James Newton, Host wrote:
> Should he take the time to learn to speak better English? Just so he can
> share what he has done with foreign peoples? Or should he concentrate on
> writing more in his native tounge and hope that someone will take the
> time to correct his English and send the updates to him?

If other people want his stuff badly enough, they will translate it.  In the
end though, his work won't get the exposure it would if it were written in
english.  That's not predjudice, just the way things are.  It's a simple
fact that there are a lot more technical people that can speak english well
enough than Japanese well enough.

> I guess my point is this: Why complain about people who come with their
> hand out and do not speak English well?

Actually I wasn't complaining about them.  I only mentioned that I don't
subscribe to some Microchip topics that have a large fraction of hard to
understand posts.  Someone else took offense to that.  The reason some of
these posts are hard to understand is because the poster write english
poorly.  I wasn't passing judgement on these posters, but the reality is
that these posts are difficult and annoying to read, so I turn off the
forums where they are more likely.  Yes, I think some people that are really
bad at the language are essentially rude by posting, but that's my opinion
and I've never told anyone they shouldn't post because of that.  However I
have every right to decide what I want to read and not read on my own time.

> Saying something negative about an ESL (English as a Second Language)
> speaker shows that we are unable to see things from any point of view
> other than our own and implies that we have no respect for that
> language and people.

It has nothing to do with respect.  Badly written posts, for whatever
reason, are difficult and annoying to read.  One possible reason can be not
knowing the language.  Chosing not to read the posts or avoid a particularly
high occurrence of them is just reality.  It's the way the world works.

Most foriegners are actually not so bad at posting in english.  The
occasional wrong tense or unusual usage of a word are easy enough to
overlook.  Of all the posters on the PIClist, I can only think of two I find
difficult.  One of them has interesting things to say, so I try to sortof
follow his posts anyway.  The other is a waste of time and I hit delete
pretty quickly.

> Nothing needs to be said. My mother taught me: "If
> you can't say something nice, don't say anything"

That's real PC, but neither realistic nor effective.  Sometimes a person is
not aware how his actions are peceived by others, and explaining it is doing
him a favor even if he thinks you're a jerk because of it.  However I don't
think bad english posts fall into this catagory since it's not something
that the person can fix readily and he's probably well aware of it.


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