We could talk about how Britain got rid of birthright citizenship in the 80s, how Trump is trying to do that, and what this says about xenophobia and policy. Or we could whine that we are being insulted.
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Like, without looking this up (and without wanting to discuss this at length - right now, since I need to get to bed), but isn't the context pretty different, since in Germany, UK, France, and I'd think most European countries, you get citizenship via parental lineage automatically, while in US, no?
aug 29, 2025, 12:17 am • 0 0 • view
If by "birthright citizenship" you mean "anyone born in the country is automatically a citizen", that would strike me as an oddity in the "neighbourhood", yeah. I don't know if drawing conclusions from it being "revoked" (in the US, its a constitutional amendment, right?) to the degree of racism 2/
aug 29, 2025, 12:20 am • 0 0 • view
in a country makes a lot of sense to me... fin/3
aug 29, 2025, 12:20 am • 0 0 • view
I think most western hemisphere countries do it the same as the US. So it is not really an oddity in that neighborhood. And the UK also had this regime of citizenship before 1983. The original point I made a few months ago was that in the US there is a strong ideology of assimilation
aug 29, 2025, 12:25 am • 0 0 • view
That was kinda what I was trying to point out - that my feeling was its the norm in the Americas (but not in Europe - I was referring to the UK's neighborhood). On your other point: "strong ideology of assimilation" - I've only ever been to the US once for a couple weeks, so I don't think .. 1/2
aug 29, 2025, 8:53 am • 0 0 • view
.. I can judge, but my impression is - idk, you really have some weird things going on regarding the generic view of "races" most people have. So, I'd reiterate - I don't think comparisons are very much helpful (though discussing developments in the US and Europe is certainly interesting).
aug 29, 2025, 8:53 am • 0 0 • view
I find the idea that such comparisons are unhelpful to be strange I guess. Avoiding such comparisons for... I'm not actually sure why you would want to avoid them... It serves the purpose of stifling the conversation and limiting knowledge of how people experience the world
aug 29, 2025, 10:39 am • 0 0 • view
I think my point is that the depth you need to go to for a meaningful comparison is beyond what can regularly/sensibly achieved on a platform such as BlueSky. If I wanted to look at parallels and differences - beyond just entirely superficially - I'd need room and time to look at cases in detail 1/
aug 29, 2025, 10:50 am • 0 0 • view
which, like I said, is not really possible here. Which in turn leads me to my conclusion (that - at least here - its probably going to be more constructive to discuss issues more narrowly). Like - I think it'd be interesting to discuss differences between Europe and the US, but my feeling is 2/
aug 29, 2025, 10:50 am • 0 0 • view
we don't even share the vocabulary to do so (sensibly). fin/3
aug 29, 2025, 10:50 am • 0 0 • view
Birthright citizenship is very much an American thing, every country in the hemisphere has it except Colombia and I think the Dominican Republic, both repealing their laws because of racism.
aug 29, 2025, 12:43 am • 2 0 • view
While in Europe the degrees to which someone might be considered "unassimilable" can be more pronounced. We could talk about how many European countries came about as nationalist projects and how that relates to this. Or modern-day identity politics. Or we can feel insulted and rage about it.
aug 29, 2025, 12:25 am • 0 0 • view
US confers citizenship by parentage and by place of birth
aug 29, 2025, 12:19 am • 2 0 • view
American parent OR born in the US = citizen at birth
aug 29, 2025, 12:20 am • 1 0 • view
There's a few exceptions, in particular the American citizen parent, if naturalized, has to have lived in the US a certain time. That guy who got deported to Jamaica having never lived there fell into that loophole because his dad was in the military and deployed abroad.
aug 29, 2025, 12:44 am • 1 0 • view
But also what I want to stress is that Dov thinks having this sort of discussion is beneath him since I made an unfavorable comparison of Europe to the US
aug 29, 2025, 12:21 am • 0 0 • view