they come to our country and expect us to speak thier language. what a joke that is..speak english or get out ! this is the u.s not mexico or puerto rico or cuba. if i were in thier country i would know i have to speak thier language.i was in germany last yr and i didnt expect them to know english or understand me or make them understand me
205848
frankly i think all immigrants should go back to where they came from, they do not respect our way of life then they get the hump when we dont respect theirs... WHY THE HELL SHOULD WE, they are in our damn country... You dont like it then GO HOME!
268107
No doubt! My 7th-grader learns a foriegn language every 2 weeks in school. 2 weeks is not enough time for one thing. It only causes them to run all the languages together. And why should they even do it? The language in America anymore seems to be Spanish. You can't even order a cheeseburger without hearing a foreign language. It kills me to go to the counter of McDonalds,speak to an American,in American, & watch them turn around and yell in Spanish so they can be understood. We have to many homeless people here to have all the foreigners over here working our jobs. The high school kids needing a summer job is gonna have problems finding them because they've been givin' to foriegners who can't even speak our language!! Gets me fired up fast!!!
575788
If you can't learn the language of the country your residing in then get out, the government cannot accommodate every language on earth, and that is stupid to expect that, to costly and would slow down the government process, and no it is not discrimination that's why governments like Mexico, France, and  all nations expect people to learn their language. If that's discrimination then every country on earth is guilty.
189878
It's a damn shame that, this is what it has come to in parts of the country. I work a manual labor job, granted I don't make 5 dollars an hour.. so, I would have to disagree there will always be people to take those jobs.. some sort of jobs. People that really want to provide the best they can for themselves or their families. My boss hired a Mexican lady once, she was legal.. married to a American man. She seemed nice.. BUT... she could NOT read english, barely write it and speak it. I asked her if she was going to learn english... and she told me straight out no!! I was taken aback by this.. as I have never encountered this before but I was pissed. If you want to be legal and come here and work,fine for now I guess!(who knows what the government will do w/amnesty) NOT live off the system.. NOT live in a shitty house with 6 kids and have a brand spanking new car in the garage! I don't know about anyone else but refusing to speak english is a pure insult!! (Sorry, I know part of my response is in the wrong catagory.) I don't think they will get a higher education.. some may and a lot more may not. They just want the money.. but shame on some of our employers for hiring them. It's such a double-edged sword.. you feel bad for them on a level but angry with them on another level. I guess time will tell.
131681
I have been to Cancun. It was nice. Yes, most people spoke English, not all though. I dont have a problem with people speaking Spanish here, in fact I speak Spanish here sometimes too, at work they gave me a hard time that I was talking to a Cuban co-worker in Spanish, people thought that we were talking about them, I think that is stupid, like we had nothing better to talk about than them. It got to be a real issue. But understand, it is discriminitory for them to tell us we cannot speak Spanish (not to mention ridiculous). So go ahead and talk it up.
248682
some people pick up on languages faster than others.  sounds like you cousin did a good job...but i can show you many other from germany that haven't picked it up all that well.\ni do think its only fair that if one plans to live in a country for any amount of time they should try to learn the language, but i think people are not near as tolerant as they should be about this...its hard, it takes time.  i spent a year in czech republic, and though i learned enough czech to get by, it was far from fluent, and not for lack of trying.\nthen it gets complicated, as people tend to try to live around those that are similar to them, its more comforting, and easier, and frankly given some of the xenophobia displayed lately i can't much blame anyone for not wanting to be the first south american in a neighborhood.  but this clustering makes it less urgent to learn the language and more difficult.\nas for the press 2...its a sure sign that immigrants (illegal) don't just suck the country dry.  business recognize there is money to be made by making their company more accessible to these people, or they wouldn't be putting in bi-lingual services...think large companies just do these things out of the goodness of their corporate heart? no.  its for money.
221967
I think the concessions this country is making for immigrants is dispicable! This is the United States of America and Americans need to defend this country from these right winged idiots that think we need to bend over backwards to accomadate them and their languages and lifestyles.
267253
You're right. All of us are from immigrants, but most of them came here legally and learned what AMERICA was about. They didn't come here and try to change America into the country the just fled from. They learned to speak and write English and earned money honestly. They had personal integrity and tried to raise their children to respect this new land that was giving them the chance at a new life. What people are against now is the illegal immigrants that don't pay taxes and don't pay for health care. They have free access to our schools, which suffer due to budget cuts because of the burden of being overloaded by illegal who refuse to learn our language and laws. Our health care has skyrocketed out of control partly because every hard working American is paying for the women that sneak across the border just days before they give birth in our hospitals and give fake addresses and phone numbers so that the hospital are never able to recover the costs of the care given. I don't think anyone would begrudge a foreigner entrance into this country as long as it were done legally and they didn't expect the entire country to change it's ways. As a country, we were founded on specific principles, values and laws and anyone coming here should be expected to learn and live by these principles, values and laws. Our country speaks English and this is our National language. Our consumer labels should be in English, Our Pledge should be spoken in English, and peole wishing to immigrate should learn to speak English. We should expect no less of our visitors and immigrants than other countries expect of Americans that travel.
152329
Yeah, I don't get it.  From the start America had many languages.  Some towns spoke solely french, and some German.  Now alot of places solely speak Spanish.  Bout time we started recognizing that.
498391
Ron, most of these people don't care to educate themselves on such things.  They don't really care if a person is legal or illegal.  They care about the color of his skin & the language he speaks. They scream that the Spanish speakers need to learn English. Then if he does LEARN English then they like to make fun of his accent.  They assume that every Hispanic here is Mexican and illegal just by looking at him.  They assume that all illegals are on welfare and medicaid.  They assume all illegals have fake id's and fake SSN's. I've been trying to educate them differently but they don't care to listen.  Most don't even have a clue that many of these "Mexicans" are from Nicaragua, Guatemaula, El Salvador, Uraguay, Paraguay and many Latin American countries.  They don't care.  They don't care if they are perm. residents or citizens.  If they look "illegal" they want them rounded up and deported.  That's really all they want and all they care about.
570033
I agree. The people who migrated to this country from the middle east or asia had to learn a whole new alphabet, considering their writing system is different from ours. Every other group of immigrants learned English; the Polish, Germans, French, the slaves when they were brought over, and everyone else. However, we have to stop what we're doing and change OUR national language, national anthem and learn to speak spanish for the Mexicans... It's not fair to every other ethnic group who came here and struggled to learn English. The Mexicans are just lazy.
254405
You talk because you don't know what it is to be in their shoes. They sure have rights; they have families here then it becomes a problem. that is why they protest. You talk like this because you need education. Your illiterate. You don't even make sense, just because they don't talk English. Please. R you for real. Just because they don't talk English doesn't mean they cant protest. Go back to school!!!!!!!!!.Some people come here because they need money urgently for their hungry families and school is the last thing they could think off in a situation like this.
383396
It a messed up racist comment and for all te people on here are saying it is the truth are messed up too.  I speak spanish stupid A__es and I was born here.  You can't do anything about it.\n\nAlso English is not the official language of the US.  The US has NO official language.  For all the people stating that English is should check up on this before speaking on it.   I agree since most people speak english here people need to learn it, but why direct it at the spanish speakers.  Asians, africans, etc come here and don't speak english either.
421019
About time. We shouldn't pamper people just because they don't speak the language. If you live or reside in America you better @%!& well learn English. Aside from that, if these people are not American citizens we shouldn't keep them in our prisons. Send them back to whatever country it is they come from.
540466
Oh stop! ...from what I have seen the Irish have never learned to speak English even now. Besides that is part and parcel of any group coming to America, or any other country for that matter. That is why they gather into ghettos like little Havana and little Haiti in Miami or Ybor City in Tampa and what about the China towns in cities all over this this country and Canada. The older immigrants have a real hard time learning a new language. Your ability to learn a new language is greatly diminished after the age of twelve, that was determined in many studies conducted throughout the 20th century. I was In the Air Force  years ago, and my tests indicated I might be able to learn a language and become a translator. The test consisted of spoken sentences which sound like this... "IF IGNATZ WHA BENEY, means she is a nice girl... then what does, "YAHOOLY CO DESPECZENY!" Mean? HUH!!! Needless to say I still speak only English. If I was forced to move to another country for whatever reason, I truly know in my heart I could never learn another language and I would have to hide in a ghetto speaking American English to all the other immigrants who had come to China to find work after the collapse of the Bush Brothers economy. Give it up. These people are not lazy!!!  I would like to see some of your other answerees here spend 12 to 14 hours day in the hot sun picking the tomatoes and other crops these people pick for less then minimum wages, consistantly year after year. You might call them uneducated, and have some meaning, but to call them lazy just points out your own blatant ignorance. Capitalism, as a system, needs a large underpaid working class to function. Our own Middle Class, which consists of nearly everyone but the ultra rich, would never do what these people do. Look what happened to Ford, GM, and Chrysler (before the Germans bought them) when everyone who worked for them became middle class, even if they only swept floors... Bankruptcy. The same will happen to this country as a whole when we throw all 12 million of these "illegal" immigrants out. Oh they do create problems, but so does all population growth. Every American state government knows that new arrivals only pay for 84% of the infrastructure it takes to manage their arrival, even if they are rich Americans. Go Figure...? Besides, Hispanics will be the majority population (51%) in 2051. Then they will vote Spanish in as the only spoken language in America, and you will have to push #2 to hear it in english, and then you will know how hard it is to learn a language (even if it is free) after having spent 12 hours in the fields picking hot peppers for the rich Hispanics who will then be running this country.
334884
Well, please tell me then, why do they come to the US and start badmouthing the US and her citizens?  Why do they say things like, "We're here to take over the USA!"  Why do they say, "We are here, so get used to it?"  Why do they swing their Mexican flags around, instead of the American flag?  Why do they sing the American Anthem in Spanish, instead of in English?  Don't they know that is repugnant to the American citizens?  Why do they seem to be trying to take advantage of the generosity of the USA, such as stealing SSNs, fraudulently collecting welfare, using the medical system without paying for it?  Why do they yell, "We do jobs you lazy Americans won't do?" when, really, they are undercutting the Americans who would gladly do those jobs for a living wage?  A lot of the jobs they are doing for less than minimum wage would be gladly done by our unemployed or by our high school students, if they could at least get paid minimum wage or better, but when the Mexicans will do them for much less, they take those jobs away from American citizens.  And, the Mexicans can only afford to do those jobs for such cheap wages because they don't pay all the taxes and other deductions on their wages that the American citizens have to pay and they are willing to live with an unbelievable number of people in a small residence, so they don't pay much living costs and still have lots of money to send home.  In my mind, if they were really thankful to be able to come to the USA to provide better for their families back home, they would not do these things.  As well, they would not be protesting in our streets - that really turns the legal citizens against them - don't they realize that?  We feel they should be protesting in the streets of their own country - trying to fix things there, not trying to force us to accept them here.
207015
Alright, can we all come to your country, not learn your language, work for extremely cheap and take over all your jobs, not pay taxes, send the money that we earn in your country back home to our family, hurt your economy, have lots of babies and get paid welfare, and demand special rights because we're a minority?  If that's ok with you then fine, but you'll get sick of it...I promise.