[Newsbot]

Title: Canadian immigrants unprepared for election: poll
Category: Political
Posted By: WDHIII
Date: 2008-10-08 08:04:27
Canadian

[robmik43]

Whine, whine, whine...don't bloody well vote then
you assholes. When you do take your entitled
full three hours off work to vote, you pretty well
all vote Liberal anyway, like Noorani and his
buddies tell you, so we know you know Jack Squat
about Canada....Just enough to pass our easy
"citizenship test"...what a farce.

[Brenda]

I have a REAL big issue with this topic...

IMMIGRANTS are not allowed to vote. CITIZENS are. Once you become a citizen, you are not an immigrant anymore, or there is no use to take on citizenship...

[Reverend Blair]

Immigrants may become citizens, Brenda, but they are still immigrants.

[scarecrowe]

2/3 of the electorate is unprepared to vote.

[Brenda]

Reverend Blair Reverend Blair:

Immigrants may become citizens, Brenda, but they are still immigrants.

Why?

The moment an immigrant becomes a citizen, he/she has exactly the same rights and laws to obey as any Canadian born. So there is (or should be) no difference anymore.
Why become a citizen if you stay an immigrant anyway?

[Reverend Blair]

Why? Because an immigrant is somebody who moves someplace from elsewhere. It has nothing to do with rights, it has to do with place of origin. My great grandparents were always immigrants, even though they became citizens shortly after landing. Were I to move to Fiji, I would always be an immigrant.

The reason it's important to recognize immigrants in Canada is precisely because they sometimes face challenges the rest of us don't. The voting thing is a good example of that. They become eligible, but aren't used to our system. They may come from places where there is no voting, or where voting the wrong way can land you in jail or get you killed. So it's not a matter of restricting their rights, it's a matter of helping them to exercise those rights.

[Brenda]

They have 3 years for that. You can't become a citizen earlier than 3 years after you land as PR.
So 2 years for me to go, Monday. Unless I leave the country for more than a day

In case you forgot, I am an immigrant. But once I become a citizen, I will not qualify myself as immigrant. The official question I get on applications is not "are you an immigrant" but "are you a Canadian Citizen".