What's the relationship between race and immigration status?
It's not entirely clear what the argument which unites them is supposed to be. This unification is always in the mind of the white matry not the person opposing immigration. In the UK polish immigration was opposed, en mass, poles are white.
SUPPOSE there are large numbers of poorly assimilated people in a country, whose culture of origin is very different than that of the host country. What does the minor coincidence of their common lack of european ancestry show, other than to prove the point, they lack such ancestry?
White skin evolved in europe, with the peoples of europe, as with european culture -- that whiteness tracks this culture is a conincidence. (There's less-and-less european diaspora in america -- which, if imported en mass, might also enrange europeans).
The refusal to treat large scale immigration as a cultural and economic phenomneon, to try and insult opponents of this position with a slander of racism -- this tactic doesnt work any more.
All you are doing is driving those people to say, "OK, so its racism. We'll vote for that then." And the result is real racists are elected.
Do you have any analysis of the issues people opposed to large scale immigartion, from non-western cultures, and who would reverse at least some of it -- do you have any arguments that engage the issues they actually raise?
It is strange, because this party’s platform seems to mirror the positions of the blackest Swede I know (Malcolm Kyeyune, a Marxist writer who is also often accused of being a right-winger). I suspect that the divisions in Sweden are much deeper than race.
Kyeyune was one of the members - along with Allard - who were kicked out of the Left Party’s youth organization in 2014 for supporting the Revolutionary Front.
One thing to remember in Swedish politics is that the old idea of the Folkhemmet ("the Home of the People") is always lurking in the background: a political mix of conservatism and socialism - Sweden as a home for Swedes, but also an egalitarian home. Some view, both on the left and the right, Folkhemmet as peak Sweden.
Somehow I didn’t know that, but it makes perfect sense. Thanks for the information.
Based on his writing, at least, I would assume that the party must complain more about immigrants who refuse to “become Swedish” than taking a racial angle. Although a racial interpretation is probably inevitable when viewed from the outside, considering the demographics of immigrants.
So suppose there's a large group of people arriving into your country en mass, you poll them about eg., women's rights and you find that 80%+ of them hold highly regressive views that were rare and fringe in even in the last 100+ years of your own country. Indeed, women would be warned about them even in the antebellum south. Now suppose they're a different colour than the present inhabitants.
Which fact is most salient in your analysis of whether to retain their presence, or admit more?
If its the latter, then I think there's racism in play here, but not of the kind you imagine. Namely, it seems you'd think feminism is only for white people. Or perhaps that human rights are a white things. Others, of course, disagree.
Assuming you have an accurate individual level test, and the policy action you suggest is to not administer the test to each applicant and instead treat them all as homogeneous group and reject them based on older test results?
Right, so what's the state policy you advocate here?
Import 1 million people, 800,000 of which are racist, sexist, homophobic and militantly conservative -- and you'll do that because the policy to prevent it is, as you say, "Racist" ?
You may think these imports are on your side for now, because of the cross you've nailed yourself to -- but be assured, as you see today in the US, their cultural conservatism comes out when their social position is safe.
You are importing the very people you claim to despise : racists, sexists, misoginsits, and the like. And you're doing it why?
I said it was "discriminatory" (which it is), I never said "racist" (but that case could easily be made).
How are you determining this group that holds these views? What criteria? Because I don't know any group that matches that description exactly. Could you be specific?
I think a human is a human and is deserving of the same rights as any other person. I don't believe this position is radical in any way; it is what most doctrines of fairness are based upon.
Again, who are these people? How are you lumping them together (their views or their religion or their race?) because no large group is a hegemony of exactly the same ideas or views; all groups have a diverse set of individuals and ideas among them (both progressive and regressive).
It’s a little befuddling that you are pretending it’s not possible to simply observe the nature of the countries from which these people arrived and make high probability conclusions about the mean views on, say, women’s rights. Is your belief that any particular view can and does get patched like software when someone passes through customs and stamps their passport?
It's a little befuddling that you are pretending there are countries where every person in that country share the exact same thoughts, ideas, and beliefs. Where is this mythical place?
Are we determining an individual's potential, liberty, rights and character based on group population polling now, or do we believe in individual autonomy and potential?
Anyone claiming an entire country holds one singular view (on any topic) is not truly discussing in good faith.
No one has claimed that. You're the only one claiming a border immigration policy needs to correctly quantify over the universal non-citizen class.
No state in the world today, nor in all of history, has that view. Nor is it, on the face of it, even really coherent. There is nothing to be said about the "All" of the others. Only that we don't owe them much.
If you're not claiming entire nations think and act the same way, then what you're describing (a blanket ban on entire nations of people because of some arbitrary numbers in a theoretical poll) is, without a doubt, discriminatory.
How is that not arbitrarily discriminatory on its face?
>How is that not arbitrarily discriminatory on its face?
A nation discriminating against non-citizens is not arbitrary, it is the core feature of the citizen classification. What you are implying is that the concept of "citizen" is unjust, therefore the concept of countries and borders are unjust. Of course when its put into these words few people will cop to this viewpoint. That's why there's endless obfuscation in these discussions, to avoid articulating the plain truth of your views.
It is arbitrary if you believe all humans should be afforded the same basic human rights and should not be judged simply by the country they come from (rather than the content of their hearts, minds, and character).
Do you believe that if a country can discriminate or harm non-citizens, then it should do that? Is it morally/ethically correct to treat non-citizens less than other persons?
Do you hold beliefs that apply to all people regardless of what group they come from or only your own tribe?
It really does simply boil down to whether or not you believe all humans should be afforded the same basic rights and considerations. The "citizenship" argument is essentially a legal loophole to claim that whatever the law says is the moral/ethical path, which it is not.
Laws can be (and often are) immortal/unethical, so grounding your argument in what is currently legal or not is a bad look (as it has always been); just ask former slave owners about the morality/ethics of the law, and see where that gets you.
>It is arbitrary if you believe all humans should be afforded the same basic human rights and should not be judged simply by the country they come from (rather than the content of their hearts, minds, and character).
So to be clear, you are admitting to the idea that the concept of citizen (and countries and borders) is unjust? That seems to be the inescapable conclusion of your points. At least have the courage to own the logical conclusion of your views.
>Do you believe that if a country can discriminate or harm non-citizens, then it should do that? Is it morally/ethically correct to treat non-citizens less than other persons?
It is morally correct to treat non-citizens as non-citizens. This doesn't mean they can/should be actively harmed. But this limits the obligation a nation has to non-citizens, i.e. in terms of active intervention to improve their lives.
>Do you hold beliefs that apply to all people regardless of what group they come from or only your own tribe?
My universal moral views are all in terms of negative rights, i.e. the right to self-determination, non-interference, free expression, etc.
This gets back to the salient point of this whole post/thread/comments: do all persons residing in Sweden (as citizens) deserve negative rights as you understand them (namely the freedom to not be harassed/deported simply because someone believes they are not assimilating "properly" or fast enough)?
The secondary local conversation is whether it is discriminatory to treat a whole group the same based on ideas held by some percentage of a subgroup of that group (and ignore individual differences/persons)?
I would call that discriminatory and unethical. What are your thoughts on that (regardless of what laws/citizenship of the persons)? I'm asking in the abstract as an ethical exercise.
>namely the freedom to not be harassed/deported simply because someone believes they are not assimilating "properly" or fast enough
Are these legal citizens of Sweden we're talking about? If not, then they have no right to stay in Sweden beyond whatever courtesy Swedes have decided.
>The secondary local conversation is whether it is discriminatory to treat a whole group the same based on ideas held by some percentage of a subgroup of that group
In isolation that would be unjust discrimination. When it comes to immigration policy, a nation has no obligation to discern incoming immigrants true views for compatibility. They can set whatever policy they want regarding who to let in. If the widespread views or cultural traits of some population renders immigration from that population more risk than reward, that is to no fault or demerit of the host nation. Immigration as policy is exclusively for the benefit of the existing citizens. Anything more is purely at the courtesy of the host nation, to be revoked at will.
Of course I am talking about people legally in Sweden (if they weren't there legally, this wouldn't be a conversation).
>> "In isolation that would be unjust discrimination."
You could have just stopped there. It is unjust discrimination no matter how you try to justify it (legally, practically, ends support the means, or otherwise).
The discussion isn't about what a person or country CAN do, the discussion is about what is fair and ethical behavior.
Legally in Sweden means they fall under the protections of Sweden's legal system and should be granted protections under the law, so it is a distinction without a difference.
Your context changes nothing: it's just one long "the ends justify the means" or "that's the way it is" and fails to address any of the ethics of the statements being made.
>> "When it comes to immigration policy, a nation has no obligation to discern incoming immigrants true views for compatibility."
Why? All immigration systems I know take the person's views into consideration (for obvious reasons).
>> "They can set whatever policy they want regarding who to let in. If the widespread views or cultural traits of some population renders immigration from that population more risk than reward, that is to no fault or demerit of the host nation."
They can't do that without disregarding the equality of all humans as a universal principle. And no, it very much is the fault of the nation/people making a discriminatory policy, not the fault of those being discriminated against because of that policy.
>> "Immigration as policy is exclusively for the benefit of the existing citizens. Anything more is purely at the courtesy of the host nation, to be revoked at will."
Is that an ethical/moral position? Does that conform with belief in universal human equality?
You just made a bunch of statements about what they can do and failed to address if the behavior is moral/ethical or otherwise... so it isn't even worth engaging with in a discussion since you just made a bunch of statements with no ethical rationale surrounding them.
All you're saying is "this is how it is or should be" which tells me nothing about whether those positions are discriminatory/unethical (but it seems clear they are unjust and arbitrary discrimination and unethical).
The reason you are having a hard time understanding these points is because you genuinely don’t believe that nation states should exist. You may not think this explicitly, but that is the logical conclusion of the moral/ethical haranguing you are doing. What are you expecting as an acceptable counter argument here? Someone to develop the justification of the nation state from first principles? Your argument is that there is a universal principle of equality which disallows countries discriminating in favor of their own citizens. This is unworkable because the whole point of the nation state is to discriminate in favor of its own citizens.
I believe in universal human rights and equality/fairness in application of laws. You seem like you don't and you're contorting yourself into a pretzel trying to justify discrimination and unethical behavior towards other humans.
Yes we’ve established what you believe and how you return to screaming “you’re a racist” instead of actually contemplating the logical end state of your bewildering moralizing for longer than ten seconds.
I have not called you racist anywhere in our conversation. I've simply asserted that a policy may be discriminatory.
I also don’t see how universal human rights leads to “nation-states should not exist". A state can have borders, put limits on immigration, and prioritize citizens while still being limited by due process, equal protection, and non-discrimination.
The part I'm against is treating individuals as suspect mainly because of group averages, nationality, ethnicity, religion, etc, rather than their own conduct.
If your position is just that states can favor citizens in some respects, I think there is no argument there. Where I disagree is with using that rationale as a way to justify broad disfavor toward legal residents or non-citizens as an entire class (whether administratively practical or not).
>Your context changes nothing: it's just one long "the ends justify the means" or "that's the way it is" and fails to address any of the ethics of the statements being made.
Is it asking too much of you to drop these thought ending cliches and actually try to argue your case? Ultimately ethical claims must bottom out at premises that can't be further supported. Here's the ethnical principle at play in my view: the freedom of association is a core principle as is its corollary, the freedom to dissociate. Just as I can exclude anyone from my home in principle, we can collectively exclude anyone from our collective land. This is the principle that justifies a nation discriminating based on citizenship. Of course, scaling from kinship groups to mega societies requires scaling these processes to something impersonal and ideally fair. Laws are the solution to this, but laws just are a representation of collective action and so inherit their justification.
>Why? All immigration systems I know take the person's views into consideration (for obvious reasons).
Yes, nations take stated/purported views into account. The issue is that it is impossible to accurately determine each immigrants personal views at scale. The inherent uncertainty involved is a risk, one that a host nation need not accept.
>They can't do that without disregarding the equality of all humans as a universal principle.
Universal human equality does not trump the right to free association/dissociation. Just because I see you as morally equal to me in principle does not mean I must suffer your presence around me. Of course, interpersonal relationships are different than laws. But laws are inward facing. That is, they create duties to and between people who are part of the same body politic. Outside of that body politic one has limited duties to each other. A right implies an obligation; a positive right is a claim to the effort/resources of others. I deny the legitimacy of universal positive rights. The only legitimate universal rights are negative rights, i.e. freedom from interference, assault, etc. But this doesn't imply freedom of movement across political borders.
I think we may be talking past each other a bit here.
I’m not saying countries are inherently unjust or that Sweden must have open borders. I’m saying there’s a difference between choosing future immigrants and changing the status of people already legally present (which to my understanding the party being discussed in this thread openly considers, but I could be misunderstanding their position).
I think the private-home analogy does not work in the instance of nation-states. States exercise legal power over people in ways private individuals do not, so due process and equal treatment matter more than an individual's personal preferences.
The concern should rest on someone’s actual beliefs or conduct rather than with the entire group to which they are born or reside. I’d rather see that addressed directly rather than be inferred from nationality or broad group averages (based on imperfect polling).
Practicalities matter but so does fairness to individuals.
>I’m saying there’s a difference between choosing future immigrants and changing the status of people already legally present
I'm sympathetic to this view. But ultimately legal residence doesn't rise to the level of citizenship and will always be 'second class' and subject to changing political winds. A nation should act with the interest of citizens. If allowing non-citizen residents is no longer in service to the interest of citizens, then that's too bad.
But aside from that, the view that once you are physically present in a country you can't be made to leave is dangerous in its own right. This strongly incentivizes closing any and all avenues to asylum or temporary residence due to hardship. If morality dictates there is no such thing as temporary residence, then there just will be no refuge given to the next wave of war refugees. Incentives matter, and your view creates some very unfortunate incentives.
>The concern should rest on someone’s actual beliefs or conduct rather than with the entire group to which they are born or reside. I’d rather see that addressed directly rather than be inferred from nationality or broad group averages
This is where ideals clash with reality. If it's not possible to determine views/culture until the person has demonstrated incompatibility (e.g. committing some crime), this burden is now on the existing citizens to absorb some increased level of crime for the sake of the immigrants. I don't recognize this as a legitimate moral duty.
I'm not saying that non-citizens have identical political rights to citizens or that temporary residence can never end.
What I'm saying is that persons legally present in a country should not be penalized as a group based on nationality, religion or any other broad cultural polling/averages rather than individual conduct and due process of the law.
Citizenship can allow for some distinctions but it does not make non-citizens mere guests whose rights can be revoked at will. A state can regulate immigration but it still has the moral/ethical and legal duties to avoid arbitrary and discriminatory treatment of all persons under its jurisdiction, especially toward people it has already admitted lawfully.
There should never be 'second class' persons under the law and rights should not be "subject to changing political winds" as you seem to be suggesting, because that would mean there are no such thing as universal human rights which would put all persons (citizen or otherwise) in danger of losing their rights at the whims of the state or the majority.
Why are you continually making up a strawman to argue against? If a country has regressive views that are one standard deviation more regressive than the mean view on that topic in Europe, and you allow 1 million people from that country to migrate, has Europe gotten more or less regressive in it’s views on that topic? Has it stayed the same? Notice that I am not making a claim that 100% of the population hold only 1 view, and no one else is making this claim either, but that these view exist on a distribution that has been repeatedly modeled.
Your views about individual autonomy etc are, while probably good rules to live by in your personal interactions, not really relevant to migration at the population level.
That's exactly my point. No group is a homogeneous whole, so why are you trying to blanket ban certain nations (which discriminates against individuals based on "polling" on topics). Shouldn't we determine this based on the individual, not arbitrary groupings based on "polls"?
But okay, let's get specific then. Which country are you talking about and what views?
This is a weird argument, because it presupposes that there is a positive right a priori to migrate to a country, and that it’s on the target country to come up with a reason to keep someone out. Setting aside for a moment that this is not how it works today, nor is this ever how these rights have been managed, and also setting aside the lack of a mechanism to screen for this (are you making everyone take a lie detector test or something), how about Pakistan?
Also, we are not saying the same thing at all. I am making a claim, which is true and very very visible, that when you allow large scale migration the country being migrated to begins to resemble the country being migrated from. And this is unsurprising. How could it not? There is no magic passport stamp that updates someone’s views and attitudes upon entry. As a meta comment this whole debate is really fucking strange because my position is the nominal position throughout basically all of human history, and yours is an extreme version of the blank slate hypothesis. Strange to encounter, to say the least.
I'm not saying we should have unlimited immigration or open borders. Countries can and do have immigration rules. My problem is with using nationality as a stand-in for a person's personal/individual character, beliefs, or ability to live/assimilate in a society.
Just because there are differences in public attitudes between groups or nations does not mean you can look at one applicant and assume they personally believe whatever the average person in that culture believes.
Most immigrants are not a random sample of the country they come from, they may be educated, secular, religious minorities, political dissidents, LGBT themselves, liberal, etc.
If you're worried about a particular belief or ideology then make that the standard for the applying individual and do background checks, interviews, security screening, civic knowledge, etc, rather than a blanket country of origin ban.
It is inherently discriminatory to take group-level generalizations and turn them into blanket exclusions of individuals.
As for the "destination country becomes like the origin country", that is far too simplistic and reductive of a take. Selection effects, institutions, education, intermarriage, generational change, laws/culture of the host country, all matter in shaping behaviors of immigrants in society. Immigrants affect a society but the society also affects immigrants.
I think judging any group of individuals as if they are all a single entity (be it through the lens of a particular majority view or a particular race) is discriminatory to the individual (hence discriminatory overall).
In your example (with made up numbers), if 20% are being denied citizenship and opportunity simply because they once resided in the same geographic region as another 80% (with different views), then that is discriminatory because they are not being viewed as individuals but are guilty by simply existing as part of a larger group that they have no choice over.
This is why we screen individual applicants, view each person as a single human with their own thoughts and needs, and judge everyone as an individual and not as a group; to avoid the wrong of discriminating against entire classes of people.
State policies do not operate in this fashion. See, for example, the reality of importing 1 million people.
The existence of a state pressuposes two "classes" of people: citizens and non-citizens.
Citizens are those who have lived and died, who have laboured and been taxed, and have made the very state which is constituted by them -- and they are owed, by that state, a society they wish to live in.
Non-citizens are everyone else. They are owed very little, at best, not to be killed elsewhere; but certaintly, not even to be aided. Unless you want to divide the wealth of every nation by 8bn and watch all of it disappear.
In any case, to non-citizens nothing is owed. Certainly not being carefully scruitnized under a microscope to see if a border agent can detect a lack of cultural or ethical fit.
And in any case, such a fit can be determined by citizens themsevles. And polled, overwhelming, citizens of western nations have spoken. And they have seen your dice rolling at the border, and havent appreciated its concequences.
THe presumption you have on the consent of your fellow citizens to give what you eblieve is owed to other citizens of other states -- this presumption is extraordinary, obniouxous, and short-lived. And much of your attitue here is shortening it.
What state policies are you referring to? Laws/rights should apply equally to all people or else they are not really rights (are they?).
No, Enlightenment principles come from the idea that rights and laws belong to all people (citizen or otherwise) and the founders believed that to be "self-evident" and "unalienable" to all humans. The US Supreme Court has ruled as such again and again (non-citizens have protections of the US Constitution), and Enlightenment thinkers (and any decent person) would agree.
Your entire argument (and everything after) can be ignored because your premise is not just flawed, it is entirely incorrect (false) and goes against any principle of human rights that I'm aware of.
Are you saying the population in Africa should not be provided healthcare? I fail to see your point here. If your argument is economic scarcity, then that can be solved eventually (and should be).
If citizenship isnt a line between two classes of people to which states owe obligations, then why isnt the USA obligated to pay for the healthcare of everyone in the world?
Because we don't live in a perfect world... yet. But we should always be working towards more prosperity for all, greater access to resources/services, more sharing of knowledge/assets, and improving the lives of all people on the planet (not just our preferred groups/tribes). Don't you think?
I think preferential attachment and the Pareto process world that we live in, means, that its in the nature of wealth to accumulate in proportion to wealth. And the only way to make the world rich is to exploit that process effectively.
Dividing the wealth of nations between all, even if it could be done, would be ruinous to all our weatlh.
We are a species of ape to whom the fruits of our labour acrew in proportion to those fruits. And we operate that way because reality does so. So nature has prepared us well to have familial and ethnic feelings which do well to preserve our wealth, or else, we'd all be ruined.
You may well hate that, and hate the world and our species for it. But bankrupsy and fables for children arent state policies.
If the Pareto principle holds naturally, why are you pushing for laws/policies to gate keep access to opportunities and access to wealth to force inequalities? Why do we need to make policies that discriminate against some, while benefiting others? (Isn't that antithetical to free markets and a denial of the Pareto principles' universality/inevitability?)
Nobody has discussed dividing the wealth of nations (including me, a rising tide raises all ships), but even if such a thing occurred (distribution of global wealth), it would be a hard case to make to call that "ruinous to all our wealth" (Whose wealth? Ruinous to what groups? What history/science is this view based on? Do more people gain in wealth than lose wealth?)
We are a species of ape (and often act like it as can be surmised from the tribalism proudly on display here) but that does not mean we should idolize apes and act as if we are apes in all areas of our existence.
Nature is a poor teacher of morality/ethics, which is why we have religious text and ethical treatises on how to act that does not recognize nature as the ultimate source of correct action, or else assault, rape, and murder would be legal (unless you deny those are worthy areas of thought and guidance?).
I respect evidence and truths, I do not believe the ideology you're pushing is supported by reality or necessity. I believe your ideology comes from fear of change and worries of scarcity, rather than any logical conclusions from first principles.
Here is a truth for you: The world has benefited greatly from the sharing of information and resources across borders (including human resources) and trying to deny hundreds of years of enlightenment progress flies in the face of all available evidence that the world is becoming more prosperous, more wealthy, more open, and providing more opportunities than was afforded by the protection closed nation-states that came before.
Recent Supreme Court decisions are nowhere near your position. They have given the President a lot of leeway to deport non-citizens. If everyone geographically in the country had equal standing, this would not be possible.
The Supreme Court historically matches my argument (which is all that matters). The recent controversial rulings do not negate that the US has for hundreds of years extended the protections of the US Constitution to all peoples that are on US soil (including non-citizens).
I know of no progressive that supports unlimited immigration with no screenings, that is a right wing talking point based on nothing factual.
I do see a lot of people on the right, some conservatives, and some libertarians calling for blanket bans on entire groups of people based on dubious claims and hypotheticals.
It's a hard argument to make that banning an entire country from opportunities/immigration is "treating everyone as an individual".
"you find that 80%+ of them hold highly regressive views"
Question is, does this info come from reputable pollsters? Or is it just a factoid propagated by right-wing media?
Also, impossible to square with a conservative white base *also* holding similarly regressive views. (Speaking from a US perspective, not a Euro one, but the same people yelling about regressive immigrants are also genuinely trying to disenfranchise women in favor of male-headed family units, and other things in this vein.)
It's not right-wing propaganda. Surveys from reputable sources like Pew Research have consistently shown that people from many countries in the Middle East and parts of Africa hold significantly more conservative views on women's rights, gender roles, and related issues than the European average.
so... when individuals from those regions migrate to Europe, they often bring those "attitudes" with them. Without meaningful assimilation, those views tend to persist in the next generation as well, this is literal y documented.
My posteriors are based not on some perceived virtue of brown immigrants (wat) but my experience with nativist parties: they are, to the last, full of despicable, immoral hucksters who will stop at nothing to accrue and consolidate power, including blasting out endless streams of vile propaganda that eventually takes hold on a population level. So forgive me for demanding some fact-checking before considering any action based on this sort of nebulous "polling."
Sure, i mean there's lots of highly credible polling. I didnt choose the hypothetical carelessly. Western states are by far and away the only places that maintain these liberal island of virtue, and even so, vanishing and small. The idea that eg., homophobia isn't omnipresent in the vast majority of the world is a level of head-in-the-sandism which, of course, must necessarily accompany the sentiment of "let's import massive amounts of homophobia"
Either way, it's a hypothetical to be taken literally. Suppose it, then what's your analysis? Is the coincidence of their race salient?
I'd point out that pointing at those largely powerless people is a tactic used by domestic power centres that have their own regressive views and policies which they want to draw discourse away from.
I'd ask for a comparison of how these arrivals have led to worse policy outcomes in terms of women's rights, and how that compares to the policy behaviour and outcomes of domestic groups.
I'd close out with a pointed question about which group it is that should be treated as a greater threat.
> The refusal to treat large scale immigration as a cultural and economic phenomneon
> and insult opponents of this position as racist
On the other hand, you treat the negative effects of current immigrant milieus as eternal and innert to their ancestry (dare to say: genes).
This way, you can look at integration as if it has to happen in a single generation and also, allows you to ignore the more important part of diminishing social mobility, which effects the natives as much.
Look at germany, where after WW2, alot of turkish "guest workers" were invited and stayed. After several generations the descendant of those immigrants are as german as you can be. They are still soft muslims, drink alcohol, engage with german bureaucracy, have a heavy turkish accent -- some of them are even candidates for the far right AfD. Please note, they migrated into an economic boom.
Isnt that utterly ridiculous? When time proves you wrong, it reveals your narrow mindedness.
And when you reduce immigrants to percieved negative innert properties, isnt that racist? When you broaden your scope, youll see the bigger problems are elsewhere, dont get distracted by bigotted populists, that are as clueless about problems or their solutions.
> hand, you treat the negative effects of current immigrant milieus as eternal amd innert to their ancestry (dare to say: genes).
I don't think they did say any of this. I don't understand why people who debate against limiting immigration (and it often is only this way round) continually mis-represent the person's clear, stated concern and try and replace it. It is a completely transparent attempt, and no one is fooled. This isn't 2015 when an accusation of racism was taken seriously, because who would mis-accuse someone of such an awful thing? Well, it turned out millions of people would do that. The US President would do it[0].
As for the genetics comment, this is ridiculous on its face as well. Race and culture are in no way tied. But culture survives for many generations, particularly when the immigrating group is large enough. This is obvious. Germans in the 1900s could move almost anywhere in the world and become the best brewers in the region, not because they have the genotype of a brewer, but because they had (and still have) an incredible brewing tradition handed down from parent to child. Culture doesn't change because you move into another country. It moves because you assimilate, make lots of native friends, and learn the language. Lots and lots of people are not doing that.
I think racism comes from a cognitive bias, that eg, lets you read a text without ever engaging with the broader explanation offered (social mobility, time scale of integration) but instead engange with a side remark about genes.
GP ties negative properties to entire groups without differenciation, this is by definition racist.
To end on a constructive upside, if GP was really concerned about eg womens rights, any kind of stateful intervention should only target that. By being racist and eg trying to associate this issue with brown skins, stateful intervention becomes sweeping. By being more precise, migration politics that targets them all becomes social politics wich only effects some.
> By being racist and eg trying to associate this issue with brown skins
I have only seen you associate cultural issues and non-integration from mass immigration as being race-related. I have no idea who you think you're talking about when you say people are doing this.
>On the other hand, you treat the negative effects of current immigrant milieus as eternal and innert to their ancestry
A bad faith misrepresentation of the issue. The issue is why should existing citizens have to suffer the backwards views of the immigrant population while immigrants "assimilate over multiple generations"? Why should the host country have to absorb increased crime, feeling less safe, having their culture changed, etc for the sake of the immigrant population? Where does this supposed moral impetus come from?
Congrats, you touched my time scale argument, the other commenter didnt engage with anything important. Unfortunately you didnt touch the systemic problem of social mobility, which is much more striking.
To return the facor, the "moral impetus" comes from not elevating your culture as the only origing of truth, goodness, etc., but instead codify common basic needs, human dignity, etc. into law and sanction/integrate nased on this.
Im not saying that immigrarion is frictionless, the same way you non-racist arent saying, some undesirable negative traits (like crime) cannot emerge in the native population without immigration. The solution to native or migrant crime is identical.
Why you should take the hassle and hopefully adress social mobility and organize integration? Because of demographics and economic contribution -- the bigger picture yet again.
>To return the facor, the "moral impetus" comes from not elevating your culture as the only origing of truth, goodness, etc.
A country doesn't need to see its culture as an objective ideal to justify protecting its citizens from non-citizens that would victimize, cause discord, or otherwise strain the social fabric and institutions. A government's first and most important mandate is to act in the interests of its citizens. What impetus does a nation have to help non-citizens at the expense of the prosperity and comfort of citizens?
Immigrants economic contributions are net-positive, its not at the expense of anyone bc economies are no zero sum games. This is scientific consens.
Protecting citizens with closed borders and potentially harming them in the long term with or protecting them with capable institutions based on individual cases? (Hope you see the racism trick question here.)
There was a study done in Sweden on the economics of immigration during the large immigration crisis of 2015, and the result was a significant net-negative of 7 800 € per person per year. Taking in a large number of refugees with significant lower education and overall wealth compared to existing populations, with a welfare and healthcare system that Sweden has, cost significant more than what it produce in increased taxes.
There is the concept of social dumping where municipalities try to get immigrants on welfare to move to other municipalities in order to reduce costs and balance the budget, and those other municipalities are now complaining loudly that their budgets have major deficits because of this strategy. Schools also complain about this issue since a large influx of low-income citizens put an increase budget costs without any increase in tax revenue, meaning higher costs and fewer teachers per student.
A more recent study in 2025, ordered by the government, calculated that the cost per refugee today to be around 2 500€ per year per person, while work related immigration gave a positive benefit of 4 800€ per year per person. This report however do not account for increase crime, integration initiatives, increased cost to the education system, health care and other things.
It should also be mentioned that only about 1/3 of refugees ever becomes economical self-sufficient.
Your comment comes across as very dishonest. You provide alot of subtext without clear statements.
> Taking in a large number of refugees with significant lower education and overall wealth
Implies education and wealth is needed for the workforce. It is not. Just a strawman.
> healthcare system that Sweden has, cost significant more than what it produce in increased taxes
How profitable are swedish schools? Rhetorical question to highlight your dumb-think. Services cost money, they are not meant to produce anything else.
> There is the concept of social dumping
> Schools also complain about this issue
Which can also be explained with regular budget pressure from neoliberal fiscal hawks. I dont know the swedish specifics.
> This report however do not account for crime ...
Which allows you to vaguely gesture / associate yet again.
Unfortunately, you didnt link any studies. Searching for "economic contribution migration" on any scientific platform, comes out as unanimously net-positive.
> It should also be mentioned that only about 1/3 of refugees ever becomes economical self-sufficient.
First generarion? And yet again you just glimpse at it without explanation. Whats the subtext here? Lazyness? Genetic inferiority? Without an explanation, this isnt an argument for anythig, yet tou yield it like it was. And that is dishonest. So understand better, i could use it as an argument myself, "see how bad systemetic discrimination is!?"
The internet abuses cognitive biases around cultural self-identity and foreign disgust and in the end, people group together, thinking they are the reasonable ones, the more educated...
You lack basic knowledge of how Sweden work and seem to construct a straw man arguments based on that lack of knowledge.
In Sweden everyone must by law go through basic education as children, and all education is free, including higher education. The government get no profits from schools as there is no fees for the government to collect. It is all paid through taxes. Your are using that "dumb-think" of yours, assuming that immigration from countries that does not provide basic education for all their citizens will have the same level of education as people from countries that do.
> Which can also be explained with regular budget pressure from neoliberal fiscal hawks. I dont know the swedish specifics.
You clearly do not understand how Sweden operate or how local government functions, are clearly too lazy to look it up. The budget for municipalities primarily comes from local taxes, paid by citizens that live in that region. There are a national budget posts that get distributed between municipalities, but they only cover some parts of the local budget. Regions with a lot of high income and high tax paying citizens will have more money to spend than regions with a lot of citizens that are unemployed and on welfare.
1/3 of refugees never becomes economical self-sufficient. That is basic statistical fact. If you don't like the statistics you can pretend that math is racism or something dishonest like that. The plain fact is that taking in refugees has costed Sweden money, and the more refugees that comes in the higher the cost is. The math doesn't say if the cost isn't morally worth it, or if refugees children or children children will some day repay the cost, or if then it is worth to pay a cost now for a possible profit in the future that we don't know. All the math say is that there is a cost per person and year from taking in refugees that will not be repaid by those refugees.
> 1/3 of refugees never becomes economical self-sufficient
I am not questioning this, or that math is racist. You are misrepresenting me, which is dishonest. My main point is why and what you make of it.
And you yield statistics as a definite conclusion, while you kind of contradict yourself.
> The plain fact is that taking in refugees has costed Sweden money
> The math doesn't say if the cost isn't morally worth it [in the future]
> All the math say is that [...cost...] _will_ not be repaid by those refugees
I assume this is just a slight grammar slip but i can think i can call the broader argument dishonest again, because like i said way earlier, by narrowing down the time scope, you are constructing partial views as arguments. Its like saying "brushing your teeth costs money, but is it really worth it?" I repeat, services cost money and integration isnt frictionless.
When you see immigrants as just people subject to socialization, that want a stable and fullfilling live, as much as you do, you woudnt make sweeping selective arguments and oppose immigration in total. The debate subject changes from immigration:yes/no to how/why. This perspective is missing today and i repeat/paraphrase yet again, the problems immigration are not soley caused them but can arise/effect natives as much. A broader discussion would address this too...
> Immigrants economic contributions are net-positive, its not at the expense of anyone bc economies are no zero sum games.
It's at the expense of women and their safety, for example. Between years 2010 and 2015, 60% of rapes in Sweden were perpetuated by people of foreign origin: https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC8330751/. That was back when foreigners made up about 20% of their population, which I think is now over 30%, extrapolating, the immigrant rape problem is likely even worse. At what point do we stop putting economic growth over the well being and safety of citizens?
This is just another example of Americans projecting the unique American context to the rest of the world. As the other commenter stated, immigrants aren't universally an economic benefit to the host country. The particulars of the immigrant and the context are highly relevant to outcomes.
Aside from that, this elevation of economic concerns as paramount is a strange outgrowth of Americas unique position of economic powerhouse with shallow cultural roots. You cannot expect other countries to also see economic growth as the metric that subsumes all other concerns. Harm is multifaceted and is very much up to local sensibilities to determine what they value and how to preserve it.
It's not entirely clear what the argument which unites them is supposed to be. This unification is always in the mind of the white matry not the person opposing immigration. In the UK polish immigration was opposed, en mass, poles are white.
SUPPOSE there are large numbers of poorly assimilated people in a country, whose culture of origin is very different than that of the host country. What does the minor coincidence of their common lack of european ancestry show, other than to prove the point, they lack such ancestry?
White skin evolved in europe, with the peoples of europe, as with european culture -- that whiteness tracks this culture is a conincidence. (There's less-and-less european diaspora in america -- which, if imported en mass, might also enrange europeans).
The refusal to treat large scale immigration as a cultural and economic phenomneon, to try and insult opponents of this position with a slander of racism -- this tactic doesnt work any more.
All you are doing is driving those people to say, "OK, so its racism. We'll vote for that then." And the result is real racists are elected.
Do you have any analysis of the issues people opposed to large scale immigartion, from non-western cultures, and who would reverse at least some of it -- do you have any arguments that engage the issues they actually raise?