Why do people want to have children?

Quora is a great place to find my favorite kind of idiot. That is, the idiot who always thinks he has smart things to say, says them in a way that (he believes) sounds smart, and spends his life patting himself on the back.

Quora is also a great place to find people asking questions that our modern liberal paradigms cannot answer. When you combine these genuinely good questions with obnoxious and bad answers, you get quite the spectacle.

So a user asked the question, "Why do people want to have children." I have pasted the full question below.

Give the OP credit- he has really thought this through. He has covered all bases, and successfully deconstructed all mainstream arguments for having children from a mainstream perspective (which is rather liberal).

The last three bullet point rebuttals are quite funny. According to this poster, people who have children because they simply think that it will bring joy or fulfillment are just losers who "get bored by themselves" and have "unsatisfied dreams/ego." Corroborate this with the related question on the right, "Do people want to change the world after having children?" This is a concern to some people. Worldly greatness is the number one priority, and it might be problematic if children get in the way of seeking money or status.

The poster adds two more arguments for having children, but not under the bullet points (why do they not get bullet points?). The first is that having children is a tradition or routine. Needless to say, as an enlightened young person in this current year, the OP knows that a working tradition is never a valid reason to do something that brings you joy: you must find joy in something deemed worthwhile under liberal or liberal-individualist notions, such as seeking of status and money, or maybe humanitarianism to Africans. Second is the idea that one has a legacy. This is not rebutted by the OP. Having a legacy is something that would probably be acceptable to him, just abnormal.

So that is all for the post, now the answers.

One poster explained that it makes no sense to want to pass on one's blood:

They want children of their own, with their own bloodline. By this reason, anyone who donates blood to another person should become family. Logically correct? This reason, for me, is really very narrow because there isn't really a word like mine or ours. Our body is not our own. Even our partner is not our own. I didn't even know my husband existed before I met him. But when I met him, I tried to find various ways to know him and he did the same. So, we make a person or a thing our own. The same applies to children. If you are really so eager to have one or two, you don't need to create your own. Adopt and provide an orphan a home that he or she has been wishing for.

When the question first came out, a female scientist had the top answer, and she had said that one should ABSOLUTELY NOT have some desire to pass on a biological legacy. I cannot find her answer now, which is sad. She is probably smart enough to realize that people who want a biological legacy probably care about their identity, and people who care about their identity probably like to form societies that reinforce their identity, which is not kosher to a tolerant liberal multiculturalist.

Another poster tries to tackle the question from the economic angle. One thing you will notice in political debates is that just about anything gets boiled down to economics, because economics is thought to answer questions about utility, and therefore, happiness. 

From a psychological point of view, as stated by Professor Daniel Gilbert in one of his lectures, having a child is equivalent to money spent badly.

Imagine that you bought a pair of cashmere socks. Now, cashmere socks are really expensive; they cost more than a hundred dollars. Suppose you buy a pair.

A basic law of economics is that people pay more for the things that they love. A basic law of psychology is that people love more the things they pay for.

The more you make somebody pay, the more they'll love the thing they paid for.

Something similar happens in case of cashmere socks. You tend to love them more every day, because you paid a lot for them. After some time, you begin to feel the goodness that these socks possess, even if initially, you regret the money spent on them.

Once you put them on, and start walking, your state of mind changes to "Ah! I never thought these would be so soft! It's like I can finally see the light! The feeling is incomprehensible!" And just in case someone asks you why you bought a pair, you tell them, "You've got to buy a pair to realize how awesome they are!"

Now what does that sound like? Children!

People who have children have put in their money, blood and sweat to help them become great individuals. Studies show that children DO NOT cause happiness among people. Rather the fact that you have done so much for them, makes you happy!

He is right. There are studies showing that people with children are not happier. But I wonder if these studies are really comparing apples-to-apples, or if they are measuring happiness properly. Happiness is hard to measure, and often you will see that researchers just use physical health as some kind of proxy. He is also making an interesting point that people's immediate purchasing decisions might have a complicated relationship with the happiness brought to them by their spending. Turning this theme around in a few different directions could obliterate libertarianism.

And of course, we get the answer from the dude who ignored all the arguments of the OP and says sentimental crap. Most of the other posters say similar sentimental crap. Feel free to read the first sentence and skip.

Having/raising a child can make you a better person. That being said, not having a child doesn’t make someone worse. Childless people just won’t benefit from being forced to rapidly improve themselves the way a good parent will.

First off, don’t let anyone lead you to believe it is easy. There may be some easier kids than others, personality wise, but they all require a great deal of self-sacrifice. A lot of time, resources, blood, sweat and tears (and SLEEP) are given up by the parents for the child.

Second, it forces a person to become more responsible. You have to put away the childish things, the irresponsible behaviors, because now, a completely helpless life is dependent on you for its survival. A steady job and living space becomes a must.

Third, a good parent practices humility. You are no longer the greatest thing in your life. This wonderful, stinky, cute, snot-nosed child is. I personally noticed that when i became a dad, some of the more vain things I used to care about, like how I look, what kind of car I drive, suddenly meant a lot less. Which is the reason dad jokes exist, dad socks, mini-vans, and mom pants.

Fourth, a good parent practices love. Children NEED love. You might have done everything wrong with parenting, but if you unconditionally love your child, the kid will turn out alright, although with some quirks. In practicing love, you end up becoming more compassionate about your fellow humans. I know personally, my heart has softened since having kids.

Fortunately, the top commenter does indeed have the best answer. He writes the following:

I'm befuddled by "apart from evolution theory," because I believe the urge to procreate is almost entirely driven by evolution. People justify it in other ways, often with platitudes, because we don't really feel our instincts as instincts, and we don't like to think of ourselves as "programmed machines," but it's hard to come up with anything more instinctual than the desire to have kids. Natural Selection crafted us to have it.

He is right. But he is, sadly, missing the point of the OP's comment. The OP is demanding a "rational" reason for childbearing. And the OP, like many liberals, does not take it as a given that humans should live in accordance with our nature, or that we should organize societies in accordance with our natural urges. It would be a huge problem if they did, because tribalism is as natural as the desire to have children.

So we are left without a "rational" way to justify the making of children.

I think it is "rational" to live in accordance with your natural urges - all of them, including tribalism. To build an identity and base it upon blood and territory, and to share it with a tribe is completely natural. Conceptualizing and spiritualizing these urges gives a lexicon by which one can explain these natural urges to those of us who are skeptical and rational of everything-including motivations and benefits of childbirth. One then explains that living in accordance with your nature leads to the kind of intense pleasure that the philosophically-challenged quora community expresses, that it is better to swim with the current of your instinct if you are aiming to reach fulfillment. Living this way can lead to the uniquely intense pleasure that the answerers describe.

And just as a person might miss out on some of the most intense pleasure in the human experience by not having children or not having sex, a person also misses out on intense pleasure by not having an identity or a tribe. One's identity and society, like a religion, can color every experience in one's life, imbuing them with meaning. But people who do not have identity, like those who do not have children, simply cannot understand this, because they have not experienced it.

Good Vibes Liberalism

    I was thinking about the extremely high percentage of people in the arts community who are extremely liberal the other day, trying to get a grasp on why they should be liberal. I didn't want to settle for some historical explanation.

    I was also thinking about the SWPL's and hipsters, liberals who I might call "good vibes" liberals. These are the kinds of liberals who like to throw concerts after the World Trade Center falls, do too much drugs, or advocate a hypersexualized lifestyle. I believe that the "good vibes" liberal tends to view conservatives as curmudgeonly sticks in the mud, people who ruin the good vibes of a free love society.

    Lastly, I was thinking about the oft-repeated fact about the views on happiness of people from the East and the West: people from the East supposedly view happiness as peace and contentment, while people from the West more often view happiness as excitement. If Aristotle was right in his Nicomachean Ethics, all humans should and do pursue happiness, as this is the aim of our existence. So I expect a people's view on happiness to powerfully influence the way it approaches many issues in life.

   As Westerners, we supposedly see happiness as excitement ( I would argue that Christians and conservatives actually view happiness as a kind of inner contentment or "joy," like the Easterners). Excitement, by nature, is something that is induced by an experience. One goes to an amusement park, a sports game, or a club to get excited. One might also go to a production.

    Going to a production brings us back to the liberal arts community. Actors are in the business of inducing happiness in their crowds. They are often very funny and vibrant people themselves, exciting to be around. They are even better at inducing happiness in their friends, and perhaps even themselves, than they are at inducing happiness in crowds. It would be reasonable to expect that they view happiness as good vibes or happiness that is induced.

    Sometimes I wonder if hipsters really believe in inner peace, contentment, and joy. They seem to mock everything that is taken seriously- the perpetually ironic attitude for which they are known.

    I further wonder how many people in the West do not believe in the attainment of inner joy. I especially wonder when I hear people talk about "mental illness," which used to be described in the past as "misery." They have this concept that people who are "mentally ill" are that way because of deterministic chemistry within the brain that was present from birth. If this view of mental illness is right, the attainment of joy or contentment is an end that cannot be reached for many people, unless it can be artificially induced by a drug. Any real happiness that can be reached is only in the category of "excitement"- the rest is genetics. I further wonder about people who might doubt this conception of mental illness, but are otherwise are pessimistic-for whatever reason- about the ability to create a joyous community and a joyous life.

    So if you are a liberal who just wants to keep good vibes going, you might explain the ramblings of conservatives as the crazy outbursts of insane miserable fucks. Many people do consider our views as mental illness. You will figure that you should just remove them, as all they can ever do is bring the rest of society down. Furthermore, if happiness is the end of humanity, and if the only ways that human happiness is affected is through induced excitement, there would seem to be no legitimate reason to oppose unrestricted immigration of peoples into your country. There would be little reason to oppose any societal change that is not obviously and indisputably harming people, as none of them affect your ability to ride a roller coaster, do drugs, or tell a joke. You should be able to tell jokes around anyone of any race, and therefore, you should be able to be happy around anyone of any race.

    And if you believe in the above explanations of human happiness, you must believe that any unhappiness in society is the result of the curmudgeons getting to much of a voice and ruining the good vibes (even if you are not a hipster or liberal). You might want to silence the conservatives.

   I believe that inner peace and joy is attainable, or at least alter-able. I think that traditional societies have held such beliefs. Most religions teach followers to organize their life for stability. Christianity explicitly teaches about peace and joy as destinations for the Christian life. Most religions also warn against the kinds of  pleasure-seeking that are common today, claiming that it will lead to destruction. The reduction or elimination of things such as "spiritual anguish" are common goals of religions. What you unanimously do not see religions teach is license. Religions have not taught people to get wasted three or four days a week (but this is what people do nowadays). Religions have nothing to say about the new issue of recreational drugs, but religious people immediately reacted against them. Conservatives tend to have similar ways of looking at life as the religious.

    Multiracialism and degeneracy are bad for humans (in the opinion of a conservative) because they are triggering on an instinctual level. They cause anxiety on an uncontrollable visceral level, making people fearful and distrustful - we all are familiar with the studies showing such bad effects of diversity. Multiracialism disturbs people's ability to find peace by making them fear for their genetic future, and there is no way around this, and so it is therefore bad.

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    So who is right? Is misery able to be reduced, and inner peace attainable, or is it irreparable brain chemistry? Is the best (only?) way to a happy society to tell lots of jokes, do lots of drugs, and "let it go" on the dancefloor?

    If misery is determined by chemistry, one might expect misery to be uniform in a country across time. However, we have seen a rise of mental illness in America. Maybe miserable people are more attractive and make more babies to spread their miserable genes....probably not.

    A countersignal to the idea that "good vibes" are the best path to happiness is the suicide of Robin Williams, which subsequently sparked a conversation about mental illness in comedians, which Stefan Molyneux covered. (I hope that is the right video.) One would think that these people would be the happiest in the world, if they key to happiness is creating good vibes!










   

Alt-Right Lessons from The United Arab Emirates

    So I was reading an economist article about Dubai's attempts at establishing world-class opera houses. The read itself was only marginally interesting, but the thing that popped out to me was the following sentence:

And in the case of Dubai, the opera house may further accelerate the emirate’s shift from commercial centre to expat hub: foreigners already make up 80% of the population.

    I had no idea that Dubai was that globalized (actually the situation is even worse, as 97% of the city is foreign-born), though I have met an Indian guy from Dubai. I decided to look into Dubai and the United Arab Emirates a little further on Wikipedia.

    The United Arab Emirates are an old set of trade centers in the Middle East. The formation of this nation only came after Britain relinquished control of the territory in 1968.  Cities like Dubai were not nearly so heavily populated until the immigration boom; Dubai only had a population of about 40,000 in 1960. Around this time is when Indians and Pakistanis began to move into Dubai. The population jumped to 58,971 by 1968, and was measured at 2,250,000 in 2014.
    The immigrants are a mix of Indians (51%), Pakistanis (16%), Bangladeshis (9%), and Filipinos (3%).  There are over 100,000 British expatriates in Dubai, making up about 5% of the total population. English is the second language of Dubai, and Hindi is also an official language.
    Despite what many people believe, Dubai does not get its wealth from oil. A great deal of the wealth is from the immigrants themselves, the wealthy classes of India, Africa, and other parts of Asia who sought to escape from the poverty and financial risk of their home countries. Oil only accounts for 5% of GDP, the bulk of GDP is high finance, tourism, service, trade, and real estate. Oil was only found in Dubai in the 1960's, well after it was an important trade hub. Dubai is around the world's 20th most expensive city, and is known for its being among the world's most luxurious cities. It has a skyline that can compete with that of any city in the world.
    The culture of the city has taken a noticeable hit. According to Wikipedia:

Due to the touristic approach of many Dubaites in the entrepreneurial sector and the high standard of living, Dubai's culture has gradually evolved towards one of luxury, opulence and lavishness with a high regard for leisure-related extravagance. Annual entertainment events such as the Dubai Shopping Festival (DSF) and Dubai Summer Surprises (DSS) attract over 4 million visitors from across the region and generate revenues in excess of $2.7 billion.

    A major reason for the opulence of UAE is actually George W. Bush. After 9/11, the Patriot Act created a vast number of money-laundering regulations to punish banks that were complicit in funding terrorism. The UAE financial system was, of course, complicit in terrorism, and investing in the USA became risky and difficult. So the Arabs began investing at home, in real estate.

    While this is true, the government does enforce Muslim culture, earning the scolding of the secular world. Women are not allowed to dress indecently in public, and calls to prayer happen five times a day. They have a firewall, except in specially protected regions in which people can search the internet freely, with the exception of Israeli internet sites.
     There are massive efforts to create social and cultural activity among the people, such as the creation of the opera house from the economist article. As a golf fan, I know of the two major events in UAE, both of which draw many of the world's best players with massive purses. They are odd to watch on television, because essentially none of the residents of UAE come out to watch golf. These people do not care about golf.
     The rest of UAE follows a similar story. Only 13% of residents of UAE are nationals, and Indians are a massive plurality.


     From what I can tell, the place is basically run by monarchs of each emirate, called emirs. The emir of Abu Dhabi is the "president," and the emir of Dubai is the "prime minister." The monarchies are hereditary.

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     So what happened to these regions? How did they let themselves become global cities? It is an important question. But let us back up and talk about how many alt-right misconceptions are challenged by the existence of the globalist UAE.

    Firstly, many on the alt-right would claim that monarchy is better suited to protect the native peoples' majority than democracy. It just feels  to people as if a monarch would want to protect his people out of pride and loyalty, or something like that. But since UAE is clearly bucking this trend (if the trend even exists), we need to examine and specify the conservatory effect of monarchy.
    It would be a good idea to control for wealth, as the one thing that separates nearly all monarchies from UAE would be monetary success.

    The second misconception of the alt-right is that Dubai will go in the shitter when the oil dries up. It will take a major hit, as the financial sector manages the wealth of the Gulf region, which is dependent on oil. But the economy is certainly complex enough to survive the drying of oil. It is clear that Dubai will fall not economically, but demographically, if it falls at all. The male-female ratio is terrible in Dubai. In 2009, there were over three times as many males as females. So if Dubai is working the system in such a way that the foreigners are not actually families, but temporary businessmen, the elite might maintain permanent control over the foreign strivers who just want to treat the country as a playground and a shopping mall.

    Back to the main question: How did UAE become so globalized? It must be the case that the monarchs sold the people out to foreigners. I do wonder if the people are upset about this, or if there is little feeling of ethnic history and identity among them in the first place.

    I believe that the monarchs sold the people out to foreigners for wealth. The particular kind of immigration in UAE is of rich people are entering this region for freedom and luxury. Even despite that, a small population is not going to be able to generate the opulence that these monarchs enjoy today. Real estate investments, in particular, are greatly helped by a massive influx of foreign people. And there has been an influx; the population has increased from 1,204,000 to 2,250,000 since 2005. Considering that Dubai is among the world's most expensive cities, I'd say that these real estate investments did pretty well.

    There are three lessons that the alt-right should take away from the story of UAE. Firstly, if my suspicions are right regarding the drive for money is, in a vacuum, enough to cause to the replacement of a people group. It makes you understand the verse "the love of money is the root of all [kinds] of evil" in a new light. Secondly, we have found that monarchy might not be as conservative as larpers think. Furthermore, if it is true that the immigration was motivated by the desire of the Arab elite class to enrich themselves, then one must wonder as to how much of America's immigration disaster is really attributable to the financial elite.
    Thirdly, we see the soullessness of the "global city" apparent in UAE. This soullessness will be America's future. UAE apes western sport and opera, things which their own residents do not care about. Nobody attends these golf tournaments in Dubai or Abu Dhabi, no matter how many players of Rory McIlroy's caliber compete. The entire point of the public spending on cultural activities is to look as classy, artistic, vibrant, and innovative as the west (and maybe to raise property values...). The reality is that none of this globalized cultural activity is real or meaningful. Diverse America is likewise heading towards an artificial culture. America apes negro culture because we are increasingly taught that this is cool, and we "observe" foreigners' holidays to look inclusive and tolerant- in colleges now, students pretend to celebrate Holi by flinging paint at one another. In fact, negro music is now almost entirely dominate the music scene, if you haven't noticed, and Holi is by far a more widely celebrated springtime holiday than Easter among college students. Our culture is becoming fake, as elaborated so annoyingly by the hipster subculture. I believe this is a result of moving from an ethic culture (which non-whites will not agree to) to a shockingly negro-centric culture of diversity that the hopelessly divided population can agree upon.

Protecting Islam, alligators, and sharks

    At the writing of this article, a Muslim man had recently killed about 50 people in an Orlando nightlub. Shortly after, an alligator killed a two-year-old boy.

    The (usually liberal) numbnuts have very predictable-and similar- reactions to both of these facts. As for alligators, they refer to such things as this Washington Post article about how alligators and sharks do not kill as many people as cows or dogs. As for the Muslim terror attack, they say things like the following:

We agree. And so do most Americans. Indeed – as we’ve previously documented – you’re more likely to die from brain-eating parasites, alcoholism, obesity, medical errors, risky sexual behavior or just about anything other than terrorism.

     They like to release pie charts about the percentage of terrorism committed by different groups, such as the following from a Princeton study:

 

They were upset right-wing extremists were not named in the graph, and

that the Latinos were bunched together. Certainly there are more right-

wing terrorists, they reason! 

   

         Of course, the obvious answer is that people have far more contact with dogs, cows, leftists, and Latinos than they do with Islamicists and alligators. But if there were as many Muslims or alligators as there are bees or whites in America, we would be looking at a different problem. We would be looking at a hostile jungle, or a country whose social situation resembles the social situation of your average Middle Eastern country. Furthermore, when one is dealing with alligators, one should be a little more careful than with dogs.

    I think that these liberals are smart enough to understand this. I think that what they are saying is that they cannot imagine such a world in which there we are overwhelmed with sharks or Muslims, so it is irrational to worry about Muslims.

    In the case of sharks, it is true that we will not be overwhelmed with them in our daily lives. But in the case of Muslims, it is entirely conceivable that certain people in certain towns or countries could get overwhelmed by Muslims. Liberals who cannot understand this need to be kindly escorted out of the helicopter. Liberals who understand this, but still insists that Muslims are no threat because of dogs and cows and Latino terrorists being worse need to be tortured and then chucked out of the helicopter.

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    Another important question is "why do these liberals avoid admitting that one animal is more dangerous than another, and that one race is more dangerous than another?" I think there is this massive emotional, psychological block they have erected to keep out all stereotypes from entering their brain. They intentionally reinforce this mental wall.
   
    Why? I think that liberals have this fear and hate of conservative people. They probably have a father or grandparent  who is a curmudgeon and who they hate. They imagine that generalization will lead to a miserable, intolerant society of assholes. So they must force a society in which all humans insist that we are all brothers. Furthermore, they hate their grumpy grandpa so much, that they want to blame everything on him. They imagine that all the world's problems are caused by grumpy, intolerant racists and bigots. Muslim terrorists are motivated by white bigots who burn their migrant shelters and be generally mean to them. So are black murderers motivated by a racist white supremacist system. Inequality is caused by classist (white) bigots such as Donald Trump, and white lower-class suicide in America is a result of this, too. Can you name a few more?
   
    The trick to beating these leftists is to shamelessly attack their emotional motivations after you make your point about an inconsistency in their beliefs, such as their support of women's rights and their pro-Muslim advocacy. Make your logos, then attack using pathos. Attack them personally, insist they are motivated by irrational hatred of conservatives, and that this clouds their judgment. Do not keep arguing the issue; the issues never mattered in the first place.
    
    If you do this, you might win. Liberals know that they are assholes. They know that they are emotionally motivated. I actually am motivated by emotion, too. So attack their motivation. Attack their roots. If you do not, and you argue the issues, they will square the circle of their inconsistent opinions, or just change a single opinion on a single issue; but they will not lose their crappy worldview. If you attack the root, you might kill the entire worldview.

Liberals at Top Colleges are not Hopeless

    I believe that students at top colleges are moving away from impassioned liberalism in droves. Furthermore, I believe they are ripe for recruitment by the alt-right. Having gone to one of these colleges for grad school, I think I have found a few reasons to believe this.
     Firstly, these universities are increasingly Asian. Asians don't give a crap about politics of any sort. They do not vote in their own countries, and they do not have opinions in America. If America goes into the shitter, they will pack up their money and go right back home to Asia. If they lose opportunity here, they will do the same. If whites in America lose our minds and go buttfuck in the streets, they do not care, because they are taught from a young age not to identify with us and our country, and more or less look down on us anyways.
    What this means for the liberals is that their moral signalling over liberal nonsense gets them so much less attention. Not only that, but many Asians will look down on them for what they see as a silly waste of time. Under the Asian way of seeing things, all activities that do not lead to money and proof of some kind of superiority are foolish. They will look at these people and think, "what a waste of time! If they were smart, they would be in the rat race for a job at a top investment bank!" This disapproval is devastation for liberals, as their activism is mostly a means of getting social approval.
    Secondly, the levels of depression, nihilism, and anxiety at these universities are very high. This is predictable to me: diversity tends to be wearing on the psyche. Our instinct is to hate to be in  compromising situations, to use every negative emotion in the book as dis-incentive to get away from them; and constant competition with other subspecies is one such compromising situation.
     The results of people being crazy depressed nihilists is good for us, because this is a psychological state that is actually conducive to new ideas. After all, if you are miserable, you probably are considering that all the ideas that you have previously heard are insufficient. You might be looking for new ideas that work for you. You furthermore will not care too much about such things as inappropriateness and craziness of certain ideas when you are a depressive nihilist. So the people at these universities are not likely to keep their liberalism, and are also likely to accept other ideas.

     So, having argued that these people theoretically might accept our beliefs for certain indirect reasons, do I actually have any direct experiences that would convince me of the same? Of course!
    The first experience was with guys at a frat I drank with once. Without me prompting them (I never bring up politics in real life), they starting talking about Trump. They mentioned that they would like to put Trump banners all over their frat house to trigger some people.
    The second experience was hearing some law students joking about safe spaces on a bus.
    The third and most powerful experience was with a liberal girl I liked. She did not like her experience at the university. She told me that she felt that people there were assholes. But then, she said she wondered if she was an asshole, as she felt that sometimes she was being intolerant of others' opinions in class discussions. (I said nothing to her, I just let her talk)
    That was shocking. I had never seen a liberal on the defensive about their beliefs. I have never seen a liberal struggle with doubt. That the liberals might be doubting is a huge gain for us.

 So take from this what you will. I personally believe that, if the alt-right provides better argument and analysis than other political outlets, we will draw some of the smartest and richest in the world. It is not them, but the moderately smart people from all-white environments who are impossible to persuade.

The sky is falling!

    One of the many things that turned me away from cuckservatism was their constant fear-mongering about the imminent fall of the economy under Democrat rule. I always was rational enough to know this is rubbish.
     I always knew, however, that immigration would be bad for me. While the American economy will not fall, it will be inherited by other people groups, which will have the same opportunity-destroying effect on me and my descendants.

Foreigners who assimilate, and foreigners who do not

    Today at work, my Indian boss tried to schedule a meeting on July 4. Some workers informed him it was a holiday, and so he rescheduled.
    A few minutes later, a Russian or Slavic worker came over to our area and started talking about football. He then excitedly informed us that he was going to a certain restaurant to get a sandwich, which he called "delicious." It reminded me of Chinese immigrants I have met, who say that American food is entirely inedible (not exaggerating).

    I felt like this was a little example of the limits of assimilation. People of other races will not assimilate into our culture, while people of our race almost certainly will, barring some kind of intense religious belief.