俺はアメリカ人 - Ore wa amerikajin

That means "I am an American" in Japanese. And to be an American can mean many things. You could have been born in China, or you could be a third-generation Mexican-American, or your family could date its American presence back to 1620. However, there are certain things that all Americans have historically shared.

A understanding and belief in the God-given rights that underlie the Constitution. A belief in the Christian ideal of charity and personal responsibility. And the English language.

Like it or not, the United States is a country built on English common-law traditions, Protestant Christianity and the English language. And until very recently, immigrants coming to this country understood that they were stepping into a culture built on these principles and that it was their responsibility to adapt and fit in. But in the last fifty years, something has changed. The new immigrants, many off them from south of the border, have decided that they want to change this country into what they are trying to escape. It is OK to build little cultural walls around one's community and never bother to learn the overarching culture. And of course learning English is out of the question. But the saddest part of the new immigration lobby is their habit of demonizing immigrants who have succeeded through their unerstanding of the need to assimilate.

In TownHall.com today, Mary Katherine Ham has a wonderful article discussing three immigrants- Al Pacino, Arnold Schwarzenegger and Jessica Alba- who emphasize their American-ness, not their original nationalities. Alba, for example, is quoted as saying,

Alba is my last name and I'm proud of that. But that's it. My grandparents were born in California, the same as my parents, and though I may be proud of my last name, I'm American. Throughout my whole life, I've never felt connected to one particular race or heritage, nor did I feel accepted by any.

...

He tried to forget his Mexican roots, because he never wanted his kids to be made to feel different in America. He and my grandmother didn't speak Spanish to their children. Now, as a third-generation American, I feel as if I have finally cut loose.

Nor should she. She is of a family that correctly understood that to emphasize their Mexican heritage was to damage their descendants' chances of success in their new country. Jessica has succeeded, in part due to her complete acceptance of U.S. culture. In the same vein, the Austrian-born governor of California Arnold Schwarzenegger recently told an audience of Hispanics,

"You've got to turn off the Spanish television set" and avoid Spanish-language television, books and newspapers, the Republican governor said Wednesday night…

"You're just forced to speak English, and that just makes you learn the language faster," Schwarzenegger said.

"I know this sounds odd and this is the politically incorrect thing to say, and I'm going to get myself in trouble," he said, noting that he rarely spoke German and was forced to learn English when he emigrated from Austria.

And yet Schwarzenegger succeeded in Hollywood despite his originally impenetrable accent. He made himself into a passably good actor, and has now risen to be governor of California by downplaying his roots and working very hard to master English and assimilate into American culture and society.

Al Pacino also looks at immigration differently from the mainstream lobby. He said recently,

Explain to me what Italian-American culture is. We've been here 100 years. Isn't Italian-American culture American culture? That's because we're so diverse, in terms of intermarriage. Most everybody who's Italian is half Italian. Except me. I'm all Italian. I'm mostly Sicilian, and I have a little bit of Neapolitan in me. You get your full dose with me.

Pacino also has it right. Immigrants who come to American wanting to become Americans usually end up contributing to the American culture. Chinese, Italians, English, Irish, Japanese, and many other races have contributed. But most of these groups have also become Americanized, assimilating into the culture. And American culture, unlike Chinese or Japanese or Mexican culture is very welcoming as a rule. Most Americans don't really care where you're from if you genuinely want to be an American we'll usually help you make it. Try becoming an accepted member of society in Asia if you were not born Asian. Try being accepted in Muslim territory if you were born Christian.

But the immigration lobby (who seems not to care for LEGAL immigrants, only illegal ones), has a whole different take on the issue. For them, if an immigrant wants to assimilate, it is betrayal. As Alex Nogales said in response to Schwarzengger's talk about assimilating, "I'm sitting shaking my head not believing that someone would be so naive and out of it that he would say something like that,".

It is Nogales who is naive, unless he is simply focused on destroying the United States by inundating it with Mexican illegals. When immigrants move to someone else's country, they must assimilate. It is not Americans' responsibility to change to fit the immigrant; it is the immigrants' job to become American. When I lived in Japan, it was always I who was expected to adapt in order to fit in. This is only right- it is not my country. But in America, we have the same right to expect immigrants to become Americans- not the other way around. And it is sad that so many of our elected leaders simply do not understand this.

China Dumbs Down?

China is attempting to make their language easier for their citizens to understand. According to a Reuters story, China's media is using fewer characters in their publications. The story states that out of the thousands of extant characters, one only needs around 900 to understand 90 percent of a typical news story. This is interesting in that one needs roughly 2000 characters to function in everyday life in Japan. It had been my understanding that the number of characters required for everyday life in China far exceeded the number necessary in Japan. However, it appears I was mistaken.

The Chinese government began simplifying the Chinese syllabary after their victory in the Chinese Civil War of 1949. However, the Communist version of Chinese, known as Simplified Chinese, has heretofore not gained wide usage amongst overseas Chinese and non-mainlanders. Taiwan, Hong Kong, Macao and most overseas communities still use Traditional Chinese characters, not the newer Simplified. In their attempt to simplify the syllabary, the Chinese are following the lead of Japan, which performed a similar operation in 1945, when they simplified the common characters into the current 1945 Joyo Kanji 常用漢字 (you will need to set your browser to ISO 2022-JP in order to view these), plus the special characters used in Japanese names.

This effort also brings to mind similar effforts by the US education establishment to dumb down the curriculum of American education following the Second World War. In that case, much of the classical education required of young men and women has been lost, leading to an educational system that far too frequently fails to teach our young people anything of value. Touchy-feely education has never replaced a good hard regimen of learning. Throughout our history until very recently, most Americans were expected to have a more than passing familiarity with the classics of Western Civilization, and to have exposure to the great writers such as Shakespeare. Actual knowledge and expertise in the mathematics was also a requirement. That has all gone by the board, as modern teachers seem more interested in pushing a hard-left ideology than actually teaching their charges the necessities that will give them a leg up on life.

In the case of China, this is not an issue, as they are trying to pucsh themselves up, not tear themselves down as we seem to be. However, I am not sure how this will eventually play out, as despite the attempt to simplify the language, one still needs to know a large number (the Reuters article states that a university graduate typically knows around 6000 characters) to function in more than the bare minimum of daily life situations. Even in Japanese, one often encounters rarely-used or classical characters in business or academia. However, the spirit of the Chinese attempt to simplify their language seems to be in good sense, as all languages that use a complicated script like Chinese make it difficult both for practitioners of the language to interact with non-native speakers, and it serves as a barrier to foreign investment as well.

Baby-Boom Ethos Reaches Japan

It has long been recognized by most responsible people that the Baby Boomers, especially the free-love, drug-addiicted, lefties who are the face of the late Sixties and Seventies in this country are responsible for severely damaging the United States' long and proud tradition of self-reliance through their spoiled, arrogant assumption that only they know best. People like Barbra Streisand, Jane Fonda and Teddy Kennedy- cosseted, spoiled brats who have never had to work for a living and have not been forced by the largely partisan media into paying for their sins. However, it appears that this phenomenon is not unique to the United States.

Acccording to the Japanese Shukan Post (週間ポスト) there is a similar, though probably less-dangerous impulse currently sweeping Japan as well. According to the Post, young Japanese are engaging in sex at younger ages and refusing to enter into the all-out work life that marked their forebears. The Post also comments that their paerents are increasingly living in joyless lives of their own and are seeking romance outside of marriage, as well as increasingly not enjoying the fruits of marriage between themselves. The general drift is that society is breaking down and the new generation will be the death of the Japanese nation.

While I do not believe that the young Japanese are as bad as the Post seems to think, I do agree that the breakdown of society is not always a good thing. The so-pleased-with-themselves Baby Boomers have contributed virtually nothing positive to the United States (despite their claims to the contrary) and the young Japanese risk falling into the same trap. So the Post's article comes as a warning shot. Too bad the media in this country are too busy trying to destroy another Presidency they dislike to take heed to the dangers they are attempting to sow.

Hat tip to Mentok.

Japan Trip, Part 2

I was in the electronic mecca of Akihabara this weekend. I remember my previous trip as one where the streets were filled with foreigners and foreign-worshipping Japanese, all of whom were milling around the elecronic goodies prominently displayed. However, I was surprised to find that Akihabara has changed rather drastically.

In the streets, were legions of the sub-group known as 'cosplay', folks who dress up in anime- or manga-inspired costumes and who seem to have become more intense about their hobby with each passing day. The amount of money and detail contained within many of these costumes was startling. Then it also appears that the 'companions' who hawk various merchandise and/or services become younger as well. I could have sworn that this trip they appeared to be around high-school age!

Finally, there is a dearth of low-price options. Japan was never known as a bargain-hunter's paradise, but I did not notice any deals that particularly caught my eye. However, I shall be taking another trip this week, and this time I shall take my camera to provide some documentary evidence. In the menatime. Japan has definitely changed- I am not yet sure if that is for the better or not