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Jewish World Review Oct. 20, 2010/ 12 Mar-Cheshvan, 5771 Multiculturalism? Check, Please By Arnold Ahlert
http://www.JewishWorldReview.com |
Last Saturday, German Chancellor Angela Merkel tossed one of progressivism's most cherished concepts under the bus. "This (multicultural) approach has failed, utterly failed," Ms. Merkel told members of her Christian Democrats (CDU) party, adding that the idea of people from different cultural backgrounds living "side by side" didn't work. What is multiculturalism? It is a bankrupt ideology, one based on the fraudulent premise that all cultures are "equally viable" and "equally deserving" of respect. Are they really--or is this another simple case of progressives looking at the world the way they want it to be, instead of the way it really is?
The way the world actually is underscores the fatal conceit of multiculturalism: if all cultures are equally viable, then why are we witnessing massive movements of people away from some countries and cultures towards other ones? Why for example, if Mexico and the United States are merely "two sides of the same coin," do we have millions upon millions of Mexicans sneaking into the United States, and virtually no Americans sneaking into Mexico? Why are millions of Arabs abandoning their ostensibly worthwhile lifestyles in the Middle East and Africa and emigrating to Europe?
Could it be that such concepts as freedom, democracy, economic viability and equal rights for women are more attractive than religiously-inspired totalitarianism, ingrained misogyny and/or corrupt economic systems that yield little hope for advancement?
You bet your life they are. And yet the multiculturalists among us would throw it all away. Theirs is a world in which it is unseemly or arrogant to expect those who make the choice to move to a new nation to embrace the ethos of that nation. It is the host which must accommodate the guest, lest that host be perceived as bigoted, racist or nativist. Such incongruent thinking begs a stunningly obvious question: why should success accommodate failure? And let's be clear here: people don't completely uproot their lives and those of their families in order to purposefully lower their standard of living or diminish their opportunity for a better life. The intention to emigrate, despite al the ideological blather to the contrary, is a self-admitting revelation:
Life is better somewhere else.
This is not to say other cultures are not worthy of respect. The integration of people from ethnically diverse backgrounds can be richly rewarding, and there is no greater beneficiary of such rewards than the United States of America. We are a nation that wouldn't exist were it not for our embrace of divergent ethnicities and cultures.
On the other hand, one can't help but wonder what kind of country we would be if the multiculturalist philosophy had prevailed far earlier in our historical timeline. For most of our history, America embraced a melting pot mentality, a set of expectations with which all newcomers were expected to comply. The most salient of those expectations was the idea that one would learn and speak English. Another was that America was an "exceptional" nation which one would be proud to call home--and a nation would command the newcomer's primary allegiance.
What has multiculturalism produced? Entire sections of our country and those in Europe hermetically sealed off from the prevailing cultural ethos. Even worse, some of these sub-cultural enclaves demonstrate no allegiance whatsoever to their host country or its laws. In Europe, there are "no-go zones" which police have ceded to Muslims--and Sharia Law. In America, we have millions of illegal aliens demanding "rights" to which they are manifestly not entitled. From both sides of the Atlantic, a common theme emerges: the customs, language and culture of the host countries are not only irrelevant, but to a large extent contemptible.
Yet if such multiculturalist attitudes were limited to immigrants themselves, it is quite likely that the current unrest would be far less of a problem than it has become. The most pernicious aspect of multiculturalism is the level of cultural indifference--or worse, cultural self-loathing--it has produced among native citizens themselves. Such self-loathing may explain why, as author Mark Steyn pointed out in his book, "America Alone," Europeans are failing to produce enough children to sustain their population levels, even as immigrant populations are booming.
If one's culture is "worthless," why bother keeping it alive?
Ironically, this demographic reality is one of the main factors driving European immigration: a dearth of native-born Europeans has necessitated importing millions of foreign-born workers. Such immigrants are needed to offset an aging European population which simultaneously disdains those immigrants even as they embrace the socialist welfare state which requires their output in order to sustain itself. As for the immigrants themselves, one can only marvel at the effort to transform their new surroundings into something similar to what they willingly abandoned.
In America, resistance to multiculturalism has been denigrated as "jingoistic." National pride and unabashed patriotism are out. International apologies for our imperialism and historical shortcomings are in. Thus, in keeping with progressive ideology, better to resist assimilation than embrace a "fundamentally flawed" America, "unworthy of" respect. Better to adopt the progressive agenda which has long separated people into class, race, ethnicity, religion and gender for the purposes of political exploitation--under the banner of "celebrating our differences," no less.
That agenda isn't working in Europe or America. For example, France has banned the Muslim hijab outright, and an American majority's clamor to "build the damn wall" on our southern border is deafening. Whether such reactions are logical may be debatable, but they are honest and heartfelt. They are also than likely to continue occurring both in scope and frequency for the simplest of reasons:
People may be bamboozled into accepting many things, but cultural suicide isn't one of them.
It is one thing to feel like a foreigner in a foreign country. It is quite another to feel like one in the midst of one's own. Such deep-seated emotion is unlikely to be altered by the intellectual entreaties of "one-worlders" and their one-size-fits all approach to culture. One may argue the merits, e.g., of America's overwhelmingly Judeo-Christian value system, its Constitutional republic, and our affinity for football, fast cars, mom and apple pie. But there is no arguing that such a culture has had an irresistible allure for millions upon millions of people willing to make virtually any sacrifice to become part of it.
It is really too much to expect anything resembling quid pro quo from those people? For those of us who would never dream of emigrating to another country and demanding that country accommodate us, the answer is a resounding no. When in Rome, do as the Romans do.
When on the Jersey Shore? Perhaps everything has its limits.
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© 2010, Arnold Ahlert |
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