Reply #7: Forgive me for not clarifying...... [View All]

[Lipton64]

What is the difference between an asylum seeker and a refugee? I always though of them as basically the same thing with a different name.


As for "Americanizing" them. I think that's necessary if they are going to live in American society and stay here and eventually become citizens as most refugees do. After all, if a family of Afghans who still use wells for water and outhouses for taking care of that business come here poor, penniless, and dirty - don't we have to teach them English, job skills, American customs, where to go to the bathroom in America, how to drive a car(assuming they move out into suburbia or into the country), how to be polite, how to start a business in the United States, etc.

That's what I mean. People can live as they choose obviously but if they choose to live in 3rd-world squalor I think their prospectives of moving up the American economic ladder are slim to none - and I'm just talking about moving into the middle class. I'm not even talking about becoming wealthy.

Let them practice their customs and religious traditions and rituals as they see fit and let them speak their language at home - but without basic skills - how will they prosper in this country?