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HipChick

(25,485 posts)
Sat Apr 20, 2013, 01:02 PM Apr 2013

"I Don't Have A Single American Friend, I Don't Understand Them."


After the bombing took place in Boston, I felt like I spent the whole week listen to faux watching co-workers talking about dark-skinned Arabs from the middle east attacking 'our' country..

These co-workers pride themselves on being good Christians....I asked them if any of them had reached out themselves and say befriended a Muslim in their community? Had got to know someone who was outside their culture comfort zone. I was met with blank stares..

For the record, I'm an atheist...I don't understand religion

But what of this cultural isolation of 1st generation children of immigrants to this country? It should be easier for a first generation to assimilate here through the socialization process..it is easy for an immigrant to move here, and never assimilate, if they move somewhere here where they are still in their own community..

In 2010, 5 Muslim Americans, known as "DC Five",all US citizens, in their late teens to early twenties, were detained in Pakistan, they all lived in DC. Metro area, and had well to parents, doctors, lawyers etc, and had attended some of the best schools in the DC area. All were eventually charged with various terrorism charges, and detained and kept in Pakistan.

So, is first or second generation disfranchisement a breeding ground for home grown terrorist?
26 replies = new reply since forum marked as read
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"I Don't Have A Single American Friend, I Don't Understand Them." (Original Post) HipChick Apr 2013 OP
I don't know. Interesting question. nt ZombieHorde Apr 2013 #1
I'm sure there's a lot of alienation. Also, they often get caught between their parents & peers Arugula Latte Apr 2013 #2
I have also seen this clash HipChick Apr 2013 #15
Message auto-removed Name removed Apr 2013 #3
What does that mean? arcane1 Apr 2013 #9
Message auto-removed Name removed Apr 2013 #13
Idiot. octothorpe Apr 2013 #22
Traditionally, it takes 2-3 generations for immigrants to really assimilate..... Wounded Bear Apr 2013 #4
That could have been my mother, an immigrant from South America. Cleita Apr 2013 #5
My parents were immigrants Fumesucker Apr 2013 #6
I think that's part of the problem. Americans see it as a slight Cleita Apr 2013 #14
Their uncle talked about this a little Mopar151 Apr 2013 #7
Putting up a wall between believers and non, is a standard MO for religions on point Apr 2013 #8
Notice how he didn't say dems_rightnow Apr 2013 #17
Ahhh. Works both ways. Part of the lead question was why Christians don't have Muslim friends on point Apr 2013 #18
But he did have a 'best friend' - Brendan Mess. reformist2 Apr 2013 #10
Followed all the way out on that link. Most informative storyline yet. Thanks. freshwest Apr 2013 #26
After things like this I make an effort to be extra friendly Marrah_G Apr 2013 #11
There have been many, many waves of immigrants to this country frazzled Apr 2013 #12
2nd rec on call it sleep. i think the final passage in that book is one if the most beautiful in HiPointDem Apr 2013 #23
another +1 for Call It Sleep fishwax Apr 2013 #25
I thought he was married to an American? kentuck Apr 2013 #16
I guess not, but I find that is the case in many marriages even among Americans. Cleita Apr 2013 #19
I believe this is closer to why he did it than anything else. DevonRex Apr 2013 #20
I find it difficult to believe he couldn't find a single American friend he could relate to octothorpe Apr 2013 #21
His own brother was an American. So was his wife. He had an American best friend riderinthestorm Apr 2013 #24
 

Arugula Latte

(50,566 posts)
2. I'm sure there's a lot of alienation. Also, they often get caught between their parents & peers
Sat Apr 20, 2013, 01:09 PM
Apr 2013

My best friend when I was a teen was first-generation. Her parents were incredibly conservative and tried to shield her from the pitfalls of "normal" American adolescence. They were "protective" to the point it where seemed abusive to me. Many times she couldn't go out with our friends but she felt like she had to lie about it to us to cover for her very controlling father.

Response to HipChick (Original post)

Response to arcane1 (Reply #9)

Wounded Bear

(58,440 posts)
4. Traditionally, it takes 2-3 generations for immigrants to really assimilate.....
Sat Apr 20, 2013, 01:12 PM
Apr 2013

It's true. Plus, it's exacerbated by our culture, which, like you said, tends to actually isolate "others" and outsiders in general.

Historically, the most hated immigrant class tends to be the latest one. It happened to the Irish, the Germans, the Italians, really all of the waves of European immigrants through the 19th Century, as upheavals in their countries drove people to come here.

The hatred of Hispanics and the various Muslim groups is really just the latest in a long line of xenophobic reactions by the good ole US of A.

Part of the problem lately is that many immigrants have come from countries we fought wars in, starting with Vietnam. The latest round of Afghan and Pakistani immigrants face many problems, mad worse by our continuing War on Terror.

Cleita

(75,480 posts)
5. That could have been my mother, an immigrant from South America.
Sat Apr 20, 2013, 01:12 PM
Apr 2013

She never really had any American friends because she said she didn't understand them, so she mostly socialized with women from the Latino community. However, she became an American citizen was proud to be an American and was patriotic making sure that we put up a flag every 4th of July and other holidays, even when living abroad.

She never wanted to hurt any Americans and cried when JFK was assassinated, so I can understand the sentiment, what I can't understand is the need to hurt just because you don't understand them.

Fumesucker

(45,851 posts)
6. My parents were immigrants
Sat Apr 20, 2013, 01:13 PM
Apr 2013

They moved somewhere there were basically no immigrants at all and to tell you the truth, over sixty years later I'm still a bit alienated from much of American culture.

America is a remarkably extroverted culture and my parents came from a culture a lot less so, it made things quite difficult sometimes growing up, particularly in those years when the strongest desire of most kids is just to fit in.

I never, ever brought friends home from school, I hated the comments about "how weird" my parents were, I'm kind of ashamed of my earlier self a bit over that but hell, I was a kid what did I know.

My parents had researched America rather thoroughly when they were planning to emigrate but when they actually got here they were shocked at how different things were in the area they moved to than they had been led to believe by the research they had done.



Cleita

(75,480 posts)
14. I think that's part of the problem. Americans see it as a slight
Sat Apr 20, 2013, 01:31 PM
Apr 2013

when foreigners don't open up to them, they think that they are being insular and secretive. When they speak among themselves in a strange language, they think they are talking about them. Maybe the State Department should run an immigrant school in the embassies and consulates to educate new emigres from those countries as to what to expect from Americans and how they should react to Americans who can often be what is regarded as rude but not meant to be.

on point

(2,506 posts)
8. Putting up a wall between believers and non, is a standard MO for religions
Sat Apr 20, 2013, 01:16 PM
Apr 2013

It helps keep the suckers in line if they are not exposed to others that question the con.

on point

(2,506 posts)
18. Ahhh. Works both ways. Part of the lead question was why Christians don't have Muslim friends
Sat Apr 20, 2013, 01:36 PM
Apr 2013

Try again

Marrah_G

(28,581 posts)
11. After things like this I make an effort to be extra friendly
Sat Apr 20, 2013, 01:22 PM
Apr 2013

Especially to people I know must be frightened over the backlash of these things.

frazzled

(18,402 posts)
12. There have been many, many waves of immigrants to this country
Sat Apr 20, 2013, 01:24 PM
Apr 2013

for hundreds of years. 99% of first-generation members of immigrant families do assimilate; some do not. But then, some long-time-born-and-bred Americans don't either (Unabomber). We did have our immigrant anarchists in the teens and twenties. Perhaps that is repeating now.

All four of my grandparents came to this country in the nineteen-teens. They all lived in isolated immigrant communities for a long time, and all learned to speak English, if haltingly, and with amusing accents. To each other they spoke Hungarian and Yiddish.

All six of their children went to college; all three of the sons served in World War II. All of the grandchildren have are wholly acculturated ... and have lost most of their grandparents' cultural habits, including food and language. Rinse and repeat for Irish, Italian, Polish, South American immigrants.

But if you really want to get inside the head of a child's immigrant experience, take the time to read the 1934 novel Call It Sleep, by Henry Roth. It's truly one of the most brilliant, affecting novels I've read in recent years. About the fears and anger and confusion of the immigrant experience in a Jewish immigrant community in 1920s New York, told from the perspective of a six-year-old boy. Highly highly recommended.

"One of the few genuinely distinguished novels written by a twentieth-century American." --Irving Howe, The New York Times Book Review

"Arguably the most distinguished work of fiction ever written about immigrant life...Surely the most lyrically authentic novel in American literature about a young boy’s coming to consciousness." --Lis Harris, The New Yorker

"Roth has done for the East Side Jew what James T. Farrell is doing for the Chicago Irish in the Studs Lonigan trilogy.... When his characters are speaking pure Yiddish, Roth translates it into great beauty....The final chapters in the book have been compared to the Nighttown episodes of Joyce’s Ulysses; the comparison is apt." --John Chamberlain, The New York Times

 

HiPointDem

(20,729 posts)
23. 2nd rec on call it sleep. i think the final passage in that book is one if the most beautiful in
Sat Apr 20, 2013, 02:00 PM
Apr 2013

english lit.

He might as well call it sleep. It was only toward sleep that every wink of the eyelids could strike a spark into the cloudy tinder of the dark, kindle out of shadowy corners of the bedroom such myriad and such vivid jets of images - of the glint on titled beards, of the uneven shine of roller skates, of the dry light of the grey stone stoops, of the tapering glitter of rails, of the oily sheen of the night-smooth rivers, of the glow on thin blonde hair, red faces, of the glow on the outstretched, open palms of legions upon legions of hands hurling toward him. It was only toward sleep one knew himself still lying on the cobbles, felt the cobbles under him, and over him and scudding ever toward him like a black foam, the perpetual blur of shod and running feet, the broken shoes, new shoes, stubby, pointed, caked, polished, buniony, pavement beveled, lumpish, under skirts, under trousers, shoes, over one and through one, and feel them all and feel, not pain, not terror, but strangest triumph, strangest acquiescence. One might as well call it sleep. He shut his eyes.

Cleita

(75,480 posts)
19. I guess not, but I find that is the case in many marriages even among Americans.
Sat Apr 20, 2013, 01:41 PM
Apr 2013

The wife is his partner and mother of his children but is not considered a friend. His friends are the guys he goes out to play basketball with and drink beers with after. I have always been amazed about how little men want to have to do with women on a friendship basis. They basically only talk to you when they are interested in having sex with you. I think they even marry women without ever thinking they could actually sit down and have an interesting conversation with them. It's just my observation over my 73 years on this planet.

DevonRex

(22,541 posts)
20. I believe this is closer to why he did it than anything else.
Sat Apr 20, 2013, 01:41 PM
Apr 2013

He came here at 15 or 16. Tough time for a kid. He had talent at boxing. Should have made him popular. But maybe he was too good. Maybe he knocked a local hero out of the running. These nothings happen. Or less spectacular, maybe just caused some jealousy at school.

Or,, since it was 2002, right after 9/11, he was ostracized and said hell with it and turned to the radicals. Chechen are not among them. He had to seek them out himself.

octothorpe

(962 posts)
21. I find it difficult to believe he couldn't find a single American friend he could relate to
Sat Apr 20, 2013, 01:52 PM
Apr 2013

during his entire time in the US. Obviously closed minded bigots exist who will ignore and alienate people they view as different. However, for everyone of them, there are people like yourself who don't have that twisted bigoted view. I really think his issues had more to do with him than everyone else.

 

riderinthestorm

(23,272 posts)
24. His own brother was an American. So was his wife. He had an American best friend
Sat Apr 20, 2013, 02:15 PM
Apr 2013

at one time even.... (Brendan Mass who was murdered in what now appears suspicious circumstances).

So its not entirely true he was completely isolated. 3 close associates of his are/were American so he had the capability of reaching out and trying to socialize.

I can't help but believe that his increasing radicalization was what led to his isolation - not the other way around.

But yeah, your other point about first generation immigrants is very interesting and certainly bears some thought. The Somali American teens in MN also come to mind as first gen who got sucked in as well as the Buffalo Six in Lackawanna NY....



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