Houston: Anglos are now a minority

[SkyPiggie 0]

News:

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Hispanics exceed Anglos in Harris County

In a powerful sign of the region's growing diversity, more Hispanics than Anglos now live in Harris County as it led the nation in growth of minority residents, according to Census Bureau estimates to be released today.

The minority population in the county is 2.5 million as of July 2006, or 63 percent of the total 3.9 million residents. In 2005, the county's population was 3.7 million.

There were an estimated 1.48 million Hispanics in Harris County in July 2006, or 38.2 percent of the county's total. That exceeded, for the first time, the county's estimated 1.44 million Anglo residents, who make up 36.9 percent of the population...

Full story: http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/front/5039230.html

A correction is needed to this statement:

"The minority population in the county is 2.5 million as of July 2006, or 63 percent of the total 3.9 million residents."

It should now read:

"The minority population in the county is now the majority, and from now on, Anglo white people will be the new minority."

[Nightingale 0]

Part of this is the way minorities are traditionally counted. It's called "hypodescent" and means that if someone has some minority blood (usually 1/8th or more), they're classified as minority. So, if your great-grandmother was mexican and everybody else in your family was white, you'd have been classified as mexican because of that 1/8th. While the policy isn't official anymore (in most states), it's influenced the way we classify ourselves, and also, there are benefits from claiming minority status, such as scholarships, affirmative action, etc....

In the last 20 years or so, we've had a lot more mixed race children born than before, and they're probably classified as minority on the census, even though they're actually mixed race.

[kelpdiver 2]

I think that is over complicating things. In Texas, and California, hispanic populations are growing. White populations are closer to static. Terms like majority and minority will continue to get cloudy.

[Nightingale 0]

Well, an important thing to consider is that whites are having children with minorities, and those children are usually classified as minority, not white. It's a flaw in the way they look at the numbers. Yes, minorities are reproducing more and faster than whites, but the margin is probably not quite as great as studies want us to believe.

However, I don't really see why people care about whether there's more people of other races.

[billvon 2,397]

> I think that is over complicating things. . . .

. . . and making up sort of silly divisions. Hispanics are white.

This happens with some frequency. In 1751 Benjamin Franklin wrote this:

"Why should the palatine Boors be suffered to swarm into our settlements and, by herding together, establish their language and manners to the exclusion of ours? . . . Why should Pennsylvania, founded by the English, become a Colony of Aliens, who will shortly be so numerous as to [alienate] us instead of our Anglifying them, and will never adopt our Language or Customs, any more than they can acquire our Complexion?"

Was he talking about hispanics? Blacks? Asians? Nope, he was talking about germans.

"Germans?" I can hear people say. "That's silly! They're white, and they have no problems learning our language and customs!" We will say the same of hispanics in 50 years.

[Richards 0]

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> I think that is over complicating things. . . .

. . . and making up sort of silly divisions. Hispanics are white.

This happens with some frequency. In 1751 Benjamin Franklin wrote this:

"Why should the palatine Boors be suffered to swarm into our settlements and, by herding together, establish their language and manners to the exclusion of ours? . . . Why should Pennsylvania, founded by the English, become a Colony of Aliens, who will shortly be so numerous as to [alienate] us instead of our Anglifying them, and will never adopt our Language or Customs, any more than they can acquire our Complexion?"

Was he talking about hispanics? Blacks? Asians? Nope, he was talking about germans.

"Germans?" I can hear people say. "That's silly! They're white, and they have no problems learning our language and customs!" We will say the same of hispanics in 50 years.

I think much of the culture clash would be avoided if there was an attempt to diversify the intake. In the case of germans I suspect that it was not predominately germans but europeans of all descent (I could be wrong). If the majority of immigrants to a region are from one nation, then there will be assimilation difficulties (language, culture..etc), which will lead to more friction. If a new immigrant is not amongst numerous people from his/her homeland but rather amongst 4th generation americans and immigrants from a variety of places he/she will be more likely to assimilate and become an american than if he/she can move to little italy, chinatown, ...etc.

My biggest handicap is that sometimes the hole in the front of my head operates a tad bit faster than the grey matter contained within.

[warpedskydiver 0]

whites are also a minority in Crook County, Illinoistan.

55% non-white and the crime just keeps getting worse.

We had a triple murder that was gang related one mile from where I live, and only 4 blocks from my younger brother and his family.

But my brothers neighborhood is improving, they have not had a double murder in front of his house for two years now.

[billvon 2,397]

>In the case of germans I suspect that it was not predominately
>germans but europeans of all descent (I could be wrong.)

It was specifically the Pennsylvania germans (often mislabeled as Pennsylvania dutch) that aroused such ire in Franklin, mainly because of their lack of effort to assimilate. Another quote is shown below, in which he laments precisely what many lament about hispanics. As you mention, Franklin's ire was also aroused because they were coming in in such large numbers, and this made assimilation tougher. They were the hispanics of the day - it took a while before they were as american as anyone else.

When my grandmother came to the US, she was the horrible outsider who didn't want to fit in. "Irish need not apply" read the ads in the paper. They were, after all, lazy drunkards who relied on crime to feed their slothful habits, ate completely different food, had funny accents - and my grandmother's first tongue was gaelic!. But they were assimilated as well, and if I tried to claim that I was a minority because I'm half irish people would laugh at me.

Today the big influx is hispanic, and they are the ones who are going to destroy the US. I don't think they will do so any more than the germans or the irish did. Indeed, I think such new blood is one of the things that periodically refreshes the US and keeps it from getting into a cultural rut.

That being said, it also makes sense to figure out how to better assimilate people who are entering. History shows that that involves us changing as much as it does them. We didn't erase irish culture and force them to assimilate, and indeed irish bars are nowadays part of our culture, as is german beer, the frankfurter (with sauerkraut!) and the hamburger. Heck, just about every american has at one point drank the beer created by german brewers and named after a czech town. Are we worse off today because we drink budweiser? Would we have been better off if Adolphus Busch had stuck to the american tradition of distilling whiskey, instead of refusing to assimilate and brewing beer?

In the future there will be a lot of hispanic influence in our music, food, drink, and culture. And someone 50 years from now will think tacos, enchiladas and margaritas are as american as, well, budweiser. To make that happen sooner, both 'sides' have to accept the other's influence and different ways of doing things. Once that happens, people will start to forget that there are sides, and that hispanic is different from anglo.


(Franklin quote)
---------
Few of their children in the Country learn English; they import many Books from Germany; and of the six printing houses in the Province, two are entirely German, two half German half English, and but two entirely English; They have one German News-paper, and one half German. Advertisements intended to be general are now printed in Dutch and English; the Signs in our Streets have inscriptions in both languages, and in some places only German: They begin of late to make all their Bonds nad other legal Writings in their own Language, which (though I think it ought not to be) are allowed good in our Courts, where the German Business so encreases that there is continual need of Interpreters; and I suppose in a few years they will be also necessary in the Assembly, to tell one half of our Legislators what the other half say; In short unless the stream of their importation could be turned from this to other colonies, as you very judiciously propose, they will soon so out number us, that all the advantages we have will not in My Opinion be able to preserve our language, and even our Government will become precarious.
-------------

[Richards 0]

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When my grandmother came to the US, she was the horrible outsider who didn't want to fit in. "Irish need not apply" read the ads in the paper. They were, after all, lazy drunkards who relied on crime to feed their slothful habits, ate completely different food, had funny accents - and my grandmother's first tongue was gaelic!. But they were assimilated as well, and if I tried to claim that I was a minority because I'm half irish people would laugh at me.

Today the big influx is hispanic, and they are the ones who are going to destroy the US. I don't think they will do so any more than the germans or the irish did. Indeed, I think such new blood is one of the things that periodically refreshes the US and keeps it from getting into a cultural rut.

That being said, it also makes sense to figure out how to better assimilate people who are entering. History shows that that involves us changing as much as it does them. We didn't erase irish culture and force them to assimilate, and indeed irish bars are nowadays part of our culture, as is german beer, the frankfurter (with sauerkraut!) and the hamburger. Heck, just about every american has at one point drank the beer created by german brewers and named after a czech town. Are we worse off today because we drink budweiser? Would we have been better off if Adolphus Busch had stuck to the american tradition of distilling whiskey, instead of refusing to assimilate and brewing beer?

I think you misunderstood the meaning of my message. I do not in any way think that any one group will be bad for society (nor do I think that muslims will bring terrorism). In fact my own wife is mexican and I am quite fond of latin culture. I realise that with newcomers we have cultural additions to our society and this contributes to our long term well being.

My point was that any group that comes in large numbers will assimilate slower than groups who come as one small part of the immigration intake. For example here in Canada, 75% of our immigration intake comes from China, India and Pakistan. Many Canadians are open to newcomers but it is natural for newcomers to stick to their own if they can (I imagine if large numbers of Canadians immigrated to India they would cling). This does not help matters. There are schools in toronto and vancouver that are so heavily populated with Chinese or indian immigrants that they are failing to learn the language fast enough to succeed in our english based education system and our ESL system cannot accomodate this. This is why when english canadians go to french imersion they are forbidden from speaking english, because it is critical that you have to not just practice the language in a classroom but rather make it your lifestyle to communicate. This is also why non-bilingual RCMP officers are not only given french language training, but sent to spend some time in quebec so they are forced to become familiar with french. If a chinese immigrant is at elementary school and the other 10 immigrants each come from other backgrounds (german, thai, russian, pakistani..etc) he and they are forced to become familiar with the language quicker since they will have nobody to talk to otherwise. The way it works here is that the chinese immigrants hang with the chinese, the indians with the indians, the pakistanis with the pakistanis and all three groups do not mingle with the canadian kids. Subsequently outside of the classroom (and in their ethnic enclave) they are immersed in their own language and have no english reinforcement. As a result they do poorly in english (and in courses that are taught in english) and cannot get the grades to get into university. This perpetuates the cycle of immigrant poverty in the immigrant enclaves and further fuels resentment amongst them towards us and adds to the division amngst cultures. We can make quotas to get a certain amount of them in university even if they lack the english skills but again we are now simply passing the problem along the line and now they will face challenges there. It is the great "unsaid truth" amongst university ESL instructors. They all know it but cannot say it officially.

We will do a lot to speed up the process of assimilation if for each chinese guy (or in the case of the US for each mexican guy) there is one japanese, one russian, one welsh, one thai, one australian, one jamaican...etc.

It has nothing to do with resenting outsiders, and each of these groups can still market parts of their culture as Adolph Busch did. They do not have to come in a homogeneus wave, but in a mixed bundle. You can still derive the benefits of outside ideas without the major culture clash and the inevitable language gaps.

My biggest handicap is that sometimes the hole in the front of my head operates a tad bit faster than the grey matter contained within.

[kelpdiver 2]

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Well, an important thing to consider is that whites are having children with minorities, and those children are usually classified as minority, not white. It's a flaw in the way they look at the numbers.

Aren't most of these polls self selecting? That is, the people decide is they want to be White (as many Hispanics will choose), Black, or the likely growing category of Other? Some feel a need to be "White," others feel proud to be "X" instead.

So I don't think it's just the inconsistency of the census takers.

[Nightingale 0]

Many are self selecting, but there is more tangible incentive to self-identify as minority (scholarships, affirmative action, part of a group, etc...) than as white. There was a study done (I will try to track it down.... it was from my anthro class) that said that people with one white parent and one minority, if asked to pick a race, will choose that of the minority parent. The study, at least the part I read, didn't go into why... my guess is the factors above, as well as that minority features such as skin color and hair color tend to be more dominant.

[billvon 2,397]

>My point was that any group that comes in large numbers will assimilate
>slower than groups who come as one small part of the immigration intake.

I think that's true, but immigration waves _do_ come in masses. The potato famine drove much of the irish immigration, for example - and the people who came in were larger as a percentage (although smaller in absolute numbers) than hispanic immigrants are today. Heck, in 1890, 14.8% of americans were immigrants who were not born here; in 2000 it was 11.2%. We have a ways to go before we are as 'foreign' as we were in 1890.

Or take Houston. While people who self-identify as hispanic are around 38%, the numbers I've seen for hispanic immigrants in Houston (legal or not) run around 10-15%. Compare that to irish in NY over the 1840's - over 25% of NYC's population were recent irish immigrants. Germans numbered over 15%.

>We will do a lot to speed up the process of assimilation if for each
>chinese guy (or in the case of the US for each mexican guy) there is one
>japanese, one russian, one welsh, one thai, one australian, one
>jamaican...etc.

I can see the logic in that, but unfortunately that's not how immigrants come to the US. They come in big waves - the british, the irish, the germans, the chinese, the hispanics etc. There are dark blots on our history from our attempts to prevent these waves of immigration from coming, such as the Chinese Exclusion Act. While perhaps well-intentioned, it institutionalized racism toward chinese and ironically _prevented_ the very assimilation that we all hope will happen to immigrants.

So I guess my point is that we've had this happen before, and not only has it worked out OK, it's made us what we are today. So all in all I'm not too worried about any "hispanic invasion." We've seen worse.

Would it be better if they came in more gradually? Probably. But overall I think erring on the side of letting too many people in rather than too few works out best for both the immigrants and the future US they will shape.

[wmw999 2,121]

Houston, in particular, has a long-standing survey done of is people. Been done every year for over 26 years, using the same methodology for the whole time, and similar questions. It's a good way to see how the makeup of Houston is changing, and how its people's perception of themselves is changing.

http://www.houstonareasurvey.org/

Wendy W.

There is nothing more dangerous than breaking a basic safety rule and getting away with it. It removes fear of the consequences and builds false confidence. (tbrown)

[crwtom 0]

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I think that is over complicating things. In Texas, and California, hispanic populations are growing. White populations are closer to static. Terms like majority and minority will continue to get cloudy.

Look at how much US Census is struggling with definitions to see
how "cloudy" this can get. As already mentioned Hispanic is not a
race but an ethnicity. Most, but not all, are white - there are about
1.7 Mio black hispanics in the US, for example.

How many ethnicities are there according to US Census? Two:
Hispanic and not-Hispanic. Also someone from Spain can claim this
minority status but not someone from Italy - two totally comparable
countries.

But with xenophobia on the rise again in the US who knows -
perhaps they will reintroduce the old "Mulatto" category used in
previous censuses (censi?).

The 2000 the US Census allowed several race declarations, and
about 7Mio declared themselves as mixed - not counting the
"Other" category which will be abolished in 2010.

I suppose in future year Census will have to allow percentage
declarations beyond the check marks, at which
point this all becomes a ridiculous exercise.


Cheers, T

*******************************************************************
Fear causes hesitation, and hesitation will cause your worst fears to come true

[rehmwa 2]

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I suppose in future year Census will have to allow percentage declarations beyond the check marks, at which point this all becomes a ridiculous exercise.

Perhaps, but they'll try to do that long before they give up asking the pointless question altogether. The PC thugs will insist.

...
Driving is a one dimensional activity - a monkey can do it - being proud of your driving abilities is like being proud of being able to put on pants

[kelpdiver 2]

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Would it be better if they came in more gradually? Probably. But overall I think erring on the side of letting too many people in rather than too few works out best for both the immigrants and the future US they will shape.

Waves worked a little better when there was still a frontier. We don't anymore, and most of our infrastructure is past full capacity.

[JohnRich 4]

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"Germans?" I can hear people say. "That's silly! They're white, and they have no problems learning our language and customs!" We will say the same of hispanics in 50 years.

The problem is that the Hispanic immigrants are NOT bothering to learn our language and customs - they have no interest in assimilating.

Instead, everyone caters to them in their own language, such as spanish language newspapers, radio and TV stations, bi-lingual signs and restaurant menus, bilingual school classes, even spanish billboards. They have no motivation to assimilate, because we're making it easy for them not to have to.

Furthermore, there are many that see this as taking back their former land, in a re-conquest.

And a nation divided by language and customs, is a nation that is dysfunctional.

[kelpdiver 2]

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Instead, everyone caters to them in their own language, such as spanish language newspapers, radio and TV stations, bi-lingual signs and restaurant menus, bilingual school classes, even spanish billboards. They have no motivation to assimilate, because we're making it easy for them not to have to.

And how is that different? Ever been to Little Saigon (there's now more than the one in Garden Grove)? We have newspapers available in every language on the planet - freedom of the press is good.

When I'm in foreign countries (esp Asia), I'm happy to see an English menu, or at least something with pictures.

I believe the financial motivations are strong enough that Hispanic immigrants will be pushing their children, if not themselves, to learn English and as Bill suggests, the problem will fade away. If, otoh, states like CA and Texas become majority Hispanic, there could be a drive towards dual language which would not be so beneficial to the nation. Or instead we may find ourselfs in a legal version of apartheid where the majority population enjoys a very small portion of the wealth.

[billvon 2,397]

>Waves worked a little better when there was still a frontier.

Not sure I agree with that. There are no more territories, but look at Alaska - there is a whole lot of nothing up there. Heck, look at Nevada or Montana. Much of the romance is gone, and land isn't free, but there's a whole lot of cheap land in the middle of nowhere available for people who want it.

If anything, the paradigm has changed. You can't homestead a farm or cattle ranch and make money any more. That limits people in what they can do when they're starting out. Flipping burgers has replaced milking cows as a "way in" to the employment marketplace, and that has to happen in a population center. That's the natural result of a switch from an agrarian to a service-oriented society.

[billvon 2,397]

>The problem is that the Hispanic immigrants are NOT bothering to
>learn our language and customs - they have no interest in assimilating.

That is EXACTLY what Frankin was complaining about with the Pennsylvania Dutch. In the end, though, they assimilated to some degree and kept their own customs/languages to some degree (Budweiser, frankfurter, hamburger.) Are we worse off today because our most popular foods and drinks are the result of germans refusing to assimilate? On the whole, I'd say we're better off.

>And a nation divided by language and customs . . .

. . . is America. And it's one of the reasons we have been as successful as we have been.

[kelpdiver 2]

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>Waves worked a little better when there was still a frontier.

Not sure I agree with that. There are no more territories, but look at Alaska - there is a whole lot of nothing up there. Heck, look at Nevada or Montana. Much of the romance is gone, and land isn't free, but there's a whole lot of cheap land in the middle of nowhere available for people who want it.

No one wants cheap land in the middle of Nevada. Or tundra in the middle of Alaska. That's not economical for homesteading, or for even merely existing. So the only place for 3M ethnic minorities to go to are the cities, and ideally just a couple of them so they can have a familiar enclave of langauge and culture. What city can support that rapid a growth? Maybe Las Vegas. Certainly not San Diego or anywhere in the SoCal basin. Not the Bay Area (too expensive for immigrants anyway).

[Snowflake 0]

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here are no more territories

Yes there are. The most important, The most resource rich territory is still waiting for humans. The bitch is building an infrastructure to get there, and the vision to actually do it.

[billvon 2,397]

>No one wants cheap land in the middle of Nevada. Or tundra in the middle
>of Alaska.

. . . or in the middle of Montana. Not because it's not arable - there's still plenty of land near rivers in the forests of Arizona and Montana, and both of those places are more conducive to farming than, say, El Centro, which is an arid desert that's become a big farming community, and has no natural water supply. Heck, they raise CATFISH there!

Like I said, what has changed is society. We used to be a nation of small farms, now we're a nation of malls. The move from agrarian to service economy has resulted in people needing to live near population centers in order to have jobs. (With some exceptions - farms still need labor.)

>What city can support that rapid a growth? Maybe Las Vegas. Certainly not
>San Diego or anywhere in the SoCal basin. Not the Bay Area (too
>expensive for immigrants anyway).

47% of LA (almost 4.7 million people) are hispanic. An estimated 1 million are illegal immigrants. So that's a city that has supported such an increase, and can certainly continue to do so at a replacement rate.

I am of the opinion that we should stop illegal immigration both by better enforcement of border/employer laws and by making it easier for people to immigrate legally. But I also don't think that the immigration wave we're seeing now is going to harm us any more than the german dutch did over a century ago.

[kelpdiver 2]

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47% of LA (almost 4.7 million people) are hispanic. An estimated 1 million are illegal immigrants. So that's a city that has supported such an increase, and can certainly continue to do so at a replacement rate.

I don't see how you can make that conclusion. LA is not working very well, as seen by traffic, pollution, and it's reliance on a water supply that really depended on the other cities along the Colorado River not using 'their fair share.' Infrastructure is past the 100% capacity point. That's why I live up north where it's probably only in the high 90s.

Mexico City supports what, 25M people. But not very well, either. The 'racist' Zero Growth wing of the Sierra Club is correct.

[billvon 2,397]

>LA is not working very well . . .

LA has its problems (as do many other cities.) But employment is growing slowly, pollution problems are getting better (not worse) and LA still has enough water that every house, business and store can have a green lawn out front. Traffic is quite bad, but new roads are being built and more mass transit is going in (although people are fighting that tooth and nail.)

That's not to say it's a great city (I don't like it) but it can hardly be said to be "not working."

Compare that to Detroit, an area not seeing much immigration at all. Which city is doing better by most standards?