Essential reading:
Multiculturalism is not the best way to welcome people to our country
It promotes not a melting pot but a segregated society of sealed off cultures, each sticking to its own.
by Johann Hari
[...]
[Johann quotes an email he received] "My younger sisters go to Denbigh High School [in Luton] which was famous in the headlines last year because a girl pupil went to the High Court for her right to wear the jilbab [a long body-length shroud]. Shabinah [the girl who took the case] saw it as a great victory for Muslim women ... but what happened next shows this is not a victory for us.
"My sisters, and me when I was younger, could always tell our dad and uncles that we weren't allowed to wear the jilbab. Once the rules were changed, that excuse was not possible any more so my sisters have now been terrified into wearing this cumbersome and dehumanising garment all day against their wishes. Now most girls in the school do the same. They don't want to, but now they cannot resist community pressure ... I am frightened somebody is going to fight for the right to wear a burqa next and then my sisters will not even be able to show their faces."
So to multiculturalists, we have to ask: which Muslim culture do you want to preserve? The jilbab-wearing culture of Shabinah and the mullahs, or the culture of the hundreds of Muslim girls who curse them? All immigrant communities are divided and diverse; it is a form of soft racism to assume they have One Culture that should be respected at all costs.
Good stuff throughout. If you're interested in this topic it's worth looking at a couple of earlier posts on the subject:
http://impdec.blogspot.com/2005/07/ee-begum.html
http://impdec.blogspot.com/2005/07/multi-culturism-and-dangers-of.html
3 comments:
Excellent article indeed.
For example, what would you do if, in your block of flats, there was a white family where the women of the house rarely left without the patriarch's permission, and - on the very rare occasions when they did - they covered their face so only their eyes were visible? What would you do if, in the same family, there was a gay son who knew he could never tell his relatives, because he would be beaten and then ostracised from everybody he has ever known?
The answer is easy (I hope): you would be disgusted, and you would try to help them. But there is a family just like this in the building where I live, and there is only one difference - they are Asian. So I do nothing, and nor do any of the other nice liberals who live here, even though this family is as British as we are. Isn't there a word for treating people differently because of the colour of their skin?
And also this:
But it is increasingly clear that, forged with the best of intentions, multiculturalism has become a counter-productive way of welcoming people to our country. It promotes not a melting pot where we all mix together but a segregated society of sealed-off cultures, each sticking to its own.
Samuel Huntington writes about that in his "Who Are We?" (http://www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/ASIN/0684870541/qid%3D1123244471/202-5497568-2755823), contrasting the "melting pot" approach with the "salad bowl", where the ingredients do *not* mix.
Amartya Sen, Nobel-Prize winning Economist & noted thinker, looks at some of the contradictions in the use of the term "multiculturalism" (Tebbit Test and all).
Chili and Liberty
The Uses and Abuses of Multiculturalism
by Amartya Sen
TNR Online
02.18.06
[H]aving two styles or traditions co-existing side by side, without the twain meeting, must really be seen as plural monoculturalism. The vocal defense of multiculturalism that we frequently hear these days is very often nothing more than a plea for plural monoculturalism. If a young girl in a conservative immigrant family wants to go out on a date with an English boy, that would certainly be a multicultural initiative.
In contrast, the attempt by her guardians to stop her from doing this (a common enough occurrence) is hardly a multicultural move, since it seeks to keep the cultures separate. And yet it is the parents' prohibition, which contributes to plural monoculturalism, that seems to garner the loudest and most vocal defense from alleged multiculturalists, on the ground of the importance of honoring traditional cultures - as if the cultural freedom of the young woman were of no relevance whatever, and as if the distinct cultures must somehow remain in secluded boxes.
Being born in a particular social background is not in itself an exercise of cultural liberty, since it is not an act of choice. In contrast, the decision to stay firmly within the traditional mode would be an exercise of freedom, if the choice were made after considering other altenatives. In the same way, a decision to move away--by a little or a lot--from the standard behavior pattern, arrived at after reflection and reasoning, would also qualify as such an exercise.
Indeed, cultural freedom can frequently clash with cultural conservatism, and if multiculturalism is defended in the name of cultural freedom, then it can hardly be seen as demanding unwavering and unqualified support for staying steadfastly within one's inherited cultural tradition.
What do people think of this? For me, the most interesting question is whether the statement is true or not.
Rod Liddle accused of racism for blog
Telegraph
07 Dec 2009
Rod Liddle, the journalist and magazine columnist, has been accused of racism after suggesting in a blog that young African-Caribbean men were responsible for most of the crime in London. Mr Liddle, referring to the case where two teenage rappers tried to murder a pregnant 15-year-old, described the perpetrators as "human filth" before adding "It could be an anomaly, of course. But it isn't."
In the blog for The Spectator, he then says: "The overwhelming majority of street crime, knife crime, gun crime, robbery and crimes of sexual violence in London is carried out by young men from the African-Caribbean community. "Of course, in return, we have rap music, goat curry and a far more vibrant and diverse understanding of cultures which were once alien to us. For which, many thanks."
His comments have prompted a backlash from MPs and anti-racism campaigners alike.
...
Mr Liddle has defended the blog, arguing that it was not racist but rather an issue of "multiculturalism". "There is an important argument to be had about crime levels in London, Manchester and Birmingham which are down to culture. It is nothing to do with race," he told the newspaper.
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