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Arizona: I dont follow the point you are trying to make. My point is this: Northern Europeans tended to move to Northern America. Mediterraneans tended to move to South America .... so that record I cited leaves one to conclude that one group (southern) is jealous of the other (northern) and is manipulating history to prove that they are "owed" parts of the northern success.... (similar to the MAFIOSO mentality that says "I deserve your success, YOU DON'T)..
Here in the Southwest; allnon Hispanic White people including Iranians, North Africans, etc. are considered to be 'Anglos'
For the record: there are millions of people here in the USA of French and Italian lineage.
Arizona: I dont follow the point you are trying to make. My point is this: Northern Europeans tended to move to Northern America. Mediterraneans tended to move to South America .... so that record I cited leaves one to conclude that one group (southern) is jealous of the other (northern) and is manipulating history to prove that they are "owed" parts of the northern success.... (similar to the MAFIOSO mentality that says "I deserve your success, YOU DON'T)..
Pretty shaky reasoning there, mdillon, though there is a GRAIN of consistency in what you say. Very briefly stated, during the "colonization" period, England was the most advanced society on earth, in terms of human rights, as we know them today. That, really, is where the "right of the individual" was first made into law. In this respect, England was a century or so ahead of Spain in "enlightenment". Add to THIS the fact that Spain did much of its New World settling a century or so earlier than did England, and you have the equivalent of two centuries or so difference in the "outlook" of these two societies. When Spain first "discovered" America. it was quite literally still in the "Dark Ages". By the time England made its moves, it was already on the way to becoming a modern society, heavy on individual rights.
On top of THAT, the two "colonizations" had profoundly different aims. Spain looked at the New World in terms of riches to be found and gained, and "souls" to be converted. Most Spanish "settlers" were unattached single males. England looked at the New World in terms of new lands to be settled, and farmed, and most of its settlers were families---or, on occasion, whole villages of immigrants. These differences produced vastly different "systems" in the ensuing centuries.
The "Anglo-American" area had laws based on the English system, very big on civil rights. The older "Napoleonic" system in Latin America had far fewer protections for the individual. All this very much affected development, progress, and the distribution of wealth.
America contains HUGE numbers of "mediterraneans" and many others, while Latin America is also quite mixed and varies widely in ethnic background of its inhabitants. It is the SYSTEM, though, not the ethnicity, which causes the big differences in life and prosperity these two areas.
All Americans, who've been here a generation or more, regardless of their race or ethnicity, are, for purposes of culture, "Anglos". We have a basic "anglo" culture which encompasses our civil and criminal laws, our system of education, our political system, our civil liberties, etc etc etc. I hate the terms "anglo" and "hispanic", because they're really so vague. But our system here in the US could really be described as an "anglo" system, no matter where our ancestors came from. Italian Americans aren't "Italians"--they're Americans. The same hold true for Irish, Chinese, Black, and any other assimilated American, including Mexican-Americans. All of these people live lives very different from those of their foreign ancestors and cousins.
It's very fashionable now to suggest that 'multiculturalism' is the way to go. I don't think many people really think about this carefully. The culture of America is really all that's holding us together. Lose that, and we soon fall apart. Multiculturalism is fine in choosing food or music--but not so good in choosing laws or "rights". We'd better be very careful about how "multi" we want to be...
By the way, the large majority of "anglos" don't have ANY English ancestry at all. They are "anglo" by virtue of the language they speak, and by the American culture in which they live their lives. And MOST of them are well aware that they're far better off than their ancestors, no matter who those might have been...
let's be clear as to "who" it is that wants open-borders. This Unholy Alliance is made up of: Catholic Church, US and Mexican corporate interests profiteering from cheap Mexican labor, politicians who believe that they can get elected in the US only with more minorities able to vote, and of course the Mexican government, meaning the political and corporate elite who love the idea of sending millions of their poor and uneducated to be taken care of by the US taxpayer rather than Mexican taxpayers, relieving them of their need topay their fair shae of taxes...not to forget about the famous REMITTANCES at the rate of about $2B per month.... money that Americans are NOT making and on which little if any taxes are paid AND money NOT SPENT IN THE US ECONOMY....
this, on top of our $70B trade deficit, can only be described as a SWEET DEAL for Mexico and the corporatins profiting from this chaos...
Oh PLEASE! The Catholic church?? I'm sure they love the flow of Catholics coming from the South, but the REAL people who profits are the US Businesses who have a steady pool of CHEAP LABOR. Why do you think that despite the all the big talk no REPUBLICAN president, even with a REPUBLICAN majority in Congress has managed to stop illegal immigration? Forget the Democrats, I don't expect that from them, but Ronald Reagan's amnesty??? Ummm.....I guess it was his corporate donors talking.
All Americans, who've been here a generation or more, regardless of their race or ethnicity, are, for purposes of culture, "Anglos". We have a basic "anglo" culture which encompasses our civil and criminal laws, our system of education, our political system, our civil liberties, etc etc etc. I hate the terms "anglo" and "hispanic", because they're really so vague. But our system here in the US could really be described as an "anglo" system, no matter where our ancestors came from. Italian Americans aren't "Italians"--they're Americans. The same hold true for Irish, Chinese, Black, and any other assimilated American, including Mexican-Americans. All of these people live lives very different from those of their foreign ancestors and cousins.
So Mexicans are now Anglos??? Come on. What you're saying is that we- legal residents of the US- are AMERICANS. Forget this silly Anglo thing. If your ancestors came from England, Scotland, Ireland, Germany...you're Anglo-Saxon. If your ancestors came from Italy, Spain, Portugal, Greece...you're Mediterranean. If your ancestors came from Sweden, Denmark, etc. you're Nordic. If your ancestors came from Russia and beyond, you're slavic. If your ancestors came from the Middle East, you're Middle Eastern (Persian- Iran). And so on....that's your cultural heritage....but if you're a LEGAL AMERICAN CITIZEN....you're American.
America contains HUGE numbers of "mediterraneans" and many others, while Latin America is also quite mixed and varies widely in ethnic background of its inhabitants. It is the SYSTEM, though, not the ethnicity, which causes the big differences in life and prosperity these two areas.
I think you would find that the ethnicity of most Latin Americans is not unlike that of most US Americans....there is a European (Northern and Southern), Indian, African and even Asian mix. In terms of prosperity, well, if US Corporations and Government have their way, you will see the elimination of the middle class to parallel the LAtin American class system- a small ruling elite and large lower class.
All Americans, who've been here a generation or more, regardless of their race or ethnicity, are, for purposes of culture, "Anglos". We have a basic "anglo" culture which encompasses our civil and criminal laws, our system of education, our political system, our civil liberties, etc etc etc. I hate the terms "anglo" and "hispanic", because they're really so vague. But our system here in the US could really be described as an "anglo" system, no matter where our ancestors came from. Italian Americans aren't "Italians"--they're Americans. The same hold true for Irish, Chinese, Black, and any other assimilated American, including Mexican-Americans. All of these people live lives very different from those of their foreign ancestors and cousins.
So Mexicans are now Anglos??? Come on. What you're saying is that we- legal residents of the US- are AMERICANS. Forget this silly Anglo thing. If your ancestors came from England, Scotland, Ireland, Germany...you're Anglo-Saxon. If your ancestors came from Italy, Spain, Portugal, Greece...you're Mediterranean. If your ancestors came from Sweden, Denmark, etc. you're Nordic. If your ancestors came from Russia and beyond, you're slavic. If your ancestors came from the Middle East, you're Middle Eastern (Persian- Iran). And so on....that's your cultural heritage....but if you're a LEGAL AMERICAN CITIZEN....you're American.
Here in the Southwest; allnon Hispanic White people are counted as 'Anglo', legally speaking.
Yours Truly; despite being of 1/2 Eastern Euro heritage, considers himself culturally WASP as well as being Anglo.
Pretty shaky reasoning there, mdillon, though there is a GRAIN of consistency in what you say. Very briefly stated, during the "colonization" period, England was the most advanced society on earth, in terms of human rights, as we know them today. That, really, is where the "right of the individual" was first made into law. In this respect, England was a century or so ahead of Spain in "enlightenment". Add to THIS the fact that Spain did much of its New World settling a century or so earlier than did England, and you have the equivalent of two centuries or so difference in the "outlook" of these two societies. When Spain first "discovered" America. it was quite literally still in the "Dark Ages". By the time England made its moves, it was already on the way to becoming a modern society, heavy on individual rights.
On top of THAT, the two "colonizations" had profoundly different aims. Spain looked at the New World in terms of riches to be found and gained, and "souls" to be converted. Most Spanish "settlers" were unattached single males. England looked at the New World in terms of new lands to be settled, and farmed, and most of its settlers were families---or, on occasion, whole villages of immigrants. These differences produced vastly different "systems" in the ensuing centuries.
The "Anglo-American" area had laws based on the English system, very big on civil rights. The older "Napoleonic" system in Latin America had far fewer protections for the individual. All this very much affected development, progress, and the distribution of wealth.
America contains HUGE numbers of "mediterraneans" and many others, while Latin America is also quite mixed and varies widely in ethnic background of its inhabitants. It is the SYSTEM, though, not the ethnicity, which causes the big differences in life and prosperity these two areas.
All Americans, who've been here a generation or more, regardless of their race or ethnicity, are, for purposes of culture, "Anglos". We have a basic "anglo" culture which encompasses our civil and criminal laws, our system of education, our political system, our civil liberties, etc etc etc. I hate the terms "anglo" and "hispanic", because they're really so vague. But our system here in the US could really be described as an "anglo" system, no matter where our ancestors came from. Italian Americans aren't "Italians"--they're Americans. The same hold true for Irish, Chinese, Black, and any other assimilated American, including Mexican-Americans. All of these people live lives very different from those of their foreign ancestors and cousins.
It's very fashionable now to suggest that 'multiculturalism' is the way to go. I don't think many people really think about this carefully. The culture of America is really all that's holding us together. Lose that, and we soon fall apart. Multiculturalism is fine in choosing food or music--but not so good in choosing laws or "rights". We'd better be very careful about how "multi" we want to be...
By the way, the large majority of "anglos" don't have ANY English ancestry at all. They are "anglo" by virtue of the language they speak, and by the American culture in which they live their lives. And MOST of them are well aware that they're far better off than their ancestors, no matter who those might have been...
Multiculturalism is crap IMHO as well. The de facto language is English, etc.
Looking at Gibraltar at the southern tip of Spain; they inhabitants there consider themselves British culturally, not 'Hispanic'-------despite many of 'em having Hispanic names and speaking Spanish in addition to English..
America contains HUGE numbers of "mediterraneans" and many others, while Latin America is also quite mixed and varies widely in ethnic background of its inhabitants. It is the SYSTEM, though, not the ethnicity, which causes the big differences in life and prosperity these two areas.
I think you would find that the ethnicity of most Latin Americans is not unlike that of most US Americans....there is a European (Northern and Southern), Indian, African and even Asian mix. In terms of prosperity, well, if US Corporations and Government have their way, you will see the elimination of the middle class to parallel the LAtin American class system- a small ruling elite and large lower class.
I think you're missing my point. I said I HATE the term "anglo" for its vagueness. However the word is used for lack of a BETTER term. It denotes the culture of the US, normally as OPPOSED to another culture--most of the time these days, as "opposed" to Hispanic. Both words are silly, incomplete, and dismissive. I don't like the term, and seldom ever use it, outside a forum such as this.
My wife, for example, is about 3/4 native American (though she prefers the term "Indian".) She also has some Spanish ancestry. However, in her daily life, she would be called "anglo". She speaks English. Though I'm not hispanic myself, my Spanish is far better than hers. She never wears "war paint" and hasn't been on a "buffalo hunt" in years. When she gets sick, she goes to a doctor. Her life is encompassed by "anglo" language, laws, and traditions, more than Indian or Spanish. For the purposes of "comparison" with various cultures, she is an "anglo", culturally. I, too, am culturally an "anglo", though none of my ancestors were English.
I am well aware of the many ethnicities in South America, and the wide differences there between different countries--all the more reason for the very silly sound of the term "hispanic"..but I didn't coin that phrase.
AS far as your classifying Americans as to what they "are"---Nordic, Mediterranean, Slavic, etc...I'm not sure what your point is. Do they all "see the world" differently? I thought we were all Americans. And what about the MAJORITY of Americans who "are" more than one ethnicity? Are they "normal" Americans, or some special hybrid category? What about Americans with 8 or 10 ethnicities in their genes? If they speak English, generally understand how life 'works', and celebrate Thanksgiving, what "culture" are they?...I'm not following your reasoning here...
BTW---Germany isn't "Anglo-Saxon"--it's Teutonic...Ireland (and, arguably, Scotland) are Celtic, not Anglo-Saxon. I think it would be a stretch to equate Spanish culture with Greek ---"Mediterranean" is an awfully vague term. Aren't Algerians and Tunisians and Libyans "Mediterranean"? Pretty imprecise way to "classify" long-established populations of Americans, I'd say.
schools that require all teachers to be Spanish speaking, preferably from Mexico and of course the lowering academics.
Schools cannot lower the academics, all schools that get federal money are subject to the sanctions NCLB imposes. Since NCLB is punitive against teachers and administrators, lowering academics would only serve to punish teachers and administrators.
That is just one sentence of Bull hockey out of that particular load.
I think that any legal resident of the US is an 'American'. What we choose to identify ourselves as culturally is up to us. I have Italian friends who say they are 'Latin'. Ok by me. Hispanic friends who say they are 'Latin'. Ok. Whatever....it really doesn't matter to me. I guess I just don't 'get' calling people 'Anglo' who aren't Anglo-Saxon. I understand that you are seperating the 'Anglo' and 'Hispanic' culture, but I don't see why that's necessary. Anglo = ? Hispanic = ? Can you fill that in?
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