Quote from: mdgiles on September 23, 2012, 10:30:44 AM
You know I keep asking WHAT American culture is. But I never get an answer. If I do, it usually something about our shared political values. You need to learn the difference between Political Values and Culture. Or rather you need to learn that in America, our shared political values are the closest thing we have to a "common" culture.Here's an idea.

OMG Giles, the Bill of Rights is not a political document, in fact it is anything but!!!

These are God given Rights, not by the Govt. but God Himself!

This is the foundation of our culture Yawn is talking about, these are rights that cannot be taken away, it is the fabric that unites us as a culture, whether you believe it or not.

Quote from: Solar on September 23, 2012, 11:38:07 AM
OMG Giles, the Bill of Rights is not a political document, in fact it is anything but!!!

These are God given Rights, not by the Govt. but God Himself!

This is the foundation of our culture Yawn is talking about, these are rights that cannot be taken away, it is the fabric that unites us as a culture, whether you believe it or not.

The Bill of Rights is a political document. As is the Constitution it belongs too.
Have French men stop being Frenchmen during their innumerable changes of government - 3 Monarchies, 2 Empires, and 6 Republics? Were Germans German before unification? Would America be America without the political union. You and Yawn keep making the same mistake, you keep listing our political values, when questioned aout our culture. In a way that's understandable political values are what America has instead of a unifying culture. In a nation that has already had two major secession movements. That even today has a large numbers of people who feel that culturally they have nothing in common with large numbers of other Americans. Americans are Americans because we all subscribe to the same set of political values. That's what makes Americans, American. We don't all have the same shared history. Texas has a different history than Massachusetts which has a different history than California. The English we speak is different in different parts of this country. Every American has had the experience of traveling to a different part of the country, hearing people talk, and not understanding what they are talking about. I've already made the point about Alligator hunters in Louisiana being different from diary farmers in Wisconsin. Mass entertainment, and mass media have made many Americans unaware that culturally there are a number of Americas and always have been. A culture is a shared history, shared language, shared social values and norms.  You guys are denying the most wonderful thing about America, that people so different can exist together so peacefully.

Quote from: mdgiles on September 23, 2012, 01:21:01 PM
The Bill of Rights is a political document. As is the Constitution it belongs too.
Have French men stop being Frenchmen during their innumerable changes of government - 3 Monarchies, 2 Empires, and 6 Republics? Were Germans German before unification? Would America be America without the political union. You and Yawn keep making the same mistake, you keep listing our political values, when questioned aout our culture.

Wrong again!!!
The Bill of Rights is not a political document, it usurps political power, it is the wall that separates politics from culture.
Maybe a description of politics will help you discern between the two.

Involving or characteristic of politics or parties or politicians
Of or relating to the profession of governing

You see, there is only a barrier set up to keep politicians at bay, to keep them from usurping the rights that meld the fabric of the American culture, a culture we all subscribe to, Freedom!

QuoteIn a way that's understandable political values are what America has instead of a unifying culture. In a nation that has already had two major secession movements. That even today has a large numbers of people who feel that culturally they have nothing in common with large numbers of other Americans. Americans are Americans because we all subscribe to the same set of political values. That's what makes Americans, American. We don't all have the same shared history. Texas has a different history than Massachusetts which has a different history than California. The English we speak is different in different parts of this country. Every American has had the experience of traveling to a different part of the country, hearing people talk, and not understanding what they are talking about. I've already made the point about Alligator hunters in Louisiana being different from diary farmers in Wisconsin. Mass entertainment, and mass media have made many Americans unaware that culturally there are a number of Americas and always have been. A culture is a shared history, shared language, shared social values and norms.  You guys are denying the most wonderful thing about America, that people so different can exist together so peacefully.

All under one belief, a belief that they are free, which is why we all celebrate America, not a hyphenated one.

The United States may have a unifying political culture. It does not have, and has never had, a singular unifying social culture.

Quote from: mdgiles on September 23, 2012, 01:59:56 PM
The United States may have a unifying political culture. It does not have, and has never had, a singular unifying social culture.

Please define "social culture" in the context in which you are trying to apply it.  I might agree with you, I might not.

Quote from: mdgiles on September 23, 2012, 01:59:56 PM
The United States may have a unifying political culture. It does not have, and has never had, a singular unifying social culture.

I'd say that that's true, although, the political culture has become poison. I don't see anything unifying in it.

And you're right. In the big cities, cultures are very separate. The Irish, Italian, Chinese, Black..................neighborhoods are clearly defined, and clearly separate. It's an unwritten rule. Once you get out into the suburbs, and particularly rural areas, those divisions tend to dissappear.

As far as the hyphenated African-American thing goes...................I'd be lying if I said I didn't have a little bit of a problem with it. Why? It's not the use itself, it's that I believe that it's yet another tool that's used by the left to divide us. Kids that know nothing about Africa, are being taught at a young age, to refer to themselves as African-American. I don't think that's right.....................and the reason I would never introduce myself as an Irish-American, is because I may be talking to an Italian-American, and I don't see any reason to dredge up any possible, "old", bad feelings. I'd like to think that most of us are over the old hatred that used to exist.

That pretty much sums it up. African-American is fine, but not when the term is used to completely separate a group of people from the rest of, "Americans". I wouldn't want to be referred to as Irish-American, and I'm sure that if I was black, I wouldn't want to be called African-American.

Culture is the process of assimilating new ideas into an existing cognitive structure based on a foundation of shared beliefs and ideals.
Those shared ideals and beliefs in America all stem from one document, the Bill of Rights.

I don't see where you were going with this, but it's proves you don't understand American culture.

He wants to believe ONLY America has a lot of sub-cultures that he believes are equal to American culture. I have a friend from Spain who complains about all the people in Barcelona who think every day is "Halloween" She's talking about Arabs and Turks dressed in their native "costumes."

I have a friend originally from Germany who went "home" after more than a decade in the USA to visit her mother. When she came back she said it was like visiting a foreign country (because of all the COLONIZERS).

Russia has their sub-cultures and so does China and even Norway (remember the killer who couldn't take all the colonizers? And Africa has always been Africa--always in a perpetual war with other cultures.

The problem is the groups who want to move to the more successful countries but refuse to adopt the customs and culture of their new country. THAT makes them colonizers and not immigrants wanting to become citizens.  I have zero respect for those who do that.

Culture- the behaviors and beliefs characteristic of a particular social, ethnic, or age group:

If we think its okay to identify America as a "Christian nation" (an identifier which doesn't fully describe what America is supposed to stand for) then why would the use of African American be offensive?

Quote from: For Liberty on September 23, 2012, 07:53:24 PM
Culture- the behaviors and beliefs characteristic of a particular social, ethnic, or age group:

If we think its okay to identify America as a "Christian nation" (an identifier which doesn't fully describe what America is supposed to stand for) then why would the use of African American be offensive?

Now do you get it Giles? When a lib is pulling for ya, you know you must be doing something wrong.

Quote from: Solar on September 23, 2012, 08:14:47 PM
Now do you get it Giles? When a lib is pulling for ya, you know you must be doing something wrong.

I can't stand moderates 

Quote from: For Liberty on September 23, 2012, 07:53:24 PM
Culture- the behaviors and beliefs characteristic of a particular social, ethnic, or age group:

If we think its okay to identify America as a "Christian nation" (an identifier which doesn't fully describe what America is supposed to stand for) then why would the use of African American be offensive?

QuoteCulture- the behaviors and beliefs characteristic of a particular social, ethnic, or age group:

Those are all SUB-cultures of our shared NATIONAL culture. It's the same in every country whether that country is Iran, Sweden, Cuba, Russia or America

We are not an African-American culture. That's a sub-culture that hasn't fully identified with the AMERICAN culture.

The Founders gave us a country based on a certain set of beliefs. I know it offends so many, but our laws have their roots in BRITISH law, not Iranian, not Arab, not Chinese. Our moral code is Christian--particularly Protestant. Those who don't get it spend too much time in our urban ghettos and are out of touch with the real America.

That's the problem we've been having lately with immigration. We are being flooded with immigrants who don't share or respect AMERICAN culture. Now they tell us THEIR culture is every bit as valid in OUR country as it is in the country they left.

Our beliefs and values are based on British law and Christian morality. THAT'S why we're offended when Muslims try to push Sharia here. It doesn't fit with our Bill of Rights or the Constitution or the Declaration of Independence.

Quote from: Solar on September 23, 2012, 08:14:47 PM
Now do you get it Giles? When a lib is pulling for ya, you know you must be doing something wrong.

"Stopped clock". 

Quote from: mdgiles on September 24, 2012, 02:11:54 PM
"Stopped clock". 

Solar youre right... Im a liberal while Giles is "angry" and "un-American". I will take the liberal insult