No comprendo esta discusión. En español, por favor.
I think that’s unreasonable. It encourages xenophobia and discourages tourism.
I’m not so sure about that.
What use is letting a guy from Pakistan rent an apartment if you don’t also ensure that he is allowed to buy food from a supermarket?
This seems racist at first, until you realize they’re talking about rice.
The shop owner is clearly an asshole… it sounds like we have a consensus on that. But I don’t see his sign as being in the same league as Jim Crow, or “No Jews”, or “Whites Only” signs. Anyone can learn enough English to order at a fast food shop, which means the requirement is fundamentally different from an overt refusal to serve people of the wrong race or religion.
To me, the sign provides advance notice that the shop owner is a lowlife, which means I’d take my business elsewhere… just like I know not to group with MMO players who name themselves “HoSlapper”.
Apparently you are both incapable of seeing the issue and against having a good time.
People putting up signs that say, in essence, “We don’t want X around here” are blatantly discriminating, be it against speakers of Russian, Spanish, Hebrew, Sanskrit, or Ninjaplease. The difference between this and a “No Niggers” sign is one of degree, not of type. Since we are in agreement about not putting up signs that say “No dogs or Jews”, it seems a short step from there to agreeing to not put up other discriminatory signs, such as ones that say “English Only”. The sign serves no functional purpose – the employees are not being inundated with foreign language speakers, and there are certainly other methods available to indicate that service cannot be given because, hey, they don’t speak the same language (I’ve worked in shitty fast food places, and I had no trouble helping Spanish speakers even though I only speak English and French). The sole point of this sign is to indicate the following: “This Store Hates Immigrants, Brown People, and Having Fun”.
Is that legal? Possibly. Should it be legal? Fuck no.
And not grouping with people named HoSlapper? What are you, crazy? Only person in the game creative enough to not end up with GenericFantasyName345. I guess you wouldn’t group with “Busty Was Aeon” either. Sucks to be yooooou!
You misunderstand me. I’m not saying that there should not be such a law. That’s not the point (or at least my point). I am saying that, having read a lot of statutes, that particular statute that you linked to clearly (admittedly my personal opinion, but based on a fair bit of experience) was not written to address this situation.
There may be another law out there to address your issue, one that is actually written to cover the problem. However, there are laws protecting the disabled like the ADA. Suggesting that the ADA covers murder because what would the use be of mandating handicap accessible buildings if you can freely murder disabled people is a stretch.
Yeah, I interpreted the litany of commas and “or” statements in a different way than you did.
Are most laws written in such an ambiguous manner?
No, it’s a difference of both type and degree. Thus, the rest of your rant doesn’t apply. The fact that we disagree on this point doesn’t mean I’m “incapable of seeing the issue”. It means we disagree.
Should it be legal? Fuck no.
I guess that depends on how much value you place on free speech. I’m leery of having an ever-increasing number of laws that restrict more and more varieties of speech.
And not grouping with people named HoSlapper? What are you, crazy? Only person in the game creative enough to not end up with GenericFantasyName345. I guess you wouldn’t group with “Busty Was Aeon” either. Sucks to be yooooou!
I’m concerned with my own fun, not the fun of every random smacktard whose name is an attempt to walk the line between offensive and bannable. I’ve learned from hard experience that people with names like “Titty Mama”, “Dickus Biggus”, and “Busty Was Aeon” are best avoided if I want to maximize my own fun. And no, I’m not shedding any tears about not getting to group with you.
We don’t have an official language in the U.S., so the sign is a bit off. If it read “Our workers only speak English” that should be OK, I would think. It would simply be a statement of what they are capable of accomodating. Surely, you can’t expect employees at a diner to learn every language in the world in order to take orders. But the “This is America” seems to imply that people should not be speaking anything but English anywhere in America. It doesn’t say “Order in English, please”. It says, “Speak English!” as though demanding that foreigners conform to a certain language standard that has no legal basis.
All that said, I’m torn about this one. It’s his establishment, and he should be able to refuse service, but we have laws against refusing service on the basis of certain issues (like race or sex). I’m really not sure if this crosses the line on those issues. I don’t know enough about the law here.