling behind on the world stage, because somewhere along the line (schools, at home, the US Govt) we're not empowering our children with a chance to speak anything outside their Okie drawl.
Also: Your headline, "No Hable, No Service," your attempt at cleverness, I suppose, is as dense as this post. You're trying to tell me because you can't speak Spanish, you can't get served at McDonald's? That's a laugh.
It's funny to me that you're so anti-George Bush. A lot of your politics here are right in line with a world W dreams of. "Let's get those bibles in public schools, and let's tell them Mexicans that they better start talking Americanese or go home." Is Travis writing this blog, or Condoleezza?
Ah, I love Seth. The funny thing is that our political ideologies are prolly closer than you might think. Let's reverse the script to give some clarification.
Let's say I immigrated to Mexico. What are the chances of my success if I refused to learn to speak Spanish? Prolly slim to none (and you know the rest of that joke). If I didn't at least master the basics of the language, chances are very good that I would be forced to either come home or scrape by as best I could. How tolerant do you think people there would be of me if I demanded that they master English to accomodate me?
And yes, for over 200 years, there was no national language. But people from those same nationalities that you describe made it a point to learn English so they would be able to function in their new nation.
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