Letters: English-only crowd lacks empathy

It is clear from the deluge of letters Newsday reports receiving ["Learn English, por favor," Sept. 25] that Suffolk County residents are not connecting the dots around the issue of immigrants from Latin America.

Bringing it all home are the recent reports from the U.S. Department of Justice, criticizing Suffolk County police for not following up on complaints by Spanish-speaking immigrants; the Southern Poverty Law Center's 2009 report, "Climate of Fear," and the airing this month of the PBS documentary "Not in Our Town: Light in the Darkness."

Have we changed in our attitude toward undocumented immigrants? Clearly not, and by reactivating the "English only" argument, Suffolk County residents continue to remain fixed in their attitudes and beliefs. This argument is a smoke screen for the prejudice and discrimination that has long survived the winds of change in this county.

Spanish-speaking people I have worked with have told me how difficult it is to learn English. There are few English as a second language classes, with long waiting lists and no bus service. They tell me they work two jobs and then take care of their children when they come home. The reality is that they continue to live under the radar and are marginalized, silenced and invisible because of their treatment. This is now fact, attested to by multiple sources, including the DOJ.

Where is the love?

It is time for Newsday to stop fueling these "debates" and for the residents of our county to show some respect for the very values they insist on -- family, children and hard work -- in the immigrant community, and stop focusing on the hate.

So who is not understanding English?

Cathy Carballeira, Port Jefferson Station

Editor's note: The writer is a former president of the National Association of Puerto Rican and Hispanic Social Workers.

I very much appreciate your coverage of the news conference demanding that the Suffolk County police be more responsive to the Latino community ["Suffolk County Latinos to cops: Speak our language," News, Sept. 22].

I am hopeful that the police will continue to make every effort to do a better job of providing interpreters, teaching officers Spanish and hiring bilingual employees. But I join Amol Sinha, the director of the Suffolk County chapter of the New York Civil Liberties Union, in saying that we won't be satisfied "until we see that immigrant communities and minority populations aren't living in fear."

Donald Solar, South Setauket
 

How arrogant and self-centered we Americans have become. Yes, some of our grandparents learned to speak and understand the English language after some time in the United States. But not all of them did this. I'm sure many of us can recall someone whose parents or grandparents did not speak English. To look down on Hispanics in this light is hypocritical.

How many Americans, when visiting foreign countries, don't bother to learn even the rudiments of the local language? Then, while hollering loudly at some local who doesn't speak English, are assisted by someone who does speak English. It has been my experience while traveling in Europe to meet many multilingual people.

I understand that for some here in the good ol' US of A, the national pastime is getting fat and lazy. But maybe the rest of us can muster up the energy to learn a foreign language or at least have compassion for those who, like us, only speak one language. Then we can begin to understand and help others as our grandparents were helped when they first got here.

Ken Blais, Bay Shore