Wonder Gem PigtailsOfDoom wrote:
That really sucks Maz, I hope the process of getting things fixed is relatively painless.
@Kali: If both parents are bi or multilingual, the choices do become more difficult. I would say that teaching your children English and then maybe one of the more obscure languages the two of you know would be a good option. English is currently the language of business, and it's widely used across Europe (duh, why am I telling a European this? lol), so it would definitely be a good investment for people to learn. That said, teaching a child an obscure language that not a lot of people know is cool, but how useful is it going to be? Are you going to use it enough that you will both retain that language? Also look at your motivation for teaching your children multiple languages at an early age. Is it for nerd cred? Or are you doing it to give them an edge in life and for the practicality of it?
Yeah, I won't raise my children in Dutch/Gujarati even if I could, that much is clear. I just wish that I'd been brought up in German/Russian or something, and I know a few people who have only been brought up in the country's language and not their parents' other language(s), and don't think it's good.
I would teach them the other languages later on (and before they're ~12 or so) if it makes some sense, but not from the start. I also might end up having them take Arabic lessons should it become relevant. I personally wish I'd gotten them as a child when I wanted to; similarly I'll give my children the opportunity to learn the languages they fancy if they express a strong interest and don't start a new one every few months.
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As far as religion stuffs go, I obviously can't speak for Europe, but there are plenty of Christian sects here in the US that believe that others are wrong and that they're going to hell because they aren't the "right" kind of Christian. Baptists are notorious for this (J was raised Baptist, but he's more agnostic now than anything), and most of Christendom is guilty of thinking this way about Mormons because they're "different." What's stupid is that as far as I can tell, there isn't that much difference between the different Christian sects. A lot of the more modern Christian sects believe in a more personal relationship with God, where as Catholics and Episcopalians like to have their priests as middle men via confession. I think the only real difference is that Christians don't hate each other enough to kill each other the way the two different Muslim sects do.
The funny thing is that the only somewhat significant Muslim sect that has vastly different customs in reality (Sufis) is the one not involved in any wars. The Sunni vs Shia conflicts are mostly about which family has power; In Bahrain it gives the royal family an opportunity to a) suppress the masses and b) receive powerful allies with Saudi Arabia and UAE, for example, when the actual religious conflict is really not all that relevant. It's of course always been like that with religious wars, the motives tend to be related to something completely secular.
It's of course not as simple as that but a lot of the stuff going on is totally against Sharia in my opinion and these people really don't have that much credibility when you try to base their actions on scripture.
In Europe there's not much conflict because no one really cares about any religion at all. Most European countries have a strict policy of either ignoring that people want to live out their beliefs at all, or "respecting everyone" for the sake of public image and political correctness.
This all gets to be a bit different when you notice the Libertas/Freedom parties that have started cropping up everywhere and seem to have virtually no policy beyond some very broad undifferentiated Islamophobia. Bleh.
Edit: re: names
I agree they shouldn't be translated. Actually on a similar note to the children thing, I've been trying hard to think of a name I could give a child that could be pronounced by my parents and wouldn't end up completely ridiculous sounding in whichever country I'd potentially raise children in. Meh.
Although the Dutch version of Harry Potter is totally lulzy.
Edited, Jul 23rd 2011 6:13am by Kalivha