Why are so many people obsessed with immigrants culturally assimilating?

[Naruse]

I'm English and in my lifetime people have really leaned into the same arguments as France, that if people want to live in England they need to be British. Which I guess would be defined as taking on British values ditching any aspects of their own cultures, eating English food and dissociating themselves from their former state and history. I guess I'm curious about this mentality, from my perspective people tend to assimilate in a few generations anyway so screaming at 1st generation immigrants that they need to conform to fit in just comes off as bullying but I would be interested to hear what people think on the subject, all nationalities welcome.

[Levin]

Good question old fellow and I can see you take a calm rational approach. However, unfortunately I cannot.

I suppose what people say maybe points to some deeper thing that pisses people off or leads to some resentment. My grandad was Ukrainian and came after the second world war. The Ukrainians formed their own social clubs, but naturally integrated very quickly within a generation or two. This is because our culture and values were similar to the native one. But there is a debate whether people from certain cultures can be so easily integrated. I mean, it's quite a topical issue, there have been stabbings in France recently etc. You might say, well, these are outlier events. But can two cultures who have fundamentally different values enmesh and integrate? Obviously, we Westerners, we value freedom of speech, individualism, the right to trod one's own path and make mistakes, so long as they generally fall within the parameters of being legal. There are certain cultures and religions that you can't criticise, they threaten violence. Integration has proven to be more stubborn with people from Islamic cultures. They form their own communities, they don't integrate. There is suspicion, distrust and disrespect between communities.

In terms of the pointing I was referring to, there's two other things I would mention. There's an innate sense of unfairness within the system for people who are native and who do work, to generalise a bit. I work, in a reasonably professional job. However, as part of my job I look at benefits claims, tends to be people who have emigrated from other countries. I can see that many get £2000 to 2500 a month in universal credit. We had one recently who got £2800 a month, whatever the arrangement was, she had 5 kids. Now I'm from the north, and that's a pretty decent salary here. You're looking at a better or comparable salary to a teacher, nurse etc. At 2000 grand a month, you're looking at a salary of 30 grand a month after tax. 2500 I guess is in the high 30s. So how is that fair? That I slave away, each and every day, and get fuck all to show from it. There is something fundamentally wrong in the benefits and thus wider system.

Next point I'd make is the pace of change. In my town, I believe that the non-native born population is sitting at around 30%. This is most egregious. People do not want this. No one minded immigration, provided it was slow and and gave opportunity for a reasonable pace of change. It can only be described as a flood at the moment. I mean, what's the net immigration figures for the UK last year? 606k? The politicians in change can only be described as treacherous, as can the complicit population. We have a small housing supply. If you bump up the population, from 60 odd million to 67 million in 20 years, that obviously increases the demand. The supply cannot keep apace. House prices rise. You, for subscribing to this, have made the population terminally poorer. A greater proportion of one's income is now spent on housing, mortgages or rent, destroying leisure, play, the ability afford children. You have made the population wage slaves. To slave away till we die on housing, to be unable to afford kids. That is our fate now. This is beyond fucked up.

[Levin]

by the way, it's quite an interesting feeling looking out, just looking out into my town on a typical day. I see these people, and again, they are not involved in my world. We are completely separate from one another. This is not a shred of integration, of common ground. It's almost as if you have two separate species in an area, doing their own thing, existing together but seldom interacting.

[KostasKouvalis]

Macron said it best, "Criticizing Islam is legal in France, chopping people's heads off, isn't."

[Levin]

@KostasKouvalis Help me out, man. I feel like I'm going mad here.

[Metallsturm]

Because culture shapes society. When immigrants move to another country, then typically do it for several reasons, such as better opportunities, better healthcare, better quality of life etc.

It appears that they seldom, if ever, question as to what exactly made the country they immigrated into better than their home country. One of the unpleasant truths is culture.

Therefore, if people en masse emigrate from one country into another that is vastly different in terms of culture (and I'm not talking about shallow aspects such as cuisine) and refuse to assimilate, essentially what they're doing is spreading the same crap that made their original country unattractive to begin with in a new country.

If we're talking about Britain and France, they aren't *that* different in terms of relevant aspects of culture (liberalism, laws, values, personal freedoms etc.), thus those who nitpick on shallow aspects such as food are indeed somewhat dumb. However, those who highlight that having millions of, for example, Arabs or Africans moving into England or France and refusing to assimilate as a problem, they're absolutely correct.

[PetLover24]

British - well Anglos in general - are bigots or racists. Even Canadians who say aren't are probably worse racists than Americans because they refuse to acknowledge it.

When Anglos move to other countries after all they refuse to do what they demand many foreigners do. There's Anglos in Spain, Italy Japan, Thailand, Greece, Germany, etc. that refuse to adopt to native culture. Even if they are 1st or 2nd generation borns.

I've laugh at Americans in other countries - such as in Japan, there's many dumb Americans in that country posting youtube videos - whining about the native culture. These stupid bigoted racists demand that Japanese abandon their culture in America but are too ignorant and uneducated - one can say useless - to do the same in Japan.

[KostasKouvalis]

It's not bullying. Why would you immigrate somewhere if you don't like the culture? Granted, you guys set up your own communities on the Spanish coast and don't bother to learn Spanish, but at least you guys aren't bothering anyone. Muslims on the other hand, when a Westerner visits a Muslim country, they have to follow their shitty culture, and when Muslims go to Westernern countries, they ALSO want people to follow their shitty culture. If you don't see any problem with this, then this means you have no respect or love for British culture. I'm not saying they should stop speaking their language, eating their food, listening to their music or even having their festivals. But in the UK, women can wear revealing clothing, mingle with men, shake their hand and celebrate Christian holidays. If this bothers you, then stay in your own country. You're not gonna come to someone else's country and dictate how they should live. You guys have Polish immigrants, some of whom may not be completely assimilated, but at least the Poles don't practice shitty medieval traditions.

[ProbablyClueless]

The short answer is because immigrants carry their country/culture, identity and values with them. Other countries are the way they are because of the people inside them. When those people come to other countries, they bring the world view and understanding of their old country with them. Those understandings are what led that country to be in their current state, so they'll just recreate their home country in the new country if they don't adopt the new country's values.

The reason assimilation is so important is because the country the immigrant is moving to needs to preserve its way of life. If the immigrants don't assimilate, they'll just bring new forms of the same political situation as they have in their old country. When the old country is a place like Afghanistan or Ukraine, I hope you can imagine how "Afghanistan lite" would be less than desirable in a place like the UK.

[MiddleAgedClimbee]

I'm wondering if it's more a concern of being able to speak the language versus assimilate to the culture of a country. Often times, another concern may arise, that native businesses may be pushed out to make away for foreign/culturally different businesses (depending on space availability).

[DextroShade]

If they won't assimilate we shouldn't accommodate. A lot of these people are just moving from their shithole countries to Western countries with generous welfare systems so they can get handouts and not have to work. If you want to bring your food over that's fine but showing up and demanding everyone speak your language instead of theirs is asinine and you should be sent packing.

[BlissfullyCurSed]

Simply because they are now living in a different country with different cultures.

[Anonymous]

If you don't intend to become part of the new country then stay in your old country with your own culture.

[exitseven]

If I have to explain to you what it means to be "OF" someplace you won't understand it.

[jahaims]

If someone likes and values their culture I could understand them wanting to preserve it.

[Malwi93]

who cares? i bet in 200 years world would be all mixed up

[QuietRunner]

Why immigrate if you aren't assimilating