Racism and Language
- Saturday, March 7, 2009, 6:21
- Constitution Daily
- 790 views
- 11 comments
This week a Storm Lake high school student was suspended for refusing to take a federally mandated English proficiency test. The student, Lori Phanachone, is Laotian, born in California, moved to New York, and finally settled in Iowa. Oh and by the way, she currently has a 3.9 grade point average and is 7th in her class.
You may be asking yourself why a student with a stellar GPA would have to take an English proficiency test. It turns out when she registered for school she truthfully reported English was not her first language spoken at home. Her reasoning for doing so, “Someone told me I should have put English as my first language when I registered for school. But I refused. I will not deny who I am. And I will not disrespect my culture or my mother.” I know what you are thinking. Give me a break! She was born here. Her culture is American. If she is more proud of her parents’ culture, there’s a serious problem in that home.
The article actually gets worse. Lori is quoted as saying, “But I want to fight this because this is what I believe. It’s wrong, not just for me but for all minority students. The test is demeaning.” And what do some of Lori’s classmates think? “She has every right to protest taking the test, because in Storm Lake race isn’t an issue. And the test singles out race… The only reason she didn’t write English down as her first language was that she is proud of her heritage,” said Stephanie Emery. When she’s says “heritage,” she must mean race, right?
What the heck does race have to do with language? I’ve never understood that. Please someone out there enlighten me…please! Whenever language issues come up, be it English as the official language or teaching English in the schools, the race card gets played. If I’m not mistaken, any person can speak any language. Language and race are not interchangeable terms. Neither are heritage or culture and race. Race is a term based completely on physical appearance. It has nothing to do with language, culture, heritage, or the tests you take in high school.
I’m glad the teachers at the Storm Lake high school suspended her for insubordination. How much do you want to bet the multicultural police are ready to step in declaring the teachers and school are racist?
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I agree that race and language are not the same thing, but the Feds making her take this test because she checked the wrong box is just stupid. Republicans should be holding this girl up as an example of how to stand up to the Federal Government. It’s none of the government’s business how well people speak English (especially since we don’t even speak authentic English anyway ie. The Queen’s English)
If we don’t want to print all our government documents in a 100 different languages because it costs too much money I understand that. But carrying this issue further than that is just xenophobic pandering.
I applaud this anonymous troglodyte blogger for once again putting his/her/its own ignorance front and center. Congratulations! You represent the worst of the Republican Party (next to Krusty, of course).
Your complete lack of understanding of why someone might be proud of their heritage is mind blowing. You go a long way to show how ridiculous this Web site truly is.
The only time culture and heritage count to a conservative is when they want to impose their own on someone else. At every other point, and here is no exception, conservative Republicans are culturally tone-deaf. This is one reason why young people are so turned off by the GOP, and why many of us who were/are young Republicans end up “in the closet.”
What Republicans should be saying about this situation: Here is an example of government forcing an excellent student to take a (to her) meaningless exam for the sole purpose of padding the district’s scores. That the school won’t relent in the face of overwhelming evidence of the girl’s English abilities is an example of bureaucracy at its worst. The argument that she claimed Laotian as her first language is a whitewash. In a Gazette article, officials from school districts across the state were asked about this situation and they all said they would not be giving the exam to a person with her grades and obvious fluency.
Didn’t take long for the name callers to come out – xenophobic and ignorant. I never said the girl isn’t proficient in English. She is just plain insubordinant. And for her to have so much contempt for American culture even though she was born and raised here is definately a bad sign. And Steve, your complete lack of understanding why someone may take offense to this girl’s action is just mind blowing. Let me guess, you three are against English as the official language, against sealing our borders, against the rule of law…I could go on all day.
How has she demonstrated contempt for America? By disagreeing with you and the autocrats running her school? The girl has better English skills than most of us here, and probably most of her teachers. They are making her take the test to pad their results. No other school in the state would make her take this test. It is completely amazing that you not only care deeply about this issue, so deeply in fact that you think it amounts to an American-or-not litmus test, but also that you are on the exact wrong side of this issue.
Insubordination in the face of stupidity, corruption, or plain wastefulness should be not only acceptable to Republicans, but encouraged by them. Who were the people outraged only last week by the DNR’s refusal to let a bit a tea to be dumped in the Cedar River?
Now you have a girl standing up against a wasteful, stupid, and possibly corrupt instruction from the educational bureaucracy and because it’s about what language her parents speak at home, you want her to roll over and call her anti-American for standing her ground. You are are demonstrating a complete lack of principles, something even worse than being wrong or ignorant. In the process, you are re-affirming the stereotypes that keep millions of people under 40 from being able to embrace the GOP/conservatism.
I’d love to have another good conservative blog to read in addition to Krusty. But there’s evidence of principle and thought in his posts.
The saddest thing isn’t that you just don’t get it, it’s that you really don’t want to get it. Conservatives revel in their own ignorance. You thrive on it. Your world is based on not knowing, and anything other than that is unacceptable.
The only thing I can take comfort in is that you are in a small and dwindling minority. Soon, the Flat Earth types, like yourself and fellow anonymous trog bloggers on this site, will be so irrelevant as to no longer matter.
So enjoy living in your cocoon of ignorance. I’m sure it’s warm and cozy. But for me and the rest of the rational world, we’ll stick with reality and truths.
Oh, and you stole that picture without giving credit, which is a violation of copyright law. Stop it right now.
Constitution Daily– Weren’t the American revolutionaries in our War of Independence insubordinate?
For the record, I didn’t call anyone names, I pointed out facts. If you are for English as an Official Language because it will save the taxpayers money, that is one thing (as I said earlier), but if it is because you think somehow English is a superior language that we should all have to demonstrate proficiency in by taking some Federal test–or you are just afraid to hear people speaking another language on the streets of America–then that is the very definition of xenophobia. If I had been name calling, I would have called you an idiot.
Back in my College Republican days we used to work very hard to bring speakers to Iowa like Ward Conerly who fought courageously to get rid of ‘check boxes’ exactly like the ones this girl was forced to fill out. If she had refused to accept some form of Affirmative Action, or other special treatment, on the basis of her first language or heritage I think you would be all for her refusing ’special treatment’, regardless of how ‘insubordinate’ she was.
I would suggest that you refrain from assuming every person who comments on your blog and disagrees with you is a Democrat, and that you do some thinking, and perhaps some research, about what it really means to be a conservative. Because subordination is not a conservative value.
I’m going to set the record straight here. First, Iowa Cynic wrote that I called her anti-American. I did not. I wrote she had contempt for the American culture – which she proves to have by not taking the test and calling it racist. Second, Steve Right, the last person I’m going to listen to about the Republican Party or conservatives is a liberal. Third, Cory Cramer, I completely disagree with everything you say. Really though…you are comparing the Revolutionary War? You also make assumption after assumption and they are all incorrect. I don’t think English is a superior language in the sense you are talking about. I do think English is the superior language in the United States. For example, immigrants who learn the language make approximately 50 percent more than those who don’t. You also assume I’m afraid to hear people speak other languages…that’s just silly. This is a girl who is equating language with race and that’s flat out wrong. They have nothing to do with each other.
Claiming someone has contempt for American culture is awfully close to calling them anti-American but you present no evidence for either point. Refusing to take a worthless test is more an embrace of American culture than some kind of “contempt.” You completely ignored the substance of my arguments. Is it because you can’t? Should students always do what their school tells them to? Is that the principle you’re espousing? Schools are always right? Even when they’re wasteful money-grabbers manipulating tests that serve no educational purpose? Or should kids be applauded when they stand up to wasteful bureaucracy? I know where conservatives should be. Why aren’t you there?
I love how you morons are arguing about something you know nothing about. You don’t go to the school. You have no idea what went down and how it all played out. So shut up and quit arguing about shit you don’t know about. FYI she ended up graduating.