I'm afraid of Americans

[technicolornina]

Clever David Bowie titles aside, something happened to me tonight at the car wash that I really feel sheds a light on why American society, as a whole, needs to be flushed down the shitter and started over

Comments

[poutytrout]

Punch them in the face! Then run like hell I suppose...

But no. I see a lot of stuff like that too. I grew up in Florida and was very very used to seeing a large mixed culture of people between native born americans, southerners, spanish, latino, island etc. Large mix of people. But now I go to school in the bible belt and my mother lives even deeper in it and it still shocks me to see people's reactions to those who aren't 'blatantly american' (as if being considered american is based on your skin color or the language you speak). Its hard to do anything about it but the fact that you helped at all was good. I've seen plenty of people turn the other cheek even when they could help rather than involve themselves.

<3

[aeauna]

What tribe is he from? Oh, his ancestors were immigrants too? If he can't speak Mojave, he should GTFO.

Seriously though, people suck. I don't know where people get off thinking they can say some things.

[uberreiniger]

I'll be honest, as a cashier I frequently do get frustrated with non-English speakers. But I feel that's a far cry from wanting them to get out of the country. And I certainly don't think anything justifies standing there and bullying the customer over the fact that they don't speak your language.

[technicolornina]

I'm also a cashier, but I grew up with a rather special point of view: two of my classmates were Chinese refugees. They took to English like ducks to water, but their parents were forever lost in this one-word-out-of-every-three twilight. I learned young to respect the sacrifices they made for their girls, and I feel the same way about a lot of the non-speakers I run into at my job. As I put it to one of my coworkers, "I'd rather serve a dozen undocumented immigrants than one guy in a Rolex, because of the two, it's the one with the Rolex who's more likely to call me a stupid bitch and tell me to get a real job."

[adawnrae]

You could tell people like that they should return to the primordial ooze, where they and their grotesquely primitive attitudes belong.

Or you could throw Godwin to the wind and remind them that we beat the Nazis fair and square almost seventy years ago, and it's about time they got over it.

Or you could just shake your head sadly and say, "what an ignoranus."

Because an eloquent, well-considered argument will be lost on someone like that.

[technicolornina]

The dangerous thing in that second statement is there are a lot of white supremacists out here. They damn near single-handedly put our sheriff in office four years ago (Joe Arpaio--look him up and weep). That's part of why I want to get the fuck out of Arizona.

[adawnrae]

Oh, I don't have to look up Mr. Arpaio. He is living, mouthbreathing proof that there is a truly mud-puddle shallow end to the gene pool. I can't believe anyone is still on that birther crap, but behold: Joe Arpaio's Childish Cursade.

Come to the northwest, we elect the kind of sheriffs that march in our pride parades.

[technicolornina]

Well, with this recent thing where his office was burying child-sex abuse cases so they could go round up people guilty of breathing while brown, I think his days are numbered. Thank GOD.

And I have my sights set on LA, but DUDE THAT IS AWESOME :-DDDD Someday I want to visit you up there.

[technicolornina]

I shudder to think someone like that--and it's possible, racism and nationalism are depressingly common down here--could get a job at my store. It's really close to the airport. You can imagine the number of people I talk to every day who either don't speak English (I've been hailed in Spanish, French, Italian, at least two Scandinavian languages, Japanese, and Mandarin--and probably others I can't remember) or speak it only brokenly, because they're here as tourists. Certainly we have our share of customers of dubious citizenship, also, but the way I see it is their money is as good as the lady in the $300 blouse standing behind them (and probably comes with nicer manners). It's a global world. Pretending it's THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, BY GOD and the rest of the world, bless their poor ignorant hearts, is just plain racist (countryist?) stupidity.

[technicolornina]

Mmhmm. From my perspective it's a serious human issue, but there is that, also.