butterflywing

nellie, i'm sorry that you think this was about you. in my area there is no problem with illegal spanish-speaking undocumented people, so the "joke" was certainly not directed at you. rather, it referred to the fact that there ARE undocumented immigrants from all over the world in this country who, unlike you, are not citizens, have not learned english, but are still using YOUR tax dollars for medical aid and to educate their children. the united states has 4 borders: 2 of them are major port coasts where immigrants enter, 1 is a southern border where immigrants enter and one is a northern border where immigrants enter. illegals get in from all of these places. people from all over the world come in through canada and also through mexico, as well as both coasts. this was not about any particular ethnicity and none was mentioned.

minnow895

if you want to talk about discrimination try being white american born if i want a job i have to learn your langue or have to say i am mexcan just to get work i am tired of everone that wants to scream discrimantion so they think they can keep skrewing evrthing away from us american we have tv channels just for you we have class room just for you i don't get special; help because i'm not mexican if i ask for an interputure because i don't understand your langue i here tuff l;uck go learn englus and than i get fired learn the relthuth quit feeling sorry for your self and move on your in a country that gives mexican everk break in the world but if your white your out of luck i face discrimination everday of my life i just go on and don'y be a baby about it so get over it and go on with life

nellie

you know you may be right but when people start poking funny of others about border patrol or make jokes about a fat person or short person ,people get hurt we don,t know what a person has to go throught just to make a life ,i thank god i was born in this country and not had to leave my family and country just to make a living for themself, ive been shuffed in the system as well with my social security system ,ive been denied worker com ,as well at frist but i took a stand for myself becaues i new my rights,take care all

tigger5464

What a major discussion....but I did laugh...I also am of mixed heritage and still found it funny. My grandfather came here eons ago and we still have his citizenship papers. BTW...he fought for the US in WW1 and some of my uncles fought in WW2, Korea, and Nam. What is not funny are the stories I hear at work from the spanish speaking coworkers. Of how they paid a certain dollar amount to be transported illegally across the border and how to get to a certain community near here. When they get to this community, they are to go to a certain factory where they are GIVEN a fake green card and all other fake papers and such. Once they have that, they are called legal.
One lady told me that she was folded into a tool box on a semi tractor for 15 hrs across the border and then dumped and told to find her way to that community.

And we wonder how some of these people get here??? Is that funny now??? To me...it's not funny that they are able to do this, because they take jobs, money, and health care away from us.
Is the joke funny??? YES..people tend to be very thin skinned in this life time. If no mention of what nationality or no person specifically named, where is the harm???
Let's just take this as it was intended and let it be just that, a joke. Like television or radio...if you don't like it turn the station.
P.S. Like my great grandmother said.... ( who was native american Indian).....If you have nothing good to say...say nothing at all.
Enjoy your quilting projects please? Hugs and sunshiny laughter to all :D

nellie

well we still have to pay more taxes because the system gets and make those fake card for them so they can pay them less

butterflywing

my mother's people came from russia and poland. they spoke and wrote and read russian, polish, hebrew and yiddish. they also read hebrew, the prayer language. they came legally to canada, where they learned french. all their kids were born there, spoke french, polish, yiddish and russian. when they legally came to the usa, they added english. they all became citizens, except my own mother, who filed green card papers every year of her life. she married a citizen and was allowed to stay. she paid taxes and bought insurance.
i was born here and lived with my parents and grandparents. the house language was yiddish and that's what i spoke. when i was 4.5 yrs old i started kindergarten and learned english then. when my parents moved away, english was the house language. i am still mostly bi-lingual.

my father's people came from russia and spain. his father spoke polosh, russian, yiddish and hebrew. his mother spoke spanish, yiddish and hebrew.
they came here legally, learned english and became citizens. my father was born in the usa. he married my mother, and gave her immigration status.
my family, collectively, spoke russian, polish, french, spanish, yiddish (and thereby german), hebrew and english. wherever they lived they learned to read and write in that language, and become part of that community. that's why they came, after all.

what does that make me? american.

k3n

And a pretty fabulous one to boot! Says me! :-D

nellie

well good for you wavey the flag proud like i do as well :thumbup: :thumbup: :thumbup:

JoanneS

Yeah for all of us - most of us are descendents of immigrants, but we're Americans. My grandfather's parents immigrated from Bavaria and Switzerland. They learned English, but they spoke both German and English in their home. My grandfather refused to speak German to his children, so they learned only English. Going 'full circle' so to speak, my family lived in Germany for 4 years, where my children learned German from neighborhood children. They were in an American school because the German schools only had a month of summer vacation, and we were there to TRAVEL as much as possible. In college, they both SAILED through German language classes.

As far as I'm concerned, Americans would do well to actually learn to SPEAK more than 1 language. We're just about the only country in the world that's arrogant enough to think everyone else should learn our language while we don't require our kids to be able to speak a foreign language when they graduate from high school.

butterflywing

i quite agree. in high school i had to choose a second language :lol: and i chose spanish from among the choices. you couldn't graduate without that second language. the choices were spanish, french, german or latin.