I have seen variations on this online for a long time, and this has always baffled me: do strangers in America really go up to random people who are speaking foreign languages and tell them “you are in X, speak Xese”, a language they may or may not speak? Even among people who share their native language?
When I was a kid my mother’s boyfriend bragged of doing exactly this. He heard them having a conversation in another language at a gas station, approached them, and started speaking to them in German. When they were confused he allegedly said exactly the phrase. You are in America, speak English. He thought it was hysterical.
He may have been full of shit, but the fact that he felt it worth bragging about said enough about him.
I saw it twice that I can remember in person in my ~30 years growing up and living in the US. Can’t speak for the last decade as I’ve only spent a couple weeks in the US in that time to see family.
I have seen variations on this online for a long time, and this has always baffled me: do strangers in America really go up to random people who are speaking foreign languages and tell them “you are in X, speak Xese”, a language they may or may not speak? Even among people who share their native language?
Yeah there’s a segment of arrogant racist halfwit conservatives that get a superiority kick out of demeaning people for stuff like that.
When I was a kid my mother’s boyfriend bragged of doing exactly this. He heard them having a conversation in another language at a gas station, approached them, and started speaking to them in German. When they were confused he allegedly said exactly the phrase. You are in America, speak English. He thought it was hysterical.
He may have been full of shit, but the fact that he felt it worth bragging about said enough about him.
I saw it twice that I can remember in person in my ~30 years growing up and living in the US. Can’t speak for the last decade as I’ve only spent a couple weeks in the US in that time to see family.
Sadly, but also a bit humorously, yes.
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