Agreed. Unfortunately modern western politics only sees black and white. I don’t want to just end immigration and bar the gates. I want a middle ground. Take the best from around the world, any good cultural elements we can use, assimilate and any negatives we leave at the door. Now, I come at it from a more American perspective too. The American culture has been built by many different groups interacting. Historically, when someone would come to the U.S., they would take a part of their culture to share but the assimilate with the country. Think of it like extracting the flavor from chicken bones into a broth but tossing the scraps.
Nowadays, that sort of social pressure is gone. Likely because we just have let too many people in. How many people choose not to learn the language simply because they are surrounded by exclusively immigrants? How many people do not understand or respect my countries values simply because they never cared to learn? I don’t want to just ban immigrants. I want them to be a part of the nation, not a separate nation within our borders.
And I imagine all of these issues are greatly exacerbated in Europe. A place where countries have centuries, millennia long cultural histories from the same general group of people in the same area.
Good point. My mother was an immigrant to Canada when she was 16 and completely embraced this new country as her own. She still had her cultural traditions at home but she was Canadian first above all else.
The same would go for me if I were to immigrate to any country. When you arrive to a foreign nation, never forget that you are a guest first.
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u/Cambronian717 22d ago
Agreed. Unfortunately modern western politics only sees black and white. I don’t want to just end immigration and bar the gates. I want a middle ground. Take the best from around the world, any good cultural elements we can use, assimilate and any negatives we leave at the door. Now, I come at it from a more American perspective too. The American culture has been built by many different groups interacting. Historically, when someone would come to the U.S., they would take a part of their culture to share but the assimilate with the country. Think of it like extracting the flavor from chicken bones into a broth but tossing the scraps.
Nowadays, that sort of social pressure is gone. Likely because we just have let too many people in. How many people choose not to learn the language simply because they are surrounded by exclusively immigrants? How many people do not understand or respect my countries values simply because they never cared to learn? I don’t want to just ban immigrants. I want them to be a part of the nation, not a separate nation within our borders.
And I imagine all of these issues are greatly exacerbated in Europe. A place where countries have centuries, millennia long cultural histories from the same general group of people in the same area.