> American immigration really is the ultimate test of loyalty.
Frankly, more and more people are starting to wake up to the fact that it's a bullshit test. Partly because immigration really doesn't have to be all that, and partly because of the global...decline of the United States' image since the turn of the century.
When I was a kid moving to the US was the goal, now only a handful of people I know have it at the top of their relocation list (and some have lost interest in even visiting). Canada and the EU are much more popular destinations for people looking to move to a western country.
>decline of the United States' image since the turn of the century.
That seems to be almost universally accepted among American intelligentsia. But as a guy from outside of US, I dare to say it's false, and also built on a false premise. USA as a culture, or as a political power was never especially popular, except for a few particular places. But as an economuc destination it has been since at least the beginning of XX century, and continues to be so. In Russia it is for example a recognized phenomenon - openly anti-US people who would take any opportunity to move across the ocean, and settle there for economic opportunities, simultaneously writing blogs in Russian making fun of the States, and praising mother-Russia from distance. Obviously, for them "image" was never cool, but they are willing to relocate anyway. I'm sure the same exists everywhere. EU, and Canada are popular too, but much less so, and at least in non-EU Eastern Europe + Russia economic migration to the European Union prevails simply because it's cheaper, and practically easier.
> But as a guy from outside of US, I dare to say it's false, and also built on a false premise
As someone who is also not from the US, I dare to say you've entirely misunderstood what I meant. "Image" there is not referring to agreeability or popularity, it's referring to the near-monopoly on global consciousness as the paragon of the successful West which the US held through the latter half of the 20th century - that's what I'm asserting has been slipping over the past couple of decades (more so in the past eight or so years).
The US still an economic powerhouse, but other economic powerhouses have muscled their way onto the stage (largely China, but also the European Union). It's still a financial powerhouse, but there's also plenty of opportunity and business partnerships to be found elsewhere (and it's becoming less and less necessary to actually migrate to the US to take advantage of its wealth). It's still a cultural powerhouse, but others have achieved incredible international popularity as well (just look at the near mind-boggling spread of Korean pop culture across the globe, for example). Countries like the aforementioned Canada offer a much faster, cleaner track to citizenship, and even places like the UAE and some parts of Eastern Europe or Oceania have their appeal for someone simply looking to improve their passport. Of course, there are also factors like the highly polarised political climate and the inadequacies of the healthcare system that make it less than desirable for someone that doesn't like drama or that has health conditions they need to worry about.
In summary there are so many other options for relocation, many of which are now objectively better for a given individual, that the US is quickly becoming "just another country" for plenty of people opportunity-wise.
I made zero assumptions about you personally. I mentioned that it became a cliche in some circles.
>there are so many other options for relocation, many of which are now objectively better for a given individual,
Not so many options unless you are very rich, or your skills are in high demand globally. Which is not typical. In most cases migration works like buying houses: I'd like to have a verandah with ocean view, but there are permissions, and there's price I can afford. US is very on top of the list, but in many countries it's complicated/expensive to get there. It has nothing to do with image, or current political state of affairs in the US, or in general what is in the news.
Canada is great. It’s virtually indistinguishable from America for the typical person.
I don’t know where you’re from, but as a Bangladeshi immigrant to the US, but I wouldn’t emigrate to the EU. 76% of Americans say that a naturalized citizen is a “real American” and just 13% disagree: https://www.ipsos.com/sites/default/files/ct/news/documents/.... In France it’s 55-28. In Italy it’s 41-36. There is no place in the world more welcoming to immigrants than America. Look at what’s happening in the EU. America has been dealing with huge levels of illegal immigration for decades and for the most part we’re still very positive on legal immigration. Europe accepted some refugees from the Middle East like five minutes ago and already right-wing nationalist parties are winning elections left and right.
> There's no way 50% of Brits think gaining citizenship doesn't make you British, unless they don't speak English. That's what the word means!
That's what you think the word means, but a lot of people use "British" and "English" as ethnicity descriptors, and standard language on survey forms includes "white British" as an ethnicity.
I can quite believe that 50% of the population thinks that gaining citizenship still makes you an immigrant; you could probably find a large support for "being born in Britain to nonwhite parents doesn't make you British", and look what happened to Shamina Begum.
I have heard a horrible joke, for which the punch line was "now I'm Blitish." That joke is part of the reason I lump Airstrip One in with Oceania.
(we have our own problems with integration, but as far as I can tell, they diminish greatly in the second generation. Schools are a powerful integrator.)
And to Al-Khwarizmi's point in a neighbouring thread: I much prefer living in a society where people will interrupt their rant to me about "those foreigners" to help a head-cover-wearing dark-skinned mother put her pram on the train and then blithely resume where they left off. That dissonance is hypocrisy in the right direction. "Even a child makes himself known by his doings."
Kinda funny - the part of the world that Bangladesh is in is completely racist and has no qualms about it at all. SE Asian countries define themselves by their ethnicity, proudly.
Talking to a Cambodian about race, from a European perspective, is disturbing. Translate some of the terms and you could be listening to a nazi.
While the data you present are interesting, and I can see how they could be a factor for an immigrant to choose America, I don't think they correlate with welcomeness to immigrants as much as you imply.
In the EU, countries have a relatively strong ethnic identity, with differentiated languages and cultures (some of which are perceived as endangered, in particular by American influence), while America is a melting pot and its culture is less differentiated basically because they have exported it to the globe.
A Spanish person could think that if you don't speak perfect Spanish, eat and cook Spanish food, have lunch past 2 PM, frequent bars, stay out until late, talk loudly and eat jamón serrano, you are not a "real Spaniard", because you are not like them (I'm using hyperbole to get the point through, of course not everyone in Spain does all that, but I hope you get the idea). But does this mean that they won't socialize with you, consider you for dating, or give you a job? Of course there are racists and xenophobes anywhere, but in general, i think the answer is not at all. Many won't consider you a "real Spaniard" -not me, I would say yes to that poll, but many wouldn't- but they will be happy welcoming you, and consider that the cultural differences are a good thing as they can learn from you.
On the other hand, in the US most people will consider you to be a "real American" because in America ethnicities and cultures are much more mixed, so it wouldn't make sense at all to think that you need to have a certain culture or customs to be American. But what's that good for in practice? Probably the cops that kill black people arbitrarily consider them to be Americans (it would be hard to argue otherwise when they have lived in the US for generations), they still hate them and shoot them. I have friends in cities like Baltimore that tell me about totally segregated neighborhoods, what does it matter that people consider their fellow countryman of different races to be American if they don't mingle with them? And that's without even talking about a president who fits more into your own words "right-wing nationalist" than almost any EU president, with an erratic immigration policy that scraps visa programs on a whim, something that I've never seen in Europe.
My feeling is that the reasons for many emigrants throughout the world to choose America are more sentimental (based on the inercia of the US's reputation, romantic ideals in movies, and general hype) than rational. I have seen this live often. I have seen Iranian candidates reject a job offer here to go to America because you know, it's America, to earn much less, have a worse standard of living and be travel banned on a whim of the president a few months after taking the job...
That said, don't get me wrong, I wish you and all the people who emigrate to America the best. It has worked fine for many people and will keep doing so. I just think it's overrated, and other destinations (not just the EU) would work as well for most people. To each their own, though.
Right wing parties won the UK, if you want to call Boris Johnson that. They lost in France, biggly. They lost in the Netherlands. They won some state elections in Germany, if becoming the biggest opposition party in state parliaments without any chance of governing can be called winning (they got more votes than I am comfortable with, so).
But who again held Congress until 2018 and still holds the Senate and the Presidency in the US?
Frankly, more and more people are starting to wake up to the fact that it's a bullshit test. Partly because immigration really doesn't have to be all that, and partly because of the global...decline of the United States' image since the turn of the century.
When I was a kid moving to the US was the goal, now only a handful of people I know have it at the top of their relocation list (and some have lost interest in even visiting). Canada and the EU are much more popular destinations for people looking to move to a western country.