Rebutting A Random YouTube Clip

This video made me madder than anything that I have seen recently. Pardon me as I mount the soap-box. Please watch this video as I do.

Perhaps public schooling has ruined me. Maybe it's the five years of Spanish I have taken. Maybe it's the fact that I have friends of various cultures and races. Perhaps I'm too "diluted".

I have spent the past school year in one of the most amazing social study classes that I could ask to be in. Which preaches diversity. It is the most interesting and applicable class that I have taken in a long time, perhaps ever. We go deep into issues that a lot of people don't understand or oversimplify. For example, we spent three weeks discussing the roots of Islam, Christianity, and Judaism, and why the problems in the Middle East are the way they are. It's fascinating. I have always considered myself to be a fairly open-minded and diverse person, but I think that anyone with common sense would find this video repulsive.

Where to even start?

The man discusses how countries can't survive as a multiculture, and uniculture is the power in a nation. If this man were to look at our nation's history, perhaps he would note that our very existence began with differing cultures. We have one of the highest standards of living in the world, and we are a melting pot. We haven't been just one culture. There has always been a blend. Irish, Scottish, German. Eventually, as we expanded and moved out towards California, Hispanics and Asians were thrown into the mix. One might argue that the diversity of our culture is what makes us who we are and what gives us our strength. To say that we founded our country on similarities is true. The first people that came over here were all WASPS, pilgrims, puritans, whatever. Whites from Europe. Transportation wasn't sufficient for the Chinese to just come on over and settle down with the British. We actually came over onto a land that already HAD a people and a culture, and what did we do? We shoved them out. Trail of Tears, anyone?

The quotation from this piece that really got me was the following-

"That same government that allows Islamic women to driver's license picture wearing a neck scarf covering their face because it offends their belief. What's next? Allowing the Ku Klux Klan to wear their hoods?"

What to pick apart first in this statement?

First off, buddy, it's a hijab. It's not a neck scarf. 


Second, wasn't our country based on religious freedom? Freedom of or from religion, whichever you preferred? Wasn't it to get away from the country that was stifling its people with a forced religion called, oh, I don't know, The Church of England? Glorified Catholicism so that the king could divorce his wife? 


There are many religions that have different morals and beliefs circling around the same place that the concept of the hijab originated. I don't cut my hair for the same reason that the Jews wear head coverings. Islams wear hijabs, and women back in the day wore hats to church. The whole thing circles around respect for God. You cover your head. Is it honestly right for you to ask that woman to do what in her mind is disrespectful towards God, just so that you can have your unicultural country?

Then, the Ku Klux Klan? Seriously, sir? You are honestly comparing the Islamic hijab to the Ku Klux Klan hood? From what I've heard, the hood was modeled after the hoods from the Spanish Inquisition. We are really going to start comparing an Islam's beliefs to to sects based on hate? That's dangerous territory.

The statement about importing people from India and China really upset me, as well. The man is blaming the government for poor student performance. That's foolish. Is the government handing students drugs? Is the government forcing drop-outs and pregnancies? Last I checked, the responsibilities of student achievement lie on themselves and their parents, as well as their teacher. Barack Obama isn't telling me to do my homework. It's not his job. I would probably freak out a little bit if he did.

As for the statement about bills being sent in Spanish.

1. While it may be a great incentive to not translate the bill, what exactly are the immigrants supposed to do until they learn English? Would we like them to not pay their bills because they can't read them?
2. Because I don't write "ENGLISH ONLY" in big letters on my bills and send it back, I'm bending over backwards to accommodate? Seems to me like it would be less work to just read the English side and ignore the Spanish. It's really not a big deal. It's not hurting you. Plus, it helps me practice for my AP test.

Okay. I think I'm done now. Feel free to leave me nasty-grams in the comments. I'll be back later to check on  you.