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Refugees Welcome

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Re: Refugees Welcome

#271

Post by hoopd »

sp332 wrote: post #263
hoopd wrote: post #258

Earlier quoted context omitted.

By what measure? If you don't know how to recognize when it's become a problem then it's not meaningful when you say you don't see a problem. What is straining to you? I would describe our education system, our legal system, our prison system and our welfare system as all being currently "strained" so we must have different definitions. (and to the downvoting crew, feel free to explain to me what productive disagreee…

I don't think the strain on any of those things is caused by immigration. If we improved them to make them better for current residents, it would also increase our capacity for immigrants. But I'd see that as just a side effect of fixing broken systems.

You've once again avoided giving even a qualitative answer as to what strain caused by immigration would look like. A first step would be admitting that it's even possible.

You've also made the mistake of thinking that just because you've found one problem that others must not exist. We can have broken systems and problems caused by immagration.

10% ESL students in our public education system should qualify as a strain. 17% of California's prisoners being born abroad should qualify as a strain. Are these numbers not high enough for you? If not, what does too high look like to you?

Re: Refugees Welcome

#272

Post by rolux »

rolux wrote: post #2

Guardian article: http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/sep/01/berlin-group-be...

And just for the record: I submitted this story under the title "Airbnb for refugees", with the quotes -- which I think might have yielded a more insightful discussion than the question of "Refugees welcome" (or not), to which the title was changed after an hour or so.

Re: Refugees Welcome

#273

Post by powertower »

davidw wrote: post #266
powertower wrote: post #260

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Culprits of what? Russia and Iran are not trying to destabilize and take over the country - by forming, arming, and financing terrorist groups from within and from outside. They did not bring this conflict to Syria, nor the resulting destruction.

One of the reasons I hate these kinds of discussions is that they are so boring and simplistic. The notion that "it's all the US' fault!" seems to always rear its head. I'm not a fan of a lot of US foreign policy, but people like Assad and Putin are 'not very nice people' to put it mildly, and have done more than their fair share to cause problems in Syria. Russia has a direct interest in Syria, BTW: https://en.wikip…

If you are curious about what the other side sees this as, this is a decent write-up - http://www.globalresearch.ca/why-syrians-support-bashar-al-a...

Re: Refugees Welcome

#274

Post by sp332 »

hoopd wrote: post #271
sp332 wrote: post #263

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think the strain on any of those things is caused by immigration. If we improved them to make them better for current residents, it would also increase our capacity for immigrants. But I'd see that as just a side effect of fixing broken systems.

You've once again avoided giving even a qualitative answer as to what strain caused by immigration would look like. A first step would be admitting that it's even possible. You've also made the mistake of thinking that just because you've found one problem that others must not exist. We can have broken systems and problems caused by immagration. 10% ESL students in our public education system should qualify as a stra…

I've been letting you identify the problems because frankly I can't see any. California has so many prisoners it doesn't have enough prisons for them all. The solution is easy: imprison fewer people. Too many ESL students? That solves itself over time as they become ESL (or even non-English) teachers.

Re: Refugees Welcome

#275

Post by rmxt »

jbssm wrote: post #270
rmxt wrote: post #255

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Fair enough, they have strong religious beliefs. So do lots of people. Why does that mean Muslims shouldn't be allowed into a given country? Why should Islam be singled out? Also, apparently from the same survey: "Furthermore, the willingness of Turkish migrants and their descendents to integrate into German society remains high and is climbing. Whereas 70 percent said in 2010 that they want to "absolutely and withou…

Seriously, the complete hypocrisy of your comment is too big to actually be true. So, we are a bunch of xenophobes because we are concerned about people that clearly have social norms that are against our most basic principles of freedom are entering our countries. But when 62% of Muslims already living in Germany say they want to live only next to other Muslims then, you don't see a problem there and claim they are…

I've never said anything about anyone being racist, so forget the playing the victim card a la "bunch of racist pigs."

Being afraid of outsiders is pretty much the definition of "xenophobia," so yes, you are seemingly a xenophobe. [1] And, self-describedly, an Islamophobe. ("So, you really shouldn't have to ask why are we afraid of letting them in in such big numbers")

I've never claimed perfect integration, I'm claiming that I don't think that letting Muslims into Western countries is going to cause the social fabric to crumble as you seem to think. I would hope that both sides could be a little more accommodating: Western countries allowing disadvantaged refugees safe harbor, and Muslim immigrant communities willing to adapt somewhat to Western standards. There is actual research done on integration in these communities, above and beyond this single poll that you've been hanging on to. [2] Despite what you insist on believing, immigrants do actually adapt to their environments.

Lastly, you seem to want to paint the issue as cut and dry: put special restrictions on entry for Muslims, and social conflict won't arise between people who have differing values. That doesn't solve any issues! What do you do about disaffected Muslim communities already in Western countries? What is the best way to ensure a harmonious society? I think the answer lies somewhere between your claims of "don't let them in" and "let them all in and Sharia law will come to the West." Instead of castigating existing Islamic communities and placing restrictions on them, why not give them a fair shake and see what happens? A "fair shake" meaning one that doesn't single them out for their religious beliefs. (Hey, isn't that one of those "social freedom values" you were talking about?)

[1] https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/xenophobia

[2] http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1467-9248.2012....

Re: Refugees Welcome

#276

Post by Inthenameofmine »

s3nnyy wrote: post #268
Inthenameofmine wrote: post #227

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Interesting. Looks like I'm in the exact opposite boat. I'm a Swiss citizen and moved to a developing country (that has huge population outflow atm due to illegal immigration) to live and work. I achieved in 2 years (from scratch, no savings whatsoever) more than I ever could in Switzerland. My standard of living is incredible because of better purchasing power, and life is so much more fulfilling because you can act…

Could you also tell what you did in Switzerland and what you do now in this "developing" country? Power-distance or empathy to foreigners is no different to Germany, at least in Zurich. Switzerland can't be that bad as a place for software engineers: 1) Google placed the biggest software engineering office outside the US into Zurich. 2) The ETH is the only place except for Oxford and Cambridge that can compete with t…

We do Bitcoin and Blockchain development [1]. Full stack JS and Go. Founded the company a year ago, we're now 17 full time employees, fully bootstrapped. Equity and cash flow with several US based startups. Not to mention that we're now finishing projects international teams located in Switzerland weren't able to pull off.

As a side note, half of the team we replaced in Switzerland were from the ETH and Lausanne. Our interns here get more work done than those guys! It's completely surreal, which is why I felt so strongly about your comment.

I got a US Engineering degree from RIT, when I got back to to Switzerland I couldn't even get responses to waiter jobs, let alone programming. That said, I'm first generation Swiss with a non-Swiss name, they probably didn't even look at my CV.

I know people with similar stories in the industry, most of them in the Ukraine and Thailand actually.

[1] https://bitsapphire.com/

Re: Refugees Welcome

#277

Post by hoopd »

sp332 wrote: post #274
hoopd wrote: post #271

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You've once again avoided giving even a qualitative answer as to what strain caused by immigration would look like. A first step would be admitting that it's even possible. You've also made the mistake of thinking that just because you've found one problem that others must not exist. We can have broken systems and problems caused by immagration. 10% ESL students in our public education system should qualify as a stra…

I've been letting you identify the problems because frankly I can't see any. California has so many prisoners it doesn't have enough prisons for them all. The solution is easy: imprison fewer people. Too many ESL students? That solves itself over time as they become ESL (or even non-English) teachers.

If you don't know what a problematic level of immigration looks like then you have no idea if you're looking directly at it or not. You're telling me you haven't seen any chickens lately, I'm asking what you think a chicken looks like, and you're saying you don't see any right now.

A 10% ESL student population doesn't solve itself. That's like a child thinking that their refrigerator magically fills itself when it gets empty. If you ignore that solutions have costs than yes by your definition ESL students have no costs associated with them.

I asked about the strain on the legal system due to immigrant populations, specifically the prison system in California. You said we should put less people in jail. While that's true it doesn't solve the problem unless we're going to change our laws to the extent that aggravated assault is no longer a crime. Then we've once again solved the problem by refusing to admit it even exists.

Re: Refugees Welcome

#278

Post by dragonwriter »

hoopd wrote: post #258
sp332 wrote: post #217

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think we're really straining ourselves to handle the amount of refugees we are currently taking. That means, wherever the line is, we're not that close to it.

By what measure? If you don't know how to recognize when it's become a problem then it's not meaningful when you say you don't see a problem. What is straining to you? I would describe our education system, our legal system, our prison system and our welfare system as all being currently "strained" so we must have different definitions. (and to the downvoting crew, feel free to explain to me what productive disagreee…

You are asserting the existence of strain and that it is due to immigration, so the burden is rightly on you to explain the appropriate metric, provide evidence of that the level at which you have defined "strain" on that metric is met, and provide evidence that immigration is the cause of that.

Re: Refugees Welcome

#279

Post by hoopd »

dragonwriter wrote: post #278
hoopd wrote: post #258

Earlier quoted context omitted.

By what measure? If you don't know how to recognize when it's become a problem then it's not meaningful when you say you don't see a problem. What is straining to you? I would describe our education system, our legal system, our prison system and our welfare system as all being currently "strained" so we must have different definitions. (and to the downvoting crew, feel free to explain to me what productive disagreee…

You are asserting the existence of strain and that it is due to immigration, so the burden is rightly on you to explain the appropriate metric, provide evidence of that the level at which you have defined "strain" on that metric is met, and provide evidence that immigration is the cause of that.

First, I think your intention is to silence me as opposed to engaging in discussion.

Second, my main assertion is the existence of a point where immigration is problematic. Example: colonialism.

Third, as to the side conversation of whether or not America is experiencing a problematic level of immigration I've already submitted the fact that 10% of students in US public schools are ESL learners. We can add to it that 16% of California's prisoners were not born on U.S. soil and they're so overcrowded the Supreme Court ordered them to do something about it. I'm calling these things "strain". I hope we can agree that immigration plays a role in both examples.

Re: Refugees Welcome

#280

Post by sp332 »

hoopd wrote: post #277
sp332 wrote: post #274

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've been letting you identify the problems because frankly I can't see any. California has so many prisoners it doesn't have enough prisons for them all. The solution is easy: imprison fewer people. Too many ESL students? That solves itself over time as they become ESL (or even non-English) teachers.

If you don't know what a problematic level of immigration looks like then you have no idea if you're looking directly at it or not. You're telling me you haven't seen any chickens lately, I'm asking what you think a chicken looks like, and you're saying you don't see any right now. A 10% ESL student population doesn't solve itself. That's like a child thinking that their refrigerator magically fills itself when it ge…

So maybe California has more immigrants than it can handle. I can't see it from New Hampshire. Anyway there are several times more people in prison now than in the 80's even though the crime rate has dropped, so I don't think violent criminals make up the majority of the prison population.

As of 2006, 49.3% of state prisoners, or 656,000 individuals, were incarcerated for non-violent crimes.

By 2010, drug offenders in federal prison had increased to 500,000 per year, up from 41,000 in 1985. Drug related charges accounted for more than half the rise in state prisoners. 31 million people have been arrested on drug related charges, approximately 1 in 10 Americans.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_incarceration_ra...

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