May 7, 2007, - 2:17 pm
Absurd: Lawyers for the Right to Babble A La Babel
By
has an interesting article about all of the lawsuits employers face for requiring English-only (though the article is written by , so keep that in mind).
According to the piece, employers can only legally adopt an English-only speaking rule if they can show it’s a business necessity. HUH?! What about how it’s a necessity because we’re here in America and that’s the language we’re supposed to speak?
Whines Ronna Timpa, owner of Workplace ESL Solutions (who would go out of business if all job candidates knew they needed to speak English to get a job):
Imagine how you would feel if you couldn’t speak your own language in the bathroom.
I’d feel just fine. I speak fluent Hebrew, but I find no necessity–at any time, unless I’m in Israel–to speak it in the bathroom. Is there something I’m not aware of about toilets, #1, and #2 that requires a foreign language?
Timpa is also upset with employers who prevent co-workers from speaking in their “native” language during lunch. Uh, if they’re here other than as tourists, they’re supposed to be natives of THIS country. And therefore, their “native” language should be English.
It’s just plain bad for morale for the workplace to become the Tower of Babel. It’s amazing to me that the burden is on any employer in the United States of America to prove that it’s a business necessity to require English only.
Then, there is the problem of the Equal Employment Opportunities Commission (EEOC), which is funded by your taxes. It’s spending your tax money–that was meant to prevent workplace discrimination against, say, Blacks or Jews–to prosecute employers who ban foreign languages.
Ridiculous.
Also alarming are the figures from the 2000 Census (which have probably increased exponentially) of the percentages of people in some states who don’t speak English. Here are the states with the highest percentage of residents ages 5 and older that speak English less than “very well”:
California–20.2%
Texas–14.8%
New York–12.7%
Nevada–12.1%
Arizona–11.8%
So one in five Californians can’t speak English, and more than one in ten in at least four other states. That’s incredible. Incredibly unacceptable. .
Tags: America, Arizona, California, Debbie Schlussel, Equal Employment Opportunities Commission, Israel, Lawyers for the Right, Nevada, New York, owner, Ronna Timpa, Stephanie Armour, Texas, Tower of Babel, United States of America, Workplace ESL Solutions
ìIt’s just plain bad for morale for the workplace to become the Tower of Babel. It’s amazing to me that the burden is on any employer in the United States of America to prove that it’s a business necessity to require English only.î
DebbieÖfor years, American packaging and instruction guides have OFTEN come with Spanish written on and in them (Likely to prevent workplace injury etc.). You are describing a concern, which is a result of a process that is already MIDñSTRIDE in being completed.
This Tower of Babel is being laidÖand really it is the LATINIZATION of America that you are witnessing.
Buckle up.
Either the immigrant MUSLIMS or the immigrant LATINOS will ìfill-upî America in the futureÖbecause the old guard, the WASPs, are obviously ìshooting blanksî.
THIS PROCESS is even affecting the piety style of the Catholic Church in America: http://whispersintheloggia.blogspot.com/
A few years ago, a Jewish woman that was a specialist provided services for some of our clients. She remarked to me that she was quite busy in night school learning SpanishÖwhich struck me as odd, since most people learn French in Canada that way.
She furthered that her Jewish fiancÈe was Latin American, and that she wanted stronger family ties and thought it best to get around the language barrier right away.
That was ONLY a couple of years agoÖand already they have 2 kids ~
The Canadien on May 7, 2007 at 5:06 pm