Disintegration
Posting from: Tucson, AZ
Listening to: Matt Nathanson, Car Crash
A recurring theme among anti-immigrant arguments seems to be that, "If they would just integrate themselves into our society, assimilate into the culture, and above all SPEAK ENGLISH! then I would be fine with them coming here."
This strikes me as particularly interesting today because I am in the process of DISintegrating myself from the world I live in. I am quitting my job. I am cashing out my 401k. I am leaving the big city for a tiny county with fewer than 3000 residents. I have been trying to throw more and more of my business to likeminded individuals to try and help get the mighty helicopter of agorism off the ground. I hope never to work a conventional job again, and I will do everything in my power to accomplish that goal. And many folks who complain about "them" failing to adopt "our" culture are themselves living outside of mainstream American culture, too.
So where does this Borg-like value system come from? Why must that which is different automatically be condemned and squashed? Why is there such a strong knee-jerk tendancy in some people to assume that change is bad and must diminish us?
I don't understand how I am harmed by a person speaking Spanish with another person, by salsa taking ketchup's status as America's number one condiment, or by someone celebrating quinceanera instead of sweet sixteen.
If that is the culture that you want people to adopt, well, I wouldn't want to assimilate into that shit. In fact, I'm doing everything in my power to extract myself out of that fucked up shit.
Listening to: Matt Nathanson, Car Crash
A recurring theme among anti-immigrant arguments seems to be that, "If they would just integrate themselves into our society, assimilate into the culture, and above all SPEAK ENGLISH! then I would be fine with them coming here."
This strikes me as particularly interesting today because I am in the process of DISintegrating myself from the world I live in. I am quitting my job. I am cashing out my 401k. I am leaving the big city for a tiny county with fewer than 3000 residents. I have been trying to throw more and more of my business to likeminded individuals to try and help get the mighty helicopter of agorism off the ground. I hope never to work a conventional job again, and I will do everything in my power to accomplish that goal. And many folks who complain about "them" failing to adopt "our" culture are themselves living outside of mainstream American culture, too.
So where does this Borg-like value system come from? Why must that which is different automatically be condemned and squashed? Why is there such a strong knee-jerk tendancy in some people to assume that change is bad and must diminish us?
I don't understand how I am harmed by a person speaking Spanish with another person, by salsa taking ketchup's status as America's number one condiment, or by someone celebrating quinceanera instead of sweet sixteen.
If that is the culture that you want people to adopt, well, I wouldn't want to assimilate into that shit. In fact, I'm doing everything in my power to extract myself out of that fucked up shit.
Labels: freedom, immigration, individualism, Kirsten
posted by Kirsten | 12:01 PM
11 Comments:
Abso-freakin-lutely!
I have never understood the desire of so many people to have everyone be a cookie-cutter replica of everyone else, live in a cookie-cutter house, with the cookie-cutter family. It reminds me of that freaky planet in A Wrinkle In Time. I think it's getting worse, it's not just in High School anymore, it's everywhere! The Mexicans I have had experience with are perfectly respectable people who seem nice, try to learn some English, have jobs, etc. In general they are also nicer than many "Americans" I know. I like salsa better than ketchup anyway.
WR
Very nicely written. I'll save a spot for you down by the "Y".
p
Its actually quite simple. . .
The jobs "Americans won't do" are jobs Americans *used* to do, until Big Business discovered the illegals will do them for chump change. . . now they expect *EVERYONE* to work for the same under-poverty-level wages the illegals work for.
Until We, as a Nation, stand up and stop this shit, we're gonna have this problem. . . Look around. . . in the 2 cities I have lived in most of my life, they are starting to look more like MexiCali than an American city. . . trash everywhere, broke-down cars sittin in the yard. . . fuck that! If these freaks can't or won't leave their shithole country culture at the border, let them go back! If the way they lived in Mexico was so great, stay there! Don't bring your shit into my yard. . .
If you knock on my door, and ask politely to come in, you are most likely going to be welcomed (use the proper channels to enter the country). . . if you jump the fence into my yard, you got no-one to blame but yourself if you get shot.
Here's a nice adventure for you, if you're too much of a coward to jump the border into Mexico illegally (where being an illegal is a felony).
Go find a nice gated community.
Jump the fence into somebody's back yard and set up your tent.
When they complain, simply tell them you're only going to be there for 6 months or so while you're working, but after that you'll go home.
When they call the JBTs , gather all your friends/family who are living in other back yards in the community and stage a protest demanding the law be changed to make what you're doing retroactively legal.
What a bunch of fuckin morons. . .
"reverend" draco...
What I do with my own property is my business and you are kindly invited to piss up a rope if you would presume to make me do as you like about it.
Speaking of bringing your shit into my yard, welcome to my blog, RD. Why aren't you assimilating to my culture? If you can't leave your shithole attitude behind you, why don't you just go back where you came from? If your way of thinking is so great, what are you doing here? Little bit of a double standard you've got going there, don't you think?
Your gated community analogy suffers a fatal flaw. You seem to think that the entire country is your backyard. News flash! It's not. You do not own the entire country. Neither do the majority of voters. Neither does the government.
Much as I despise your attitude, you should be free to enforce your hatred on your own property. However, it's not your right to decide what I or anyone else does with our property- including associating with people of other races or citizens of other countries.
You are certainly free to attempt to persuade me- although hateful comments are not a good way to win me over to your point of view. But there is a big difference between persuasion and force. Forcing me or anyone else to comply with your personal whims is not acceptable.
I'd much prefer a neighbor who does things with his property that I find aesthetically displeasing to a neighbor like you who thinks he can tell me what to do or what not to do on my property.
Kirsten, you might find this article interesting. According to the study mentioned in this article, immigration actually reduces crime rates!
To be fair, K, the meaning of "disintegration" as you're using it, and how folks like RD are using it are likely miles apart when it comes to the practical realities of what each of you are hoping to accomplish.
But much of the "integrate" garbage could be done away with by the removal of state intervention. I'm annoyed that I have to pay for driver's manuals and voting ballots and other garbage in multiple languages... but blame for that falls on the state's very existence, NOT the folks coming here whose native tongue is something other than English.
If we removed discrimination laws from the books, business owners annoyed by those who don't speak English could hire employees and serve customers however they want. But again, the current complications are a result of the state at work, not the immigrants who come here.
Nicely put. At least 8 years ago I stepped away from the expected path, and now I am stepping away even further making a move similar to your own. Keep up the disintegration.
TXTStorm
The first few sentences by the "Reverend" made sense, then it all went to hell. Yes, we live in a low wage economy and it is not sustainable. But the blame is on corporate america, not any people who come here from other countries.
I first and foremost blame the unsustainable state of the economy on the federal reserve and their inflationary money policies making our dollars worth less and less.
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