European Refugees

This is true also but if the well-established social welfare mechanism is in place that's where you go if you can.

The problem in this generation's refugee crisis is cultural. The refugees have a harder time fitting in because they're mainly Semitic and can't easily pass for the population as a whole. Irish and Italian and Eastern European refugees didn't speak the language/dialect when they came to America in the 19th and 20th centuries but their kids were just fine after going through school and their grandkids were 100% American. Having a similar religious background didn't hurt the effort much either.

The refugees that weren't from the western religious cultures tended to be insular and to cluster together and really not give a crap about what society felt about them, those would be the Greeks and the Russian Orthodox and the Hassidic Jews who had no plans to assimilate into the culture, just to live in it.

Many Muslims are in the second group, although not necessarily even a majority of them, however often they have trouble integrating into society even if they're in the group that wants to assimilate because of their appearance and the fact that their religion and culture is held in low esteem in the west and has now been further tainted by the actions of the bad actors on the extremes.

If they're lucky they live in a major metropolitan area in the US and they melt in just fine. Why that doesn't work in Paris and many other European cities is not clear.

 

You would have seen the same things in Greek neighborhoods in the 1950's. Their churches look different, they dressed differently, they had different cultural styles and manners, they were very off-putting except when you engaged them in commerce, etc.

They did have one thing that helped them to "assimilate" and that's the fact that they viewed their culture as a vessel to sail across troubled waters in.

Try dating a Greek girl even today and you will find there is a lot of opposition in many families. I had the experience in the late 80's/early 90's and while I really liked the girl I knew I had no real chance with her because her family did not want her marrying outside the community. They had already been in the US for two generations at that point.

 

I'm not sure this is the case. The stories coming out of Paris are about a generational divide with angry young Muslims who have been in the country for a generation already, born in France, but cannot assimilate and are under-employed, etc.

The latest refugee wave may well be tapping into and leading an insurrection among well established refugees who cannot assimilate into the culture because the culture is not willing to let them.

French hate groups have been a big deal since de Gaulle's passing, maybe before that. We're thinking of France's refugee crisis as being about Syria and Iraq in the 2010's but in fact it's mainly about French North Africa in the last century. France colonized Algeria, Morocco, Tunisia, Syria and Lebanon and was then driven out of most of those places by WWII or popular revolts. The first three areas were part of the Islamic Maghreb and they are the areas that became ideologically active the most recently in the current Islamic revival. They were Al Qaida's expansion pool after the initial surge in recruitment played itself out.

 

the italians and the irish did much the same in the early 1900s when they migrated here. now they have all moved to the suburbs as the 2nd and 3rd generation have taken the opportunities presented to them. i hope the same sort of thing happens with each large group that comes.

 

if i had just kept reading before replying to petros post above i would see you already responded to what i said.

 

When I go to the fridge I yell alluah snackbar

 

AP:

A French Muslim female suicide bomber blew herself up in her kitchen yesterday, resulted in Linoleum Blownapart.

 

It certainly looked that way didn't it. There were enough young men in those crowds to kick the shit outta ISIS even with moderate casualties among them. So much easier to let some other country do the dying and they come back when the smoke clears.

 

for some reason I doubt they will be going back...

 

Therein lies the issue, these men are running from their country rather than taking up arms and fighting for it.

 

I have had some dealings with people who at least came from a muslim background. Here in NY there are many Albanians. Many work in restaurants. Espeecially Italian ones, maybe because they got Italian tv in Albania. But Albania is an exception as a muslim country. Due to its long period of domination by the Communist Party, it is much more secular. I mention this because the Albanians I have met assimilate very well. How do they do that? By in effect putting their religion aside.

Why do others not assimilate? I don't think it is poverty in and of itself. Most poor people do not go on jihad or any equivalent. The Times said the ringleader of the Paris attacks was not at all poor in upbringing, althought for a time he may have been a druggie and likely had some sociopathic traits.

I would like to say and think some basic liberal democratic approach will work with tis group. But my fear is that that will not be enough. The reason is that Islam makes them different. It is not enough for them merely to go to a mosque instead of a church. Too many of them hold ideas that do not fit with liberal democracy. They don't really believe in separation of church and state, or in freedom of speech. Not enough of them do.

This I fear makes them fundamentally different from any other immigrant group.

Having said that I think all the childish fear we see from our right wing fellow citizens on this issue is mostly a mix of political nonsense and irrational paranoia. The US government is certainly capable of adequately vettting @30,000 people. Why they want to focus on that instead of more pressing issues has no good reason behind it.

But this assimilation issue? It is troubling. Much more so for Europe, but still.

 

My Grandfather came over from Calabria in 1901 and my Grandmother from Basilicata in 1905.

Not one of them ever thought about strapping bombs to themselves when they got to the Bronx.

_

 

I'm not going to go all crazy attacking opposing opinions, call you racist or anything, etc.. you guys can believe what you want. I just find it shocking that we are becoming giant pussies in this country. At the end of the day we're talking about 10K people. Refugees from our enemies. Hell we probably have a lot more ISIS sympathizers already living in this country.

have some faith in the system. we spend zillions on homeland security and let them get away with violations of our personal lives for what? so we can run scared like this? France gets attacked and they still honor triple our commitment while we're freakin out in this country because ISIS makes a comment to scare us about the people fleeing from them. France with more integrity and balls than America. never thought I'd see the day

 

And don't forget just a week or so ago how they were all upset about "difficult" questions in the CNBC GOP debate. I don't know whether that was all for show, and same here. Are they really hiding under their beds? I don't know. But sometimes I think our right wing fellow citizens could use some testosterone supplement therapy.

 

Republicans don't want MSNBC to dictate questions to them in a debate, but they'll let ISIS dictate our foreign policy

 

Wouldn't it make sense to send all those refugees to the closest place that is already set up to house 3 million people? Air conditioned tents in Saudi Arabia. Closer than Germany, France, US etc. It's only used 5 days a year.

 

"difficult" questions? More like biased and disrespectful.

As for "hiding under their beds", the House yesterday got enought votes to block Obama's veto on the refugee issue. Their vote totally reflects what the nation as a whole feels about the possible influx of Syrian refugees.

http://www.bloomberg.com/politics/a...-americans-oppose-syrian-refugee-resettlement