Monday, March 24, 2014

I noticed this too

Robert Stacy McCain heard the Malaysian Prime Minister announce the loss of their flight, but the other interesting thing to me and to him was his perfect English.


  "Yes, I know the big headline is about the lost flight — “It is therefore with deep sadness and regret that I must inform you that, according to this new data, flight MH370 ended in the southern Indian Ocean” — but watching it live on TV, what struck me is that Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak delivered his press conference in such wonderfully fluent English. Razak spoke rather slowly, but quite clearly, and with only the slightest hint of an accent.
This was a triumph of the global Anglosphere. Anyone who speaks English worldwide — in Australia, New Zealand, the United States, Canada, Great Britain, South Africa or wherever — could have understood every word by the Prime Minister of Malaysia, as much as if it had been the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom speaking.
Could someone please explain, then, why it is considered xenophobic bigotry for us to expect immigrants to learn English? All over the world, English is recognized as the language of commerce and prosperity. "

From personal experience, I've found that you can't go anywhere in western Europe and not easily find someone basically fluent in our language.  I once heard two Swedes, in a restaurant in their capital Stockholm, order their food in English, even though both they and their waiter were natives.  After that I realized that the French were correct to be afraid of the encroachment of English into their language and culture.  It's everywhere.

2 comments:

  1. There you go again (to quote Pres. Reagan, who liked to say that).

    You're trying to apply a modicum of logic to the progressive agenda.

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    Replies
    1. I hear President Reagan was quite the fluent English speaker!

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