Richmond, B.C., considers banning Chinese-only signage

[GlassCity]

Originally Posted by dleung

You just don't notice other cultures do this because there are less of them and they lack a critical mass needed to have a community of their own. "Unwillingness to participate in the local culture" does sound like a good reason, but the resentment typically expressed revolves around luxury condos, BMWs driven by 16 year old kids, and other symptoms of being out-performed economically by "foreigners". Universities are scrambling to recalibrate their evaluation tools to reverse-affirmative-action some whites back into med school lol.

It's not that I don't notice other cultures doing this, they just don't, for the reasons you gave yourself: there's less of them and they don't have the critical mass. Maybe they will once they do have these things, but until they do and there isn't a problem, there's nothing to talk about.

While it's true that people here love to poke fun at crazy rich Chinese kids crashing Lamborghinis like they just enjoyed doing it, I don't think anybody resents them for it. The only reason people here resent the Chinese, outside of Richmond that is, is the impression that they are the reason real estate is so expensive here. Nobody cares that they're crazy rich, people care that they make it harder for locals to buy property.

[Hali87]

Originally Posted by GlassCity

You're right, not everybody feels the way that I do about this. But I think it can be said as a fact that a Chinese-only store feels a lot more foreign and alienating than luxury car dealerships. I'd be very surprised if there were even a few lower-class people that wish we had less fancy, expensive stuff around the city so they would feel more comfortable.

It probably depends what their neighbourhood is currently/has historically been like. I've certainly read articles on gentrification in the DTES, how the Woodward's building is creating an artificial "landscape of affluence" etc.

Here in Halifax there is a LOT of pushback from longtime residents of (historically poor) inner North End neighbourhoods against all the new businesses/apartments which they see as being for the gentrifiers/hipsters and "not for us". There is also pushback from the more recent wave of middle-class 20-somethings against projects that, while providing much-needed affordable housing, encroach on their ability to transform the neighbourhood into some kind of Portlandia-esque hipster utopia.

(Ironically the two groups are often complaining about the same projects, but that's not the point)

Anyway, there is a subtle difference between someone without much money moving to a neighbourhood full of 5-star restaurants and Ferrari dealerships and someone without much money living in an affordable neighbourhood their entire lives only to suddenly have 5-star restaurants and Ferrari dealerships replacing the grungy diners and used car lots they could afford. It is the second case that usually draws the most complaints and criticisms, and (IMO), rightfully so. The second case is also probably a better analogy for what is going on in Richmond than the first.

[GlassCity]

Originally Posted by Hali87

It probably depends what their neighbourhood is currently/has historically been like. I've certainly read articles on gentrification in the DTES, how the Woodward's building is creating an artificial "landscape of affluence" etc.

Here in Halifax there is a LOT of pushback from longtime residents of (historically poor) inner North End neighbourhoods against all the new businesses/apartments which they see as being for the gentrifiers/hipsters and "not for us". There is also pushback from the more recent wave of middle-class 20-somethings against projects that, while providing much-needed affordable housing, encroach on their ability to transform the neighbourhood into some kind of Portlandia-esque hipster utopia.

(Ironically the two groups are often complaining about the same projects, but that's not the point)

Anyway, there is a subtle difference between someone without much money moving to a neighbourhood full of 5-star restaurants and Ferrari dealerships and someone without much money living in an affordable neighbourhood their entire lives only to suddenly have 5-star restaurants and Ferrari dealerships replacing the grungy diners and used car lots they could afford. It is the second case that usually draws the most complaints and criticisms, and (IMO), rightfully so. The second case is also probably a better analogy for what is going on in Richmond than the first.

I agree with you. I am against gentrification of the Downtown Eastside myself. But I mean that I don't think an average Richmond citizen gets too worked up about not being able to go to French restaurants.

[Hali87]

Maybe not. My point was that if suddenly, a very large proportion of restaurants in Richmond were too expensive for most of the people who have lived there their whole lives, and catered almost exclusively to the newest arrivals, they might. This is basically what has been happening on Agricola and Gottingen Streets in Halifax in recent years. It's not necessarily the existence of these kinds of things that bothers people, it's their emergence and localized proliferation in areas where they are very much outside of the price range of locals, especially when they are replacing something more affordable. It's a different problem than the language one, but a parallel one in many ways.

[kool maudit]

Originally Posted by Doug

The post national state is a recent and ascendant innovation. If it is counter to human nature, why has it succeeded? The busybodies are in terminal decline.

we'll see. i think it's too soon to tell.

i don't think it's counter to human nature at all, however -- otherwise you're right, it would never have flourished. it is a bit of an outlier though.

it'll do well as long as we are relatively wealthy and only sporadically violent.

if there are larger breakdowns, the older patterns will likely re-emerge (as they have in nations where this is already the case).

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by dleung

Immigrants are too pragmatic to let racism get in the way of good business, unlike a certain province . .

And what is the purpose of this snide comment?

Geez guys, there seems to be a lot of immigrant-fetish and given some of your origins even eichenpipe (awesome Dutch expression that means to give yourself a blowjob, unsure of the spelling) on here as if immigrants and their kids can do no wrong and are all purely lily white without exception.

It seems like all of the problems in Richmond and Greater Vancouver are the fault of the stuffy old anglos who just can't get with the program.

All that's missing is a final brush-off like "well, they did it to the natives, so it's only fair!".

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by lio45

I'd be curious to see you bring up actual examples of that... if you can...

And he's the guy who always complains that Quebec derails all the threads. Yet he's the one who constantly brings it up.

Sounds like he has issues.

Must be about a pretty girl in Montreal named Marie-Josée who dumped him when he lived for a time in Montreal like a "expat" a while ago.

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by saffronleaf

I never said that it is some universally shared belief; I only have my experiences to draw from. But among graduate students at the University of Michigan and Washington University in St. Louis, this kind of thinking is definitely very popular. Hence, I suggested that it exists among educated, liberal, progressive, young people. And Canadian experience includes North York, Calgary downtown, and the University of Waterloo, in addition to suburban GTA.

Many educated, liberal, progressive, young Americans seem to have a firm belief that White Christian English-speaking Americans who have lived here for a few generations have no superior claim to America in any sense.

As I said earlier, this group never really controlled and dominated the cultural and societal mainstreams in the U.S. like Anglo-Canadians did for their society.

White anglos in the US did hold onto to political and economic power for much longer, although they've been sharing the political for quite some time as well, and the economic more and more of late.

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by GlassCity

Sorry, I'm not really sure what you mean.

I am just stating my observation of the situation. I don't live in Vancouver so I don't have a horse in this race. I am not bothered by the Chinese signs.

But regardless of my feelings I can still predict that the situation in Richmond and other places where there is white flight and higher and higher ethnic concentration is not conducive to creating a Greater Vancouver "us" that includes everyone living there.

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by GlassCity

I think there is a lot more tribalism involved in trying to separate everybody geographically by race, rather than unifying everyone under one lingua franca.

Bravo young man! You get it!

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by GlassCity

Yeah, Acajack's brought this up a few times now, but it's remarkable how many people are saying "maybe we'll become a Chinese-speaking country" as if it wouldn't bother them in the slightest.Do these people really have no sense of attachment to their own country and culture? .

It may be true that some people have very little attachment to those things, but I don't think the statement is directly related to that for most of them.

I think they're not being truly forthright when they say they don't care. Maybe not on a cultural level since many consume very little Canadian content to begin with, but certainly on a practical level it would make things much more complex and require a huge adaptation if everything was in Chinese.

The idea is such a remote possibility and they know this full well, so they can safely make the statement in order to self-agrandize themselves and claim a higher level of moral virtue than everyone else.

[kool maudit]

the people who believe in a post-national world really believe in it, in the way that only proponents of a slightly improbable or unprecedented idea can. it's the new thing, the great advance, the get-with-the-program-or-get-left-behind locomotive.

it really is a powerful thing, particularly as it's nearly 400 years old. i mean, voltaire was basically writing about this, although we are further along the curve. it's the enlightenment, still, and it's an incredibly imposing philosophical system whose impact has been at least as great as was christianity's in late antiquity.

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by saffronleaf

I never asserted that every young, educated, liberal, progressive person holds this view. But, based on my experiences living in Canada and the US, young, educated, liberal, progressives in the US tend to hold a view of immigration that treats newcomers as equals when compared to the same demographic in Canada.

They are treated as equals. Basically everywhere. But their language is not. Language tends to be a territorial thing, not a personal transportable thing.

I am a native-born Canadian with roots going back 400 years or longer in the country. My language is recognized as official and even "foundational" in this country and yet in most of the country my opportunities to use it are extremely limited if not nil.

Does that mean I am not treated like an equal in the country of my birth?

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by kool maudit

the people who believe in a post-national world really believe in it, in the way that only proponents of a slightly improbable or unprecedented idea can. it's the new thing, the great advance, the get-with-the-program-or-get-left-behind locomotive.

What's so ironic is that they can be extremely intolerant of anyone who does not have the same view of "tolerance" as they do.

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by kool maudit

the people who believe in a post-national world really believe in it, in the way that only proponents of a slightly improbable or unprecedented idea can. it's the new thing, the great advance, the get-with-the-program-or-get-left-behind locomotive.

it really is a powerful thing, particularly as it's nearly 400 years old. i mean, voltaire was basically writing about this, although we are further along the curve. it's the enlightenment, still, and it's an incredibly imposing philosophical system whose impact has been at least as great as was christianity's in late antiquity.

Every generation likes to think it has found the answers that all of the preceding ones have been looking for, but the truth is that human history is fairly cyclical. There have been very open, generously-spirited and globalist periods throughout human history. One can make the argument that each subsequent outburst pushes the envelope a bit further (often due to technological advancements), but really the period we are going through isn't dramatically different from anything we haven't seen before.

The scary part of it is that the pendulum can often swing back quickly and brutally. Think Berlin of the 1920s vs. Berlin of the 1930s.

[kool maudit]

Originally Posted by Acajack

What's so ironic is that they can be extremely intolerant of anyone who does not have the same view of "tolerance" as they do.

that's because they actually mean it.

christianity and islam were the same way. they really want the world to be this way, and they really do think it would be better for us all.

i can't really blame them for being like this; all mass movements of this type are this way.

i am just a temperamental skeptic and am never quite "on-board", probably because, like you, i have that cyclical sort of outlook.

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by kool maudit

that's because they actually mean it.

christianity and islam were the same way. they really want the world to be this way, and they really do think it would be better for us all.

i can't really blame them for being like this; all mass movements of this type are this way.

i am just a temperamental skeptic and am never quite "on-board", probably because, like you, i have that cyclical sort of outlook.

It's almost like... egads!... a religion!

[kool maudit]

religions are just a sub-set of the "ordering structures" category, i think. they are airier and less literal, more antique in their presentation, but really they are just things on which to hang worldviews, same as this.

[Acajack]

Oh yeah, and the idea that everything is going to be settled and that "from now on" things will be a certain way is extremely naïve.

Widespread discrimination against homosexuals could conceivably come back in Canada. It might even come back worse than it ever was before.

Discrimination against people based on skin colour could also come back as well. We have no idea who the targets of this could be: it could be the historical victims of racism in North America again or it could be a group heretofore spared discrimination.

There are even pretty good signs that religion (and non-religion) will be the next discriminatory and conflictual battlefield in our society. At this point it is unclear what will happen if anything, and if it does happen, whether it will be believers (or believers of certain things but not of other things) or non-believers who will end up getting the short end of the stick.

[kool maudit]

agreed^

hell, i am not even sure, taking the long view, that human sacrifice is done for good.*

this cyclical vs. linear thing is a big divide.

(most of my really antique-sounding suspicions hinge on either a global pandemic- or nuclear war-related return to pre-industrial conditions, or alternatively some sort of very strange mass anomaly of the type that was once called a revelation. extraterrestrial life, were it to interact with us, could cause such a scenario, as could weird discoveries about consciousness).