What do you expect from immigrants?

Taking a small minority & pretending they represent the whole, is an age old technique to lend support to your view, regardless of its verity. While I acknowledge there may be examples to support your thesis, they in no way represent the whole, & using that example & generalizing it to cover everyone, is more than unbecoming as an American.

 

Don't assume any disreputable minority can be generalized to represent the whole. Be perceptive enough to separate those motivated by the bad things from those motivated by the right ones, & support the latter.

 

It's dangerous to generalize one's options in this issue too broadly. Every example must be evaluated within it's particular circumstances & dealt with accordingly.

 

But you know as well as I do, that those few individuals don't reflect views of the vast majority of us. I disagree with them as strongly as you do. Why should you allow them to make enemies of you & me, or you & the majority of American Democrats who agree with you on this issue?

 

You've never encountered a migrant who doesn't speak English?

 

This untruth again?

Some languages are very VERY resilient, and will stick for many generations.

 

Is this a joke? You want to spend a huge chunk of First World wealth on careful and considered 'evaluation' of each individual demand for a green card, while the Third World still doesn't have access to clean drinking water or a toilet to poop in? Are we THAT spoiled and precious?

The moral bankruptcy of this idea is beyond words.

 

We MUST go with likelihoods, and simple and inexpensive 'measures'. If someone can't be arsed even learning the language of the nation they are demanding residency from, then they clearly don't give a flying **** about that nation, nor her people - therefore it's an easy way to determine eligibility. If you're not fluent to at least 80%, no dice. Come back when you've demonstrated your willingness to embrace the language/nation/culture.

 

No. Most individuals involved in the green card process, want to do their jobs as effectively & humanely as possible. It doesn't take long-term investigations or procedures to determine eligibility of individuals. Most determinations can be made swiftly based on available information from a few accessible people. This system has been in place for decades. Trump's opposition to any & all immigrants has been the bottleneck. After Trump, it can be fixed rather rapidly.

 

I'm OK with that if new immigrants are given a reasonable amount of time to learn English. I know it would take >6 months for me to learn another language if I moved to another country. Immigrants coming here deserve that same respect. A year might be an acceptable time period for that purpose. Then the test to determine whether they complied or not should not be above about 6th grade level. Many native born Americans go thru their entire lives never functioning above that level. We shouldn't require more than that for incoming new American wannabees.

 

I interact very closely everyday with immigrants who speak varying degrees of English; sometimes almost none at all.

 

It is true, of course. It has been true throughout American history.

 

It has nothing to do with the specific language in use, it has to do with circumstance, motivation, and assimilation. Trust me on this.

 

Your prejudice is bluntly and clumsily exposed by your decision to use loaded terminology to express your bigotry.

Someone who does not yet speak a language cannot reasonably be dismissed as "can't be arsed." That's childishly irrational.

Someone applying for citizenship is not "demanding" anything; they are requesting an opportunity.

The one who "clearly (doesn't) give a flying *****" about an honest discussion is YOU.

 

It would take A LOT longer than that.

 

No, they must learn it BEFORE coming. It shows zero interest in making yourself a productive new citizen, if you won't even do that much. I would never accept a migrant who'd demonstrated such lack of respect for the nation they expect to feed and house them.

 

If you cannot YET speak the languange, stay home until you can. Anyone sufficiently motivated to embrace a new nation/culture will do this as a bare minimum.

Request denied. Show yourself a worthy candidate by doing the bare minimum, then demonstrate that you can live without citizen funded welfare of any kind, and have a qualification in high demand here, and we'll talk.

 

That hasn't been our history. In the past, we happily took in immigrants who couldn't speak English. That is why you have things like Chinatown and Little Italy. So that foreign language speaking immigrants can survive. That said, I do agree that we shouldn't take in immigrants who immediately go on welfare. If you don't have a way to make a living or a sponsor who can support you, you should stay in your home country and make it a bettter place. I pretty much believe in unlimited immigration, under the rules that no welfare be given to immigrants for the first five years that they are here, and that any felony conviction be accompanied with deportation after they serve their time.

 

Empty nonsense. Do you even have any idea what you mean by "speak the language"? By what means would you evaluate proficiency? I very seriously doubt you would have the first idea of how to establish qualifications or test for them. You don't exactly have a perfect grasp of the language yourself.

 

Empty nonsense. Your "bare minimum" is almost certainly something you could never achieve yourself.

 

I disagree. Many if not most new immigrants, decide to come to the U.S. in response to some form of extreme danger to themselves or their loved ones in the country where they live. In such situations, time is of the essence, & there's no time to learn English. Often, there's no time to even think--just run for your life or the lives of your family. Treating them as you describe in your post would be in total opposition to the ideals of humanity & human rights the U.S. has preached around the world for decades. I vote no to your post.

 

Please explain the specific bigotry you refer to.

 

Historically, there was more largess on language simply because we had more space, more resources, more everything. Times are very different now. We MUST run on a merit system, else unfairness and inequality creeps in.

 

Language proficiency testing has existed for a long time. How odd that you think there is no such thing.

 

I'm not discussing qualified refugees, I'm discussing ordinary immigrants. Refugees are a completely separate matter.