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English-Only: Racism Disguised as a Well-Intended pro American Activism?


Sometime years ago a group of very-proud white native Americans discovered that the only race growing within the borders of this country wasn’t the black race. They discovered that millions of Latin Americans had invaded America. First, they arrived to the crop fields in California working hard for ridiculous wages. They were like the Okies (poor people from Oklahoma that crossed the country looking for jobs in California) as Steinbeck had described in “The Grapes of Wrath”. But, they didn’t stay in the fields. Very soon Latin Americans were invading their cities, their schools, their colleges, their work places and their country.

The wave of Latin American immigrants during the second half of the 20th Century faced the American government who thought that they deserved better opportunities than other waves of immigrants in the past. These governments believed that American citizens still could share the “American Dream” with all the immigrants from these poor countries, who wanted to pursue “freedom and happiness.” Some people within this country even believed that the United States could be a richer and more prosperous country if it could assimilate the Hispanic culture and language, integrating them to the American culture. So, those governments approved laws that helped those immigrants to have better education, better jobs and a better life.

One of the many laws created to help Latin American immigrants was bilingual education. According to the educational theory, if the immigrant children were educated the first years of school using their native language, they should learn English faster, and would reach their goals easier. The children educated within a bilingual education system would be better prepared that those who learned only in English. According to Professor Kerper Mora from San Diego State University: “Bilingualism and bilingual education builds connections between the home and school to enhance learning…Children who read and write in their native language transfer this knowledge to written English…; proficiency in English is vital but is only one factor that supports high levels of academic achievement …”

At the time these theories were being applied and government funding were being directed to bilingual education and non-English programs for Latin American immigrants, some Americans didn’t like the idea of immigrants coming massively to America. They started to view this with very serious fears.

The people who opposed immigration argued that in the past, there were other large waves of immigrants coming to America (Dutch, Irish, Jews, Polish, Japanese, Chinese), and that they had learned English and quickly assimilated to the American society. Furthermore, they argued that these new immigrants from Latin America, who arrived to the United States proud of their language, their culture, their way of life and their values, were not trying to assimilate to America. They were trying to make America assimilate to their culture. While the American government was spending millions of dollars receiving them!

John H. Tanton, a retired ophthalmologist from Michigan, was one of the first to provide “scientific” evidence that these immigrants were a menace to the American way of life. As a member of environmentalist groups “Sierra Club” and “National Audubon Society”, Tanton believed firmly that population control was the only way to stop a hellish future for the United States. According to Tanton and other organizations like NumbersUSA, all the big problems that America will face in the 21st and 22nd Century are related to overpopulation and immigration such as crime, traffic jams, polluted air, water shortages, encroachment on public lands and extinction of plants and animals.

Tanton, who received strong opposition among Sierra Club members when he tried to introduce immigration control in its agenda, knew that his proposal could label him as a racist. He then and created a strategy that allowed him to fight against immigration from different fronts: He was president of Zero Population Growth (1975-1977), organized FAIR (Federation for American Immigration Reform) in 1979, founded and organized U.S. Inc. and U.S. English in 1982, created the anti-immigration quarter journal “The Social Contract” in 1990 and founded the civil association ProEnglish in 1993.

One of Tanton’s creatures, Pro English, defines itself as:“…dedicated to protecting our nation's unity in the English language…aimed at enacting official English laws, ending bilingual education, opposing mandatory multilingualism and bilingual ballots, and the right of employers to maintain English language workplace rules. Because much of this battle takes place in court, Pro English has become the nation's leading legal advocates for English…”

The Social Contract Press, another of his creatures, offers online printed copies of “The Camp of the Saints”, a novel written by Jean Raspail that is like the Bible for anti-immigration people: “…the 1984 of the late twentieth century…this gripping novel, which envisions the overrunning of European civilization by burgeoning Third World populations.”

Tanton accuses his detractors of exaggerating his role in the recent tendency favoring English-Only laws and anti-immigration legislation. He writes in his article “The Puppeteer Replies” (an answer to the article “The Puppeteer” published in 2002 by the Southern Poverty Law Center): “Most Americans oppose mass immigration not because of any animosity toward immigrants, or because immigrants look different, speak different languages, or practice different religions. They oppose mass immigration because mass immigration is not in their interests. They are guilty of looking out for themselves and their own perceived interests – exactly as the immigrants and their supporters do”

The English-Only movement is a creation of people opposed to immigration, worried about the growth of Latin American population within the United States and the destruction of the perception we have about the American culture as we know it. The English-Only laws won’t stop the wave of illegal immigrants to this country but probably will make more difficult to immigrants to stay.

It’s fair to say also, that some of the most important victories of English-Only were based on the failures of bilingual education programs. According to a Reason magazine reporter, Glen Garvin, these programs: “has become a multi-billion-dollar hog trough that feeds arrogant education bureaucrats and militant Hispanic separatists…” Thanks to flawed policies, today some of the strongest supporters of the abolition of bilingual programs are immigrant parents.

But English-Only aims further than destroy bilingual education as the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) makes known on its web page: “Some versions of the proposed English Language Amendment would void almost all state and federal laws that require the government to provide services in languages other than English. The services affected would include: health, education and social welfare services, job training, translation assistance to crime victims and witnesses in court and administrative proceedings; voting assistance and ballots, drivers' licensing exams, and AIDS-prevention education…such laws can also affect private businesses.” ACLU also notifies that several Southern California cities have passed ordinances that restrict or forbid the use of foreign languages on private business signs, that some English-Only advocates have opposed a telephone company's use of multilingual operators and multilingual directories, Federal Communications Commission licensing of Spanish-language radio stations, and bilingual menus at fast food restaurants. That’s a large attack against Latin American culture within the United States!

The states with “English Only” laws now are 16: Arizona, Arkansas, California, Colorado, Florida, Georgia, Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky, Mississippi, Nebraska, North Carolina, North Dakota, South Carolina, Tennessee and Virginia but there are many others considering such laws. Recent polls show that the majority of the American people agree to make English the official language of the United States but an important percentage of the population disagree about giving a law to make it official or ending bilingual programs.

The defendants of English-Only laws argue that Latino and Asian immigrants are not learning English as fast as others previous waves of immigrants, but the last census figures shows that’s not true, that approximately 90 percent of Latinos five years old or older speak English in their households and 98 percent of Latinos surveyed believe that it’s "essential" that their children learn to read and write English.

The development of the English-Only movement is a serious menace to the perception we have about the United States: a country created over the principle of freedom. Thus, declaring English the official language of this country will be a victory for people whose objectives are to end immigrants on. These people are camouflaged as pro-Americans and good citizens when in fact they are a group of racists and defendants of ideals of white supremacy.

According to this investigation, immigrants and Americans should oppose the English-Only movement as a way to preserve their right to be free. They should oppose the idea of making the English the official language of this country for it is a law contrary to the spirit of tolerance proclaimed in the Constitution of the United States.














Works cited
American Civil Liberties Union. English Only. From its inception the United States has been a multilingual nation.Briefing paper. http://archive.aclu.org/library/pbp6.html

Crawford, James. Anatomy of the English-Only Movement.

Garvin, Glenn. Loco, Completamente Loco. The many failures of bilingual education. Reason Magazine. January 1998. http://www.reason.com/9801/fe.garvin.shtml

Kerper Mora, Jill. Comparison of Philosophical Assumptions of English-only L2 Instruction Versus Bilingual Education. San Diego University web page:

www.numbersUSA.com

www.proEnglish.org

www.thesocialContract.com

posted by ulises at 10:53 AM