You know the American Way of Life is being lost when...

[clintonhater]

When almost any business number you call first asks you to choose your language.

When public displays for a Christian holiday are required to include some reference to an alien religion--Islam, of course.

When documents sent you by your state gov't include copies also printed in several different foreign languages. (In NY, at least a half-dozen.)

When a school system having ONE foreign language student is required by law to hire a teacher who speaks that language. (And WHERE in this country is there a school without at least one illegal's kid?)

What other examples can YOU add? Think hard, as this list is for the benefit of Togor, who doesn't understand why any American should object to having their country overrun by aliens from radically different cultures.

[Roadkingtrax]

Assembly instructions for the grill I just bought came in all languages, and English wasnt first.

[JB White]

Assembly instructions for the grill I just bought came in all languages, and English wasnt first.

Language? What about pictograms having no written language instructions at all.

[clintonhater]

Language? What about pictograms having no written language instructions at all.

Like the instrument panels of many cars? Like the bizarre symbols found on computer keyboards & in most programs & web pages, where a single word or abbreviation would make the meaning clear? It's a regression to the primitive conditions of a pre-literate culture.

[Roadkingtrax]

Language? What about pictograms having no written language instructions at all.

The pictures werent even in the Kings.

[togor]

Let me toss something back at you, CH, that gets at the flaw in your argument. This from a book I'm reading, picked up for me by my wife, for summer reading. Betrayal at Little Gibraltar, by William Walker. It's the untold story of the assault on Montfaucon by the US Army 79th Division in early autumn of 1918. I'm about 1/3rd of the way through but I'll already give it a thumb's up for its assembled accounts of field actions in the closing months of the Great War. Anyways, here is an excerpt from the journal of a 79th Division lieutenant named John "Jack" N. Bentley, from p.81 of the book:

Looking at the numerous Italians, Russians, Poles, Hungarians, Greeks, Serbs, Slavs, Roumanians [sic], and even Austrians and Germans in this vast Army, one at first wondered where the real American was keeping himself. Slowly the realization came that this conglomeration of nationalities was the real body of American people--they were the real Americans.

America is an idea in self-government, and ultimately self-restraint in the practice of government, that is not the province of a single language, ethnicity or creed. Choosing snow-globe nostalgia for the past as a substitute for keeping the idea alive today is a poor excuse for one's time. I shouldn't need to spell it out, but will anyways. Today's Mexican or Afghani is the Slav of 100 years ago.

[clintonhater]

Today's Mexican or Afghani is the Slav of 100 years ago.

All those EUROPEAN nationalities named (and this is nothing new!) shared in one basic culture derived from the break-up of the Roman Empire, despite superficial differences in language & dress, which they did not go out of their way to perpetuate in THIS country; in fact, there are countless stories told by the children of immigrants who never learned more than a few words of their parent's native language, because "English only" was the rule they were brought up under. Many of those parents sought to Americanize themselves by naming their children after American heroes like Washington & Lincoln.

Many Mexicans born in the US southwest have never, unfortunately, make the same efforts to Americanize themselves beyond learning English taught in grade school, nor did they have to when they lived in Spanish-speaking enclaves; but they are at least Christian, & descendants of a former European colony, & therefor have a share in the same basic culture of all Europeans.

The Afghan, never, unless he renounces his enemy religion.

[Vern Humphrey]

Like the instrument panels of many cars? Like the bizarre symbols found on computer keyboards & in most programs & web pages, where a single word or abbreviation would make the meaning clear? It's a regression to the primitive conditions of a pre-literate culture.

I bought a tractor, and the operator's manual included 40 "icons" I have to memorize. Wouldn't it be simpler to just mark the controls "4 wheel drive", "Power takeoff" and so on?

[dryheat]

World trade requires that multiple languages be printed for whatever country that thing goes to. But universal icon stuff might as well be cave art. I hate - and o for off and on, luckily they usually make the knobs green and red.

[clintonhater]

World trade requires that multiple languages be printed for whatever country that thing goes to.

No it doesn't "require" it, it's merely a cost-saving dodge by the cheapskate mfgr. The American & English-speaking market is PLENTY large enough to justify the slight added cost of English labeling, if most Americans weren't too lazy & apathetic to demand it.

[togor]

No it doesn't "require" it, it's merely a cost-saving dodge by the cheapskate mfgr. The American & English-speaking market is PLENTY large enough to justify the slight added cost of English labeling, if most Americans weren't too lazy & apathetic to demand it.

Seriously? The American way of life is debased because we have to read international assembly instructions? That's gotta be the winner for Troll of the Month and it's only the 10th! Well done CH!

[clintonhater]

Seriously? The American way of life is debased because we have to read international assembly instructions?

My comment had nothing to do with assembly instructions, thus demonstrating your reading comprehension. However, everybody I know regards such instructions as stupid & irritating (naturally, you don't), because they turn a simple owner's manual into a thick volume of useless & confusing pages.

[togor]

I have found that the key to those instructions is to find a language that you understand and stick to it.

[dryheat]

And because everything in this country has to have Spanish instructions the can of paint remover has everything written so small that no one can read them anyway. So, I get the stuff on me and I get cancer. Thanks PC. I think I'll sue.

[clintonhater]

And because everything in this country has to have Spanish instructions the can of paint remover has everything written so small that no one can read them anyway.

Better buy up as much as you need now--before Arabic & Chinese is added.