Posted by Tina
Many leaders in the free world have come to the conclusion that multicultural practices within their countries have been an absolute failure. Rather than bringing citizens together under a shared national identity, distinct races and cultures remain segregated. French President Nicholas Sarkozy is the latest to speak out on the issue:
“Multiculturalism has failed, says French president” – AFP
“Of course we must all respect differences, but we do not want… a society where communities coexist side by side. If you come to France, you accept to melt into a single community, which is the national community, and if you do not want to accept that, you cannot be welcome in France,” the right-wing president said.
Mr. Sarkozy’s remarks follow those made by British Prime Minister David Cameron, German Chancellor Angela Merkel, ex-prime minister John Howard of Australia and Spanish ex-premier Jose Maria Aznar. Home grown extremism is the most obvious and troublesome problem that these countries face but there are other problems, like gang wars and school yard bullying that result from separate identity enclaves. PM Cameron stressed a need to promote a strong national identity with equal rights, the rule of law, freedom of speech and democracy become the focus.
This realization was bound to come as the number of attacks and foiled attacks increased but the pressures to include culturally different sets of rules and religious practices for separate groups have caused tensions that are threatening to tear the nations apart.
I would think that educational programs should be implemented with a strong emphasis on national identity and clearly, there is a need for immigration policies that weed out applicants that have no intention of assimilating.
Sarkozy: “We have been too concerned about the identity of the person who was arriving and not enough about the identity of the country that was receiving him.”
What do you mean by “multiculturalism? What do you mean by “assimilating?”
These are terms with a lot of baggage and a lot of different meanings, and it’s important to be specific when bringing up this issue.
When I think of “multiculturalism,” I think of diverse cultures coming together as one, sharing their unique contributions, learning from each other, and building a new kind of community. At it’s best, this is exactly what America is, and I am positive you’re not against it.
What you are against is segregation, which is a very large problem in Europe and here. A good example of this would be England’s sharia courts, which give Muslims a way to resolve small legal disputes without going through the regular British court system. I don’t know much about how these courts are run or if their decisions are usually good or not, but they simply shouldn’t be legally binding under British law. They promote a segregation of the Muslim community from the community at large, and that is not good for the nation or its citizens, Muslim or otherwise.
A smaller-scale version of segregation would be the kind we see here in the Valley. Some days, half of the people who come through my checkout line don’t speak English. They are usually perfectly nice, and I try to talk to them with the little bit of Spanish I know. I understand that learning a second language is hard, and that most of these people are busy working, or taking care of their families, or too old to learn. But it’s still a problem when one portion of the community has such a hard time even making basic communication with another. A language barrier makes working together much, much harder.
This isn’t multiculturalism, at least not how I’m familiar with the word. It’s segregation.
As for “assimilation,” this has loads of negative connotations to me, and to many other Americans. It’s often used synonymously with terms like “white-washing,” or “selling out,” or losing one’s own culture. It doesn’t evoke the idea of blending one’s former culture into the new one, which I hope you can agree would be a more positive act.
It’s interesting Chris that you have a different sense of these two words. I can only imagine it has to do with our different ages.
What you describe as multiculturalism I would call the melting pot. The settlers that came here did share and learn from each other and eventually formed what we know as The United States of America. In states like Arizona, Texas, and New Mexico where influences of both the Spanish and the American Indian colored the visual landscape as well as art, music food, etc, it’s easy to experience the contribution those cultures made on the local environment. Likewise in Louisiana where the French and black cultures have colored the local experience. I lived in NM as a child and enjoyed the adobe buildings, the food, music etc. But it was just the way it was. It wasn’t something that was pushed…no one’s heritage was. We were Americans.
In the last few decades “pride” in cultural heritage has taken precidence over national pride to the point that assimilation is no longer occurring. Rather than “coming together as one” we find seperation and segregation, mistrust and sometimes animosity. Websters:
The idea that assimilation would cause one to “lose” ones heritage is absurd. Placing the heritage of ones ancestry over the herritage of the nation one calls home is equally absurd.
Gotta go…later!