I don’t think that’s fair, but have it your own way. I’m happy to believe your story if you can figure out what it is. Fired people, or quit people? How many? When and where? What kind of factory? Who told you about it? You know, the kind of details that smell of verisimilitude.
Holy crap. I literally just posted an NPR podcast talking about how people were jobbed out of a chicken processing plant because immigrants came in and took over. The language barrier was cited as one of the reasons.
Is This American Life lying?
With every post I read, I start to suspect more and more that scottagibson is the alter-ego of gman. Different politics, different approach to argumentation, but roughly the same effect on the forum and, presumably, the same goals.
Why is all that important to you? It was a packing plant, as I said, in the San Joaquin Valley of the Socialist Republic of California. There are packing plants and processing plants all over the place here.
I knew white people that did that work, white people who worked in the fields and were involved in the raisin crop. Whites don’t do that anymore.
At one time the employees were white housewives, students out of school and others looking for seasonal work. Now they are pretty much latino’s trying to make a living. Around here nobody has a problem with them doing that work.
I would like to know my goals, so do tell.
Finkle is Einhorn!
If someone stops you in the street and says it happened to him, does the existence of an NPR story about other people serve as evidence that it happened to him? ‘I know people who did X’ is the most common way people use to lend credibility to unverified stuff they heard somewhere.
Obviously she didn’t read “The Jungle” in high school.
You asked him whether he knew anyone it happened to. He then told you that he did.
That is the normal response to that question.
Scuzz is not lying, and you have no reason to think that he is.
That’s a poor summary of the exchange, but I’m not interested in arguing it with you. I was skeptical that anyone was fired for being unable to speak a foreign language, and his response, for me, confirmed that skepticism. Maybe he didn’t mean to imply that, or maybe I inferred it unreasonably. In any event, what business is it of yours?
Yeah, no. Sorry, but that’s crazy.
Scott has been around for years, and active in many other places on the forum (notably in forum games like BSG and Resistance). Which is a hell of a difference from gman. So I can 100% say Scott’s intent isn’t to come trolling and cause strife.
The difference is that we’ve had discussions with @Scuzz for years, so we have a bit more confidence in what he writes versus some random guy on the street.
Saying “someone might lie and say that” does not remotely approach proof of lying.
“I know people who did X” is also what people who actually know people who did X would say.
Fair enough.
I have no proof of anyone lying, and never said I did. I don’t say anyone lied. That’s not what ‘skeptical’ means.
What I remember about those episodes of This American Life is that, while technically some people lost their jobs as a result of immigrant labor, the real story is far more nuanced than that. That, in the end, that immigration was a net positive to the entire area and the people there, since the new people resulted in new businesses opening up, existing businesses getting more people, etc.
What Scuzz is describing is probably pretty similar. In the short term, I’m sure he’s telling the truth that some people he knows lost their jobs, or voluntarily left their jobs because of the language barrier. But I’d be interested to hear what happened to that community and those people in the long run after that initial short-term hit.
Sort of. It was a net positive for the immigrant businesses, and it obviously greatly enhanced profits for the chicken plant, but the older white businesses had a tough time of it. The “flavor” of the town changed drastically, but that could skew good or bad depending on how you were impacted.
Even if people lost their jobs because new employees came in speaking a different language, why blame the employees and not, you know, management? Or is “the boss is always right” ingrained in American culture by now?
Who here is blaming the immigrants?
Nobody, but the people who got fired, who did they blame?
You should listen to the podcast. Everyone in it acknowledged that the immigrants were just coming in because the jobs were being offered over the border. They didn’t “blame” the immigrants either. They werent happy about it though.