ahahaha Colin - I once wrote here that having lived for 41 years in the UK, having sworn my allegiance to the Queen to get my British passport, having voting rights and dutifully voted, married to a Brit, mother to Brits with a British Degree and teaching career - I was not deemed British. And then some here complain that it takes a long time to be integrated here in Ch. Funny isn't it?

Boston, as far as I am concerned and for all my family and friends in the UK and CH, I am both Swiss and British- and was an immigrant for most of my adult life. However, I was always totally accepted and never made to feel like one, unlike so many (I wonder why?).

Take Care,

Ah, now here I can see an excellent way forward to show a great difference between the two psychologies and it is a mental rather than a legal difference.

Theoretically in most places, if you hold citizenship of the country then you are deemed to be "........(ish)"

However for me, most people do not deem me British as I was born in South Africa and gained my British citizenship later. It is a very cultural thing. However if I turn around and mention to them that my parents where born British and had that taken away from them unwillingly by the South African government and that I was brought up in an English household with English culture and values, then they will accept me as British albeit look at me funny because of my accent.

Now for the Swiss... As I understand here you are a citizen of your canton (first or second I don't know) and thus a citizen of the Swiss Conferderation. This means that as a immigrant here, I could perhaps one day be a Swiss citizen, but I may never really be seen or accepted as a citizen of the local canton depending on how much effort I went to integrating myself and helping the locals accept me as one.

Some parts of citizenship are legal and some are just part of the heart and the mind, and not just your own.

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Living it up in Gersau.

That sounds somewhat analogous to certain friends of mine who are quite happy to be described as British, but refuse to be identified as English because, to them, British signifies citizenship, while English signifies an ethnicity which they don't share.

My OH was also born in SA of one British parent at the time of apartheid. His parents decided to leave that dreadful regime and came to the UK - only his mother had the 'funny' accent. Like you he was educated as a true English man, and was never considered an immigrant.

Freedom of speech and posters were interesting in apartheid days, weren't they?

Yes, this would be a very accurate way to put it but I think that culture is more accurate than ethnicity as there are many different ethnical peoples from the region called "England" before it even existed.

Yes, but many native born Swiss are not citizens of the cantons they live in (my girlfriend is a cizizen of ZH, but has only ever lived in TI (and her father was born in Zug), my stepsons are citizens of SG (as am I and my daughters), but they have only ever lived in ZH, and my daughters in TI (and I, as a Swiss, only in TI).

Tom

'Ethnicity' is a pretty fuzzy term, not determined entirely by genetics, nor religion, nor culture, nor history, nor nationality, but rather one's gut instinct, informed by an awful lot of myth and received wisdom.

In the end, it means whatever the speaker wants it to mean...

In some families, it becomes a wonderfully confused concept.
My grandson looks typically British, in the classical anglo-saxon way (blond, blue eyes and very pale skin) and if you asked him he would say he is English and Irish, but he has a Swiss granny. In fact he has 3 races and about 10 nationalities (if you count Scottish) in his genes over the past 3 generations, 4 different Christian faiths and Islam. Doesn't bother him much

Edit DB he is 5 years old - so no bottle swigging just yet!

you what

it should be discussed, but what people including myself find offensive with SVP propaganda is the way they talk about foreigners, like we are the beeping plague of Switzerland...their fear mongering and propaganda is too much sometimes...they are just using this to get votes, it's perfect to blame foreigners for everything since they are the perfect scape goats, which means the parties don't have to blame the Swiss themselves...since Swiss can't take criticism...

There there mate, don't worry, it is just white sock wearers.

The problem is it is often NOT discussed, as the majority do not want to associate themselves with SVP/UDC negative anti-immigrant/racist stance, so their campaigns are truly counter-productive.

Good lord who knew the chavs of today had such sophistication:
Buckfast - The Benedictine monks at Buckfast Abbey first made the tonic wine in the 1890s.

And just what is wrong with wearing white socks?

Tom

Not at all.

The SVP just brings what the others are secretly thinking out into the open (as does the LEGA)

Tom

I was born and bred here, and now been back for about 3 years - so I have a good 'feel' for what is going on. Immigration issues are discussed- but only by those who are members of SVP and Lega, or those attracted by their stance (I was going to say 'philosophy' but ...). Those who feel that their advertising and rhetoric are bordering on the xenophobic, or indeed right in it, feel so embarrassed and disgusted with it that a healthy, balanced, discussion and debate is stifled- as most people do not want to be painted with the same brush. A great pity, as there are many issues that need to be dealt with in a balanced, fair and non xenophobic manner.

Those boots look just like a military invasion- which is just stupid. Those who arrive now are either in flip-flops or posh town shoes.

OSueco- don't put all the Swiss in the same category - the majority do not approve or even object strongly, to the SVP/UDC/LEGA
rhetoric and 'advertising', me included.

Perhaps that is the case in western Switzerland, but it is certainly not the case down this end: I have colleagues and friends from several German speaking cantons, and nearly all of them are concerned by the large number of foreigners living in Switzerland. They are not, by and large, particularly xenophobic, but they worry about the future of Switzerland and Swiss identity, they worry about the education of their children in schools in which many or most of the children are non-native speakers of Swiss German, they worry about the consequences of an economic downturn, they worry about crime. All of these issues are related to immigration to some degree or other, and it isn't just the extreme right who talk about such things.

Immigration is a hot issue everywhere in Europe, and Switzerland is no exception to that. To suggest that only xenophobes and right wingers are concerned by the social and political consequences of mass immigration is unfair and incorrect.

Wow, I am probably going to repeat a bunch since I have a flood of school werk to muddle with and not read the entire, few days worth of writing thread...

It's interesting. While SBB is posting anti/immigration posters and some protest (I get their sentiments, aside of the anti immigration, which is pointless, the fact as a vignette of CH, SBB shouldn't post campaign that really puts a bad light onto the entire country. It is not over all super super racists, just that some get a lot of room to shout and tourists and people who pop in and use the trains will get mislead and will make a very unpleasant image of CH, which isn't fair to all the nice folks...)...

Anyways. I feel immigration for the sake of immigration is just a semantic co-pout. For the sake of immigration? Where, here? The most expensive country on earth people will just put a finger on a map and immigrate? Never heard of one single soul doing that. It's just way too hard. Why would inhabitants here think it is like that for foreigners who come here? It's not any easier for those than local to live here. That's what the permits are for, me thinks, for regulating, which penalizes the industries here a lot, since there aren't enough local people on par with requirements of companies who hire. That's a fact that these campaigners tend to forget.

So, immigration for the sake of it, does not exist.

Immigration, just like anywhere else in countries which proudly bear the open borders and free society/market, yes that exists, will exist and will not stop. The fact things are expensive is not because of foreigners here. It's because of the local businesses, landlords and school fees makers, who want to make cash. That kind of enteurpreneurial or whatever you spell that nasty word spirit, exists everywhere. It's their decision, and foreigners, if anything, are often being just simply ripped off.

The fact people still can't cope with the idea of Heidiland, and modern changes that are happening all over the planet...is it really the fault of the newcomers? Is it worth to use them as scape goat? One cannot enjoy the positives of open borders and still live in a biodome.

I don't get the fact that there are campaigns, who at the same time say, horrible foreign scum who only waits for our social security money, unemployment support to sponge off, and in the same sentence point out that these rich bastids foreigners (who, by the way, usually never ever get to use free school system, social security nor other social services and take care of themselves pretty expat professionally) who get taxed to pay into communal piggy banks, those rish bastids kick up the prices that poor locals have to deal with. Don't know that many who get truly hurt by the fact country is forced to outsource a lot of work force. Most of my local friends get enormous back up help with kids, with mortgage, with free apartments, with a lot of better treatment.

Out with the campaign. I am supporting anybody who works hard, no matter who it is. Whiners and people who point fingers will only get hurt by their own inability to adjust, or abused by those who purposely mislead certain population just to gain power and advantages for themselves.

By the way, did you watch Notre village a un talent, last night? Did you notice that those lovely people who competed, many of them representantives of local, deep sticks mountains were actually foreign? Lovely singing and seeing the entire village to actually cheer for their neighbors who were immigrants or immigrant's kids.

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"L'homme ne peut pas remplacer son coeur avec sa tete, ni sa tete avec ses mains." J.H. Pestalozzi

“The only difference between a rut and a grave is a matter of depth.” S.P. Cadman

"Imagination is more important than knowledge." A. Einstein