[senectus1]

>At the end of the day, the French have no obligation to change their society to accommodate newcomers;

oooh I'm not sure I agree with you here.

A similar scenario (though very much on the micro level) is "the birth of a child doesn't obligate either parent to accommodate the newcomer."

I'm not saying the french need to bend to their every whim, or that the immigrants dont need to adopt the local culture as well. Its a two way street. When you let immigrants in you acknowledge that you're letting change in.

[fwlr]

> When you let immigrants in you acknowledge that you're letting change in.

While I agree with you completely on this (though unfortunately we draw different conclusions from this agreed-on premise)… This is simply not what the message has been on immigrants since, I dunno, probably the 1960s or 1980s. The populace hasn’t always been given a choice whether to let immigrants in or not, but in the cases where they did have a choice, they were told immigrants would not change the character of the nation, only improve it. Sometimes this was called assimilation, but this message was delivered in other ways as well.

If the populace had been given an honest choice of “yes immigrants + yes change” or “no immigrants + no change”, your argument would carry more weight for me, but it’s my impression that instead they have been receiving a consistent and solid message that they can choose “yes immigrants + no change”, which is probably where the resistance to change is coming from. It’s not fair (and more prosaically, not effective) to rugpull those people and tell them actually, it was “yes immigrants + yes change” all along.

[rayiner]

"Garett Jones documents the cultural foundations of cross-country income differences, showing that immigrants import cultural attitudes from their homelands—toward saving, toward trust, and toward the role of government—that persist for decades, and likely for centuries, in their new national homes. Full assimilation in a generation or two, Jones reports, is a myth." (https://www.sup.org/books/title/?id=35594)

[skissane]

> the cultural foundations of cross-country income differences, showing that immigrants import cultural attitudes from their homelands—toward saving, toward trust, and toward the role of government

Don't social class and education play a big role here too? University-educated professionals in country X very often have rather different attitudes from poor villagers in country X, so whether your immigrants from country X are mostly university-educated professionals vs mostly poor villagers may be much more significant than the mere fact that you are accepting immigrants from that country.

> Full assimilation in a generation or two, Jones reports, is a myth.

The two largest non-European immigrant groups in Australia are Chinese-Australians (over 5% of population) and Indian-Australians (over 3%). Among second-generation Chinese-Australians, 35% of married men and 48% of married women have a non-Chinese spouse; for the third and subsequent generations, the percentage rises to 69% for men and 73% for women. Similarly, for second-generation Indian-Australians, 56% of married men and 58% of married women have a non-Indian spouse. And those are figures from the 2006 census, [0] and I expect 2nd/3rd+ generation intermarriage rates have likely increased since then.

Isn't that an example of "assimilation" working? My friends in high school included a half-Chinese guy and a half-Indian guy, and I have half-Japanese second cousins – and I couldn't tell you what differences in culture exist between them and myself, I don't know whether there actually are any.

[0] https://tapri.org.au/wp-content/uploads/2016/02/v17n1_2khoob...

[hirako2000]

The concept is this: people come, and they assimilate.

The french culture remains irresistible, but social issues keep rising, immigrants are simply more impacted by those issues and the media makes sure to call out people's religion or ethnical "background"

Macron isn't Christian enough but France tolerates all religions, for good reasons. I would be OK for him to stay longer, but cutting off social media, and invading privacy is a blasphemy that should grant deporting him to Dubai, or any city state where he would fit in.

[vGPU]

The problem with the assimilation theory is that it only works in extremely small numbers.

As can be seen in every country in the world, as soon as you have more than a handful of immigrants coming in at once, they form enclaves and resist assimilation - indeed, it’s usually only their children or their grandchildren that do thanks to the influence of school and interaction with their peers.

[hirako2000]

New York City.

> Multicultural. About 36% of the city's population is foreign-born, one of the highest among US cities. The eleven nations constituting the largest sources of modern immigration to New York City are the Dominican Republic, China, Jamaica, Guyana, Mexico, Ecuador, Brazil, Haiti, Trinidad and Tobago, Colombia, Russia and El Salvador.

I could reference other concrete examples, instead making sure to mention NYC as nobody would call this extremely small numbers, or caveat the fact those migrants were of "european origin" for the most part, or having to get some half racist simplistic response.

to justify some biased view of "all countries of world", at least make some attempt to back it up with some factual reference

New York isn't a country, a megacity with over 8 million people is rather well suited.

France. A country that saw large waves of migrations, which don't qualify as "small numbers". Not saying everyone is seamlessly blending in, but if your reference is what mainstream media makes of it, or a repeat of electorate seeking politicans, then travel a bit more, or go shake some hands with people you seem to think categorically different, you may see a bit of reality instead.

[vGPU]

NYC literally has NINE different “chinatowns”.

And Brighton beach is almost entirely Russian. And not only Russian, but those who refuse to assimilate to the point of being unable to speak english - wiki says 98% of them don’t use English as a primary language.

Now, what are the results of that?

> For a year, Siena College has been polling voters on crime and whether they feel it’s a problem in New York state. Last month, 92% of those polled said they believe it’s either a “very serious” or “somewhat serious” problem,

>>France

Hello? Have you seen the title of this thread? France has literally been in a state of riot for decades. Look at the number of riots in 1990-2000. Now, how many of them were because of or carried out by French natives?

Exactly.

Not to mention, the yellow vest riots never stopped. 5 years ongoing now. And two more riots in 2022.

Does this sound like a country full of happy people? No, sure doesn’t, does it? Sounds like a country where a bunch of people with radically different beliefs, ideologies, religions, and way of life were shoved into a room and told: Be Nice. Or Else.

What do you think will happen when the French say, Or Else, What?

[hirako2000]

There is no federal official language in the USA. In NYC? Chinese and Russian are part of its official languages, so new russian or Chinese speaking people who happen to migrate to NYC are language assimilated on arrival.

The result of that? I don't know, I've been there and find it very much multi cultural. Crimes?

Crimes in NYC have been on constantly decreasing trend since its peak in the 80s. To again be on the rise since the fallout of covid prevention measures.

wiki https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crime_in_New_York_City

If polls aren't inline with the trends, take it up with the mass media falsly portraying the situation.

I did see the title of this thread yes, have you? A head of state displaying once again his total lack of creativity.

France surely isn't a country full of happy people. It's interesting you mention the yellow vest riots/protests, they answer your own question on whether riots are carried out by french "natives" or religious and culturally incompatible scum.

I do agree certain waves of migrants were shoved into some suburbs, expected to factory work, which they did in the since the 70s in particular, making the other factory workers rather unhappy, and now there are almost no factory left and to remain nice or else... I do also wonder, or else what?

No matter what cultural background, religion, or mother tongue language a person is attached to, deprive that person of social walfare and you eventually get revolts: pubic march and collective expressions, and unfortunately also incivility and then rioting, even mass shooting or other "terrorist" desperate form of expressions.

[rayiner]

New York City is a poster child for the problems with immigration. It’s full of unassimilated ethnic enclaves. Shared norms and social trust are almost non-existent, replaced with hostility and individualism. Governance is basically impossible. You can’t have grass roots, Tocquevillian democracy in such a fractured society, so instead you have governance by elites and ethnic politics.

[hirako2000]

I did pick NYC as I mentioned in order to hopefully avoid subjective, simplistic and/or half racist responses. One had to be made.

It wouldn't be necessarily a racist response if made against situations in certain cities in France given the extent of assimilationism of that nation, but I call that comment racist given the critic of NYC. New York through its entire existence has been waves of migrants, multi cultural in its DNA, with shapes and influences that changed over time but some would say is exactly what made this city shine and get so admired internationally: a financial pole, with countless architecture prouesses, exceptional arts, culinary and service excellence.

Those "enclaves" have been there since its genesis. What we see when the model is just acculturation.

The unfounded statement that no country in the world can "assimilate" past a certain ratio of minorities is the viewpoint that societies must reflect one particular fantasy view of some homogeneous ethnical soup. In that case sure, Japan is heaven, Singapore offers a hell of a picture, and every other societies that adopted yet other models are a myth, politics have little to nothing to do with any resulting conflict, revolt and violence, just some cross culture hate and over 200 borders not firm enough for comfort.

[dctoedt]

You have a really dystopian view of NYC — have you spent much time there?

[rayiner]

I grew up visiting family there (Queens has the largest Bangladeshi enclave in the country). I lived or worked in Manhattan for a year and a half, and my brother has lived there for more than ten years. The city gives me flashbacks to Dhaka.

[LawTalkingGuy]

> the birth of a child doesn't obligate either parent to accommodate the newcomer.

The newcomers were accommodated, just not feted. They have rights, but those don't override the rights of other French citizens and residents.

> When you let immigrants in you acknowledge that you're letting change in.

Sure, if the immigrant has new food, or music, or religion, etc, then they'll provide new choices to their society. Society is under no obligation to take those new choices, and not doing so isn't harming the newcomer.

And this is in the context of maintaining a functioning society. Driving through crosswalks at high speed isn't one of the available choices for anyone.

[senectus1]

you know they get to vote right?

Which means they get to choose who represents them when laws are being made...

[cm2187]

I don't think the people has been asked to vote on mass migration. The political elite decided it was good or inevitable and are focusing their energy on making the French live with it.