Core Rethugs don't want minorities: They call Hispanic boy singing Nat'l Anthem "illegal alien"

[UTUSN]

Before there was Diversity, the concept in White American studies was [FONT style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: yellow"]The Melting Pot[/FONT], which meant cooking off the furrin-ness. By the 1950s the term changed to [FONT style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: yellow"]Assimilation[/FONT], meaning the same thing, deleting all cultural roots to Act and Speak White. The elementary teachers along the Southern Border were telling Hispanic kids their role model was Davy CROCKETT in the coonskin cap.

There were segregated classrooms. Then there were No Spanish /English Only rules at school. And speaking Spanish children were sometimes classified as Downs Syndrome (using the colloquial term). [FONT style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: yellow"] [/FONT]

And the Rethug Party became the bastion of voter suppression in all forms, whether by legal restrictions or personal harassment, English Only, literal walls across 3,000 miles of (Southern only) border, hysterical spending on "security" with manpower build-ups, lavish headquarters buildings, horses, dune buggies, riverboats, electronic equipment, and immeasurable volume of hot air from the assorted Minutemen, TeaBaggers, and their predecessors KKK and Skinheads.

The (few) "modern" Rethugs who realize they will go extinct without SOME kind of recruitment now use the word [FONT style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: yellow"]"Aspirational,"[/FONT] as in, they are looking for Hispanics who "aspire" to the economic side of wingnuttiness (unregulated greed).

So this is Sebastian DE LA CRUZ, a U.S. Citizen, whose father was in the Navy, the U.S. Navy, singing The Star Spangled Banner, whom probable Rethug voters called an illegal alien. Funny how scores of (OTHER) American celebrities screw up that song. He didn't. And when he was pressed by media for a reaction to the name-calling, he said it meant nothing to him, no bitterness.

[el_bryanto]

1. The melting pot term is interesting to me -

It comes form the Era when Irish and Italians were coming over in large numbers and experiencing some pretty horrific prejudices. That's since changed obviously - Italians and Irish are pretty well integrated now. Did they lose their culture along the way?

There is a dark side to the melting pot which is of course that you are expected to act as "white anglo-saxon Protestant" as you can (or at least this is how it has worked. New immigrants are expected to pick up stuff from Middle-class whites but Whites don't pick up anything from new immigrants. But then again - almost every city and town in America has an Italian place- and often Mexican and Chinese places as well. Irish food hasn't really caught on but we celebrate St. Patricks day every year.

I guess if I was to look for a central metaphor for New Immigrants joining America I would want one that emphasizes our common humanity, while allowing us our differences and the opportunity to learn new ways of looking at things across cultures. I don't like emphasizing our differences because we are all in this together - I don't like ignoring our differences (or making immigrants change to fit our culture) either.

Bryant

[Igel]

5. The problem is that there was a dearth of immigration for a few decades.

Coupled with segregation and home-grown black ethnogenesis.

So when immigration and civil rights picked up there was this idea that "white America" was monolithic. It wasn't. NBC-English was the standard, we had a kind of official Rockwell culture, but there was a lot of differences.

For me, Thanksgiving standardly came equipped with lasagna, New Year's had to have pierogi, and corned beef and cabbage (like Jewish rye bread) wasn't an ethnic food.

Granted, that's just food. But even now there's still this horrible idea that "culture" is food, fashion, folklore, and festivals when those are trivial external symbols of culture. This kind of stuff can be picked up and shared just as easily as an iPhone can be picked up and shared. Rather more easily as something fairly unimportant to culture as an alphabet.

Culture is the set of norms that govern how a person conducts himself, how he fits into a family, how he and the family fits into a larger community. It's a mess of how far away you speak, how you present your wishes and when you compromise, how you respect authority or show disdain. It's a lot of things. It's culture when my kid is outraged when kids across the street pull a living lizard to pieces and laugh. It's culture when a mother defends her kid or husband, knowing he's in the wrong, at any cost to preserve the family's reputation or stages public punishment to restore the family's reputation. "Fair" is a cultural construct. "Justice" is also a cultural construct. So is how we view privacy and liberty.

You can't have a tightly interlocked, interwoven single society that has diverse cultures. It's a nice idea but ultimately is a kind of intellectual or emotional cowardice. The cake is going to be chocolate, vanilla, lemon, orange, red velvet, etc., and somebody is going to have what he wants while somebody else will lose out entirely and most will be at least able to tolerate it. It's not going to be able to simultaneously perfectly provide every's choice. Lots of cultural choices don't much matter (but the smaller the minority, the less likely their choice will count); a lot do.

[dixiegrrrrl]

2. I think of Repub. Old Guard as dinosaurs with rabies.

They know...they can see....that they are in a shrinking W.A.S.P. pool.

Census Benchmark for White Americans: More Deaths Than Births

Deaths exceeded births among non-Hispanic white Americans for the first time in at least a century, according to new census data, a benchmark that heralds profound demographic change.
The disparity was tiny — only about 12,000 — and was more than made up by a gain of 188,000 as a result of immigration from abroad.
But the decrease for the year ending July 1, 2012, coupled with the fact that a majority of births in the United States are now to Hispanic, black and Asian mothers, is further evidence that white Americans will become a minority nationwide within about three decades.
Over all, the number of non-Hispanic white Americans is expected to begin declining by the end of this decade.

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/06/13/us/census-benchmark-for-white-americans-more-deaths-than-births.html?src=me&ref=general

[Avalux]

3. They hate minorities, yet know their party won't survive without them.

Sucks to be them.

And regarding Sebastian de la Cruz - he's an amazing kid, singing again last night for Game 4. He was thoughtful and wise when asked about the racist comments and clearly hasn't allowed it to affect him. I loved it that Julian Castro introduced him last night prior to his second performance. I live in SA.

[Lady Freedom Returns]

4. Well, all I can say to repukes...

Is that on my father's side I am only 3rd. generation U.S.

Does that make mean an "illegal alien"?

Oh, and pick a race and test my DNA. I'll be surprised if you DON'T find markers! Does that make me an "illegal alien"?

[arely staircase]

6. demography is destiny

they will get louder and crazier as they become less and less relevant.

[Rex]

7. The core aspects of the GOP are racism, sexism and class warfare.

Not necessarily in that order. That is why the GOP is known around the world as the Party of Losers.