I may step on some toes with this, but in no way will I apologize for it.
Before I begin, let me explain something. I am all for people from other countries moving to the US, as long as they do it legally. Foreign cultures fascinate me to no end. I love talking to people who have moved here and love listening to what it's like in their home country. I love love love listening to them speak their first language. Kevin and I often disagree over this. He thinks once you've moved here, you should stop speaking your language. I disagree. While I believe that if you've moved here, you should learn our language and learn our culture, but please don't forget your roots! At one of the preschools where I worked, one of the mothers was from Finland, but the father was an American. She spoke English to him and us, but she never spoke a word of English to her three boys. Their father was the same, except with English. They had the perfect balance and all three boys embraced both of their cultures and languages.
However, this bothers me. Yesterday (Cinco De Mayo) five students were kicked off their school's campus for wearing clothing that had an American flag on it. The school has a large Mexican American population and the school's officials felt that it was disrespectful for AMERICAN students to be wearing AMERICAN flag apparel on AMERICAN soil. I understand that yesterday was a Mexican Heritage day and that it is an important day for them, but they're still in America. Were we supposed to take down every American flag in the country? Like I said, embrace your roots but don't get mad at us in our own country for showing our pride. One Mexican American student was quoted in the article saying that they wouldn't wear Mexican flag apparel on the 4th of July. Honestly, if I saw a Mexican wearing a Mexican flag on the 4th, it wouldn't bother me one bit. It just saddens me this happened. So many American men and women have died for our freedom and something like this happens. It's like they did all of it in vain.
What's your take on this? Like I said, I am not against people moving to our country nor am I for them giving up their country's culture. I just think they need to respect the fact that they are in America now, not in their country.
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Hi I just stumbled across your blog and its great.
ReplyDeleteI live in the UK and its the same here you get commets if you wear anything with our flag on, its getting ridiculous!
Whats wrong with being proud of your own country?
I think that's completely silly, them being kicked off campus for that. Now I could see if they had been rioting or picketing about being anti-Mexican or something, lol, but if they were simply wearing shirts that had our flag on them- just silly!
ReplyDeleteI agree. It would be curious to see the motivation behind it, whether the students did it as an intentionally rude/disrespectful thing, or whether it was done in "innocence" Often the reasons behind determine the punishment. The rest? I agree. Don't forget your roots!
ReplyDeleteI'm with Sara. I wonder if they wore them to incite something?
ReplyDeleteThat's what I was wondering too, girls. I can't find any info on it though. The more I thought about it last night (because, seriously, I was obessed with this story for some time), the more I wondered about it. I mean, what are the chances of five boys, all friends, wearing American flag apparel on the same day...which just happened to be a Mexican day of celebration. I will have to look more into it to find out!
ReplyDeleteInteresting Lady B. I had not heard about this. I think people are always just going to find some reason to argue about something. And I don't think that you stepped on anyone's feet here.
ReplyDeleteHave you heard about the new Arizona law that may be passed? They get to ask immigrants for their papers if they even suspect that they are illegal (which basically means they can pull over anyone that looks hispanic)...