[OT] Houston press conference on hurricane

[FogBat]

Reminds me of when I go to the drive up ATM machine and it asks "English or Spanish?"

 

I can't help but say "English M*&^F#%@er, do you speak it!"

Where did I see someone post that before? Was it Corp000085 from a Spike Lee movie?

[Bmwolf21]

Where did I see someone post that before? Was it Corp000085 from a Spike Lee movie?

It was from Pulp Fiction.

[spndnchz]

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[inkman]

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:lol:

[carpandean]

Sure, many other nations teach English at an early age. And they do it because it is the accepted language of business. There is a potential monetary award for them doing so, an incentive. It's all about $, thinking otherwise would be a mistake IMO.

Be it a village, a city, a county, or a state, I'm not sure why a government's desire to communicate with a huge percentage of people living under its jurisdiction is a problem for so many of you, but to each his own, I guess...

Of course money is a big driver. What I meant is that choosing English as the second language that they teach their populace is partly due to wanting American tourist money (as opposed to, say, Spanish or French or Mandarin for those tourists), but mostly due to English being the chosen unifying language of the world.

 

Encouraging or requiring all citizens to know English is another way to guarantee that the government can communicate that same segment of the population. It may be a little more long-sighted, but would be better in that long-run.

 

 

 

So does this guy! :wallbash:

Well, that (everyone should learn Spanish) is definitely an issue that I can put in the "disagree with" category, which I guess makes it a wash with immigrants should learn English, which is in the "agree with" category. While the latter could be passed, I doubt the former would be, since most of the politicians in Washington don't know Spanish.

 

If anybody required me to be bilingual, Spanish would not be my choice for a second language (and it would be easy for me to learn since I took a few years of it in high school.) At this point, I'd probably learn Mandarin, but that might be due to the number of native Chinese in academia or because they will likely be the next economic power-house. Of course, if you asked that same question 15 years ago, the answer would have been Japanese.

[deluca67]

With the ever increasing Spanish population I suggest that some of you hit the local community college for some Spanish lessons. Language is just another example of how this once great country is hopelessly falling behind the rest of the world. With the ever growing global economy it will become more important to be diversified in the manner which you are able to communicate. I work with people who get paid more because they can speak Spanish & English. It doesn't bother me because they took the time and made the effort to expand their ability to communicate. I would also never discriminate against those who come to this country to live the American dream. Who are any of us to deny them that right.

 

The initial thought that people coming to America should learn the language and not be catered to is the typical lazy fat American response to any problem. The idea that the world needs to cater to Americans instead of Americans putting down the remote control and the bucket of KFC and actually expanding their ability to communicate rather than their elastic waist bands.

 

And for the record, most immigrants who come to this country bring a work ethic that has not been a part of the American labor force for years. Americans have become fat and lazy living with a false sense on entitlement. The American worker continues to price themselves out of the global market while they let archaic institutions like labor unions to continue to destroy industry after industry. First the American Farmer, then the steel industry and now the auto industry. So instead of being angry at those who have come to this country to build on their dreams maybe try putting some effort in to rebuilding the once great American Dream.

[carpandean]

DeLuca - as someone with over a decade of higher education, I always encourage expanding one's mind. I completely admire people who are bi-, tri- or multilingual (yes, I know bi- and tri- are part of multi-, but I'm using that for four or more here.) The problem is which language should I learn? Sure, there is a portion of our population, especially in some areas of the country, that speaks only Spanish, but what about immigrants from other countries? Also, you want me to learn another language due to the growing global market, but is Spanish the best choice in that regard?

 

At this point, the choice of English is not arbitrary; it is the accepted unifying language of business (probably due to our dominance in the global economy at the time it was settled on and that "lazy and entitled" American attitude.) The choice of Spanish as a secondary language, at least globally, is somewhat arbitrary. It would help in some of South and Central America, but is that the market that I will be dealing with most? The last conference that I went to was in Montreal; French would have been helpful there. Most manufacturing companies have production facilities in China; Mandarin would be helpful there. Much of the service and technical expertise is now located in India; Hindi would be helpful there. I wish that I could speak all of those, among others, but should Spanish be my first choice? Look at a list of the top 20 most populace countries:

 

China (PRC)

India

United States

Indonesia

Brazil

Pakistan

Bangladesh

Nigeria

Russia

Japan

Mexico

Phillapines

Vietnam

Germany

Ethiopia

Egypt

Turkey

Iran

France

Thailand

 

How many speak Spanish as a their primary language? Mexico. Brazil's primary language is Portuguese. Even if you look at the top 20 by GDP, all you add is Spain.

 

Let me be clear: I do think that Americans are generally complacent went it comes to learning additional languages and it never hurts to know more than one. This does not, however, change the fact that our country and the world would be better off with everyone knowing (at least) one common language. The current choice happens to be English.

[TM8-PL16]

there are many ways to beat this dead horse, but here's one more...

 

Did anyone watch the Monday Night Football game last night? Did anyone else find it EXTREMELY annoying that they aired part of the Spanish audio for a few segments? I'm sorry but I HATE that!!! do they cut in to the ESPN Deportes broadcasts with English audio just to show you how diverse they are? my guess is NO. If I wanted to listen to the game in spanish, I'd listen to that alternate audio feed OR I would have ESPN Deportes to watch. Don't annoy me by speaking a different language that I didn't ask for.

 

When they do little things like this during the Super Bowl, I get it... and they do it to show you all the different countries actually covering the game and sometimes it's funny to hear our sport broadcast in different languages, but on a regular monday night game on a US Cable station to make me listen to spanish TOTALLY annoys me. I know that makes me an "elitest American", but whatever. I'm not saying to not have it available, but don't FORCE me to listen to it.

 

Also, apparently Mr. Tony (Tony Kornheiser) was told to apologize for a silly comment he made, that basically amounted to making fun of himself and his lack of Spanish knowledge during the broadcast. This also angers me... he shouldn't have had to apologize for anything, he didn't do anything wrong and if some spanish speaking person thinks he did and we all should bow down to them because they don't speak english, who is being elitest now?

[FogBat]

With the ever increasing Spanish population I suggest that some of you hit the local community college for some Spanish lessons. Language is just another example of how this once great country is hopelessly falling behind the rest of the world. With the ever growing global economy it will become more important to be diversified in the manner which you are able to communicate. I work with people who get paid more because they can speak Spanish & English. It doesn't bother me because they took the time and made the effort to expand their ability to communicate. I would also never discriminate against those who come to this country to live the American dream. Who are any of us to deny them that right.

 

The initial thought that people coming to America should learn the language and not be catered to is the typical lazy fat American response to any problem. The idea that the world needs to cater to Americans instead of Americans putting down the remote control and the bucket of KFC and actually expanding their ability to communicate rather than their elastic waist bands.

And for the record, most immigrants who come to this country bring a work ethic that has not been a part of the American labor force for years. Americans have become fat and lazy living with a false sense on entitlement. The American worker continues to price themselves out of the global market while they let archaic institutions like labor unions to continue to destroy industry after industry. First the American Farmer, then the steel industry and now the auto industry. So instead of being angry at those who have come to this country to build on their dreams maybe try putting some effort in to rebuilding the once great American Dream.

I should have known that you were going to present some kind of antithesis.

 

Here's my answer: when in Rome, do as the Romans do. IOW, they're on our turf, not the other way around.

 

As it is, I tried to learn some German when I was in the Army and stationed north of Frankfurt. It was quite a culture shock to say the least!