The Dangerous Pap of Multiculturalism

Ahh, multiculturalism, that wholesome concept popularized in the 1960's by righteous academics, has at last embedded its pureness into all aspects of American life as we live and breath here in 2009. Without a doubt the world is a friendlier, more harmonious place because of it.

Yet it was the fear of retribution by the agents of multiculturalism and its cousin political correctness that is thought to be the reason no one dared "connect the dots" that should have flagged Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan as a potential terrorist. Long before the Fort Hood massacre all the warning signs were there - and actually the dots were connected by multiple agencies, but fear prevented any action. Fear of the politically correct multiculturalist and their allies in the media and the justice system.

Presented as an alternative to the prosaic “melting pot” contrivance, multiculturalism replaced what was really just a code word European whites used as a license to rule American culture. The melting pot was criticized by minorities who felt that it gave whites the power to expect conformity from all others. Multiculturalism requires the opposite, it demands that that various ethnic and racial cultures exist distinctly but equally within a single society. Essentially multiculturalism regards our diversity as a concept rather than a fact. It just sounds better to declare proudly that we celebrate diversity rather than celebrating a fact. In practice it becomes a call to celebrate our differences instead of our similarities.

Here's news to you - there was nothing wrong with the concept of the melting pot except that it was uniquely American, and we will have none of that now will we?

The real problem with multiculturalism is not that it seeks to lift diverse racial and cultural entities to an equal stature with the prevailing majority, but that is seeks to depreciate the dominant culture as virtue-less. While it encourages people to respect cultural equality it also encourages people to feel separate from others on a basis of color or creed. In some academic circles this is known as Balkanization - which is not generally viewed as a positive. How is this superior to the American melting pot construct?

Multiculturalism reinforces the idea that people who look or act a certain way are inherently different. This separation inevitably leads to ignorance and suspicion. In the end the good that is supposed to be the result of widespread recognition of disparate cultures is lost. Multiculturalism was supposed to encourage the sharing of diverse cultural facets whilst allowing for cultural autonomy, oddly this is exactly what the melting pot had largely achieved. Forced multiculturalism darkens the lines between ethnic groups making them harder and harder to erase.

The real problems arise when governments, both national and local, start making laws to enforce multiculturalism instead of the slow but natural process of cultural congealing like a simmering pot of booyah.

Multicultural policies can include:

--forced support for newspapers, television, and radio in minority languages

--forced support for minority festivals, holidays, and celebrations

--forced acceptance of traditional and religious dress in schools, the military, and society in general

--forced support for arts from cultures around the world

--programs to force minority representation in politics, education, and the work force

By and large none of these things are necessarily bad goals, except when the force of government is haphazardly applied through the court system. In the Fort Hood case fear of government retribution froze out any action that might have saved 13 lives and more than 30 injuries. So now we've experienced the inevitable result of the dangerous pap of multiculturalism.

Multiculturalist policies by design oppose cultural assimilation which is the very essence of the "melting pot". We are no longer Americans, but rather, hyphenated Americans. Sadly, new immigrant groups are not even encouraged to participate in the larger society, learn the majority language, nor are they "encouraged" to legally enter the labor force. When social integration and cultural assimilation is held back it can lead to economic disparities and an exclusion of minority groups from the benefits of becoming mainstream. In the end this helps no one. It has been speculated that as practiced multiculturalism is just apartheid by another name.


CW