The Differences Between Assimilation and Multiculturalism

[Annie]

Are serious and very different, so far in which predominates in US vs. EU. Moreso on education sites, than here, the question is often raised about the lack now in civics education in the US. It's a serious problem. If we do not teach our roots of history, our next generation will not understand how we got where we are and how to keep it. It is impossible to teach American civics without Western Civ or the English legacy that helped bring about our different system.

Assimilation involves teaching young people, born here or immigrants, the commonality of Americans. It does not require forgetting or leaving behind cultural roots, just that one understand the precepts of the American system.

Multiculturalism on the other hand, assumes there really isn't an American culture, that all cultures are 'equal' and should be maintained. Many experts in political science, history, and sociology refer to this as 'The Balkanization' of America. (The same could be said in EU, difference is they have always emphasized this multiculturalism approach):

http://www.realclearpolitics.com/pr...s/2006/08/the_bbc_and_homegrown_terroris.html

August 11, 2006
The BBC and Home-Grown Terrorists
By James Lewis

More than twenty people have been arrested in Britain in a plot to kill thousands of innocent air passengers. The British press is undoubtedly looking frantically for somebody to blame. But they won't see the most obvious one: the tax-funded BBC.

If you were a young Muslim teenager growing up in Leeds, you too might be fertile soil for Islamofascism. The reason is simple: In a culture pervaded by the BBC, the message of the Labour Left would be drummed home to you over and over again: Britain is evil, America is evil, Israel is evil, capitalism is evil, democracy is a fraud. The education system would teach you a damning picture of the British Empire, which had its immoral side, but was also the greatest civilizing agent in the world for centuries.

Americans were the first to rebel successfully against the Empire, but we are very much aware of how much we owe it; we consider ourselves part of the larger English speaking tradition. India's rising prosperity and modernization owes much to the English language, the unification of the subcontinent under the Raj, and much more. Many Indians are Anglophiles, like many Americans. All that is damned and slandered in the official education given to young people in Britain, pervaded by BBC Labour Leftism.

No one should have been surprised when the suicide-murder squad in the Underground bombing of 7/7 turned out to be local lads. Britain has been preparing for its own demise ever since the rise of Fabian socialism around 1900. The Fabians founded the Labour Party, which has been in power now for a dozen years solid. In a parliamentary system, such power is nearly total. The "internationalist dream"--- which is a nightmare--- still pervades the hopes of all good people in Britain; nation states are constantly denigrated. That is why the Brits are such easy suckers for the elitist "coup from above" of the European Union. The propaganda--- and national self-hatred--- of the Left has sunk into the psyche to such a degree that even Conservatives cannot protest against the constant sabotage of British sovereignty. Tens of thousands of regulatory commands are now coming from Brussels, not London, from above, thanks to the French-style unelected bureaucracy of the EU. It's all very progressive.

So when some local imam starts to preach hatred of Britain, America, Israel, and Western culture, they are tilling fertile soil. British teens are all prepared to hate their country; it's the in thing to do. They are given a constant set of provocations: Guantanamo, and the "torture" of Muslims; the toilet-flushing of Korans by the evil Americans; the "imperialism" of America and its "poodle" Britain. Israel killing children in Qana. Just recently the BBC produced a "comedy" show with airplanes flying into Westminster, in imitation of 9/11. Is 9/11 the stuff of comedy? It is for the Bolshie Beeb. The show features guest appearances by the two main "news" anchors of the BBC. It's all a big joke to the Left, which secretly sympathizes with the fascists of Londonistan.

Like the United States, Britain is in bad, bad shape to fight a war for civilization. London Mayor "Red Ken" Livingstone and Oily George Galloway are constantly whipping up more resentment against the West. Muslims from pre-medieval places like Pakistan are easily winning the demographic race. The Jewish vote is now scattered and negligible, and Labour is not above using anti-Semitic cartoons depicting Jewish Conservatives as flying pigs.

Like George Bush, Tony Blair is virulently hated on the British Left, which feels sure that we are not being nice enough to militant Muslims. Let's throw them some red meat - Israel, the Anglo-American relationship, maybe Sharia in parts of the country where the police can no longer go. A few hundred honor killings of women can be ignored. Like the American Left, the Brit Left is the most destructive political force in the country, castrating the police and enabling criminals.

There is a silently appalled majority in Britain watching it all happen. But they are passive. There is no Rush Limbaugh. There are some excellent blogs, but not enough.

One major difference is that the average British taxpayer has been bought off: the welfare state is perceived as a generous parent rather than a parasite.

So there will be more home-grown terrorism, and down the road, perhaps defeatism and appeasement. If Gordon Brown becomes the next Prime Minister he might try the appeasement road. The United States can no longer be sure that Britain will stand for civilized values in the world; we have to find new allies in India, Japan, Eastern Europe, and Middle Eastern countries that are in the path of jihadi imperialism.
James Lewis is a frequent contributor for The American Thinker.

 

[Bullypulpit]

Assimilation, as you defined it above, has always been what I considered to be multi-culturalism, where the best aspects of one's native culture are nurtured and celebrated by everyone, with the worst aspects discarded. It lends a strenght and vitality to America that most monocultures lack.

Multi-culturalism, as it is represented by the modern conservative movement in America seems little different, though less overt, from the sentiments expressed by French racist Count Joseph Arthur de Gobineau in the late 1800's. He held that "...racial intermingling spelled cultural and political decline..." It seems simply a convenient foil upon which to hang the blame for one's own personal inadequacies and failings.

 

[Annie]

Assimilation, as you defined it above, has always been what I considered to be multi-culturalism, where the best aspects of one's native culture are nurtured and celebrated by everyone, with the worst aspects discarded. It lends a strenght and vitality to America that most monocultures lack.

Multi-culturalism, as it is represented by the modern conservative movement in America seems little different, though less overt, from the sentiments expressed by French racist Count Joseph Arthur de Gobineau in the late 1800's. He held that "...racial intermingling spelled cultural and political decline..." It seems simply a convenient foil upon which to hang the blame for one's own personal inadequacies and failings.

Bully your depiction of 'modern conservativism movement' is hooey and you know it. You are describing xenophobes, which has nothing to do with 'modern conservativism', rather the far right.

On the left, multiculturalism has come to mean the same as in Europe. We can see how well they are dealing with their immigrants and their immigrants are dealing with their new countries. Why would anyone want to go down that road?

 

[William Joyce]

French racist Count Joseph Arthur de Gobineau in the late 1800's. He held that "...racial intermingling spelled cultural and political decline..." It seems simply a convenient foil upon which to hang the blame for one's own personal inadequacies and failings.

Yet de Gobineau has been proved right. This cultural and political decline is exactly what's happening to the U.S., Britain and the rest of the West right now. America as a minority-white country in a few short decades will simply not be the peaceful, prosperous country it once was. It will be a Los Angeles-like warzone of barbed wire and spray paint. Corruption will explode. Whites will retreat yet further into their walled, guarded compounds, Brazil-style.

And race has everything to do with it. "Modern conservatism" ignores the racial reality of life and is thus a pretty flaccid response to the Murder of the West.

 

[Annie]

Yet de Gobineau has been proved right. This cultural and political decline is exactly what's happening to the U.S., Britain and the rest of the West right now. America as a minority-white country in a few short decades will simply not be the peaceful, prosperous country it once was. It will be a Los Angeles-like warzone of barbed wire and spray paint. Corruption will explode. Whites will retreat yet further into their walled, guarded compounds, Brazil-style.

And race has everything to do with it. "Modern conservatism" ignores the racial reality of life and is thus a pretty flaccid response to the Murder of the West.

Thanks for backing me up, I think.

 

[Bullypulpit]

Bully your depiction of 'modern conservativism movement' is hooey and you know it. You are describing xenophobes, which has nothing to do with 'modern conservativism', rather the far right.

On the left, multiculturalism has come to mean the same as in Europe. We can see how well they are dealing with their immigrants and their immigrants are dealing with their new countries. Why would anyone want to go down that road?

Unfortunately, the far right is moving into mainstream conservatism with alarming rapidity. They are usurping traditional conservative values with such bilious spew as attacks their on the straw-man of multiculturalism.

The failure is not an issue of liberal or conservative errors. It is the failure to make proper assimilation of immigrants into their new culture a goal rather than a mere aside. Administrations of both parties have failed miserably in this respect.

And I would be wary of Sweet Williams support.

 

[Annie]

Unfortunately, the far right is moving into mainstream conservatism with alarming rapidity. They are usurping traditional conservative values with such bilious spew as attacks their on the straw-man of multiculturalism.Only as much as your side can make it stick.

The failure is not an issue of liberal or conservative errors. It is the failure to make proper assimilation of immigrants into their new culture a goal rather than a mere aside. Administrations of both parties have failed miserably in this respect.
sorry, but it's the liberal side tha is supporting the call for multiculturalism. They want Spanish everything and are willing to make other languages encompassed to do so. For some reason, maybe over 200 years experience, many are crying, "No."
And I would be wary of Sweet Williams support.

The reason for the caveate.

 

[trobinett]

Deep, VERY deep.

Speaking for the "red necks", sounds like a bunch of BS.

Here's my take.

The minute you lose track of assimilating, and start to run the "multicultural" BS up the flag pole, your doomed.

What you end up with is a carbon copy of Europa, which hasn't worked. We've gotten two world wars from that part of the world, need to try something different.

One language, one people, has a good ring to it, of course, that's just my opinion.:huh:

 

[Annie]

Deep, VERY deep.

Speaking for the "red necks", sounds like a bunch of BS.

Here's my take.

The minute you lose track of assimilating, and start to run the "multicultural" BS up the flag pole, your doomed.

What you end up with is a carbon copy of Europa, which hasn't worked. We've gotten two world wars from that part of the world, need to try something different.

One language, one people, has a good ring to it, of course, that's just my opinion.:huh:

It's language, at least a minimum. It's also the Magna Carta and the subsequent rule of law. It's all the charters that resulted in colonies of England.

 

[trobinett]

I'm waiting for California, Arizona, and New Mexico to succeed from the Union.

Course, then we would be expected to give them foreign aid, and the "boarder" would just move further North.

I don't have the answers, but what we're doing NOW sure the hell ain't working.

:tdown2:

 

[José]

The fact that blacks and latinos have less success in school and work is an entirely cultural phenomenon, not racial.

The black and latino youth in the US belong to communities that, for historical reasons, do not value education and professional success as much as other racial groups.

It is a known fact that not only in the US but all around the world, the second and third generations of asians succeed in school and in their professions because their communities emphasise education as a means to overcome the hardships imposed on them by a new land and earn the respect of their own communities and the natives’.

This is a cultural phenomenon 100% percent.

Raise 100 american blacks and latinos in Japan and they will do as well as their peers.

In fact, you don’t even need to go that far. Any sociological experiment that reproduced the same social pressure towards education in a black neighborhood would yield the exact same results.

The asian community in the US surely is not contributing to the “economic decline” of the US, and maybe they should even encourage asian immigration.

But wait... this disturbing fact does not fit Joyce’s agenda so it’s better to sweep it under the carpet.

If this is a cultural trait it can be changed over time, if it is racial only ethnic cleansing and apartheid will solve the problem and this is Joyce’s hidden (?) agenda.

Joyce is also quick to point out the fact that many racially homogenous countries like Japan are first world countries.

Well... according to Joyce’s theory, countries that are also racially homogenous like Nigeria, Georgia, Russia and Camboja should be economic powerhouses.

The reality check says South Africa, the wealthiest african country, is also the most ethnically diversified.

What about Canada?... a truely multiracial country where Anglos and quebecois are already a minority...

I would call this argument a typical “correlation implies causation” type of logical fallacy, but, in fact, there isn’t even a real correlation to be made.

This is a constant pattern found in all posts by Joyce.

He’s always manipulating and distorting data by using them selectively in order to make them fit his racist ideology.

 

[Hobbit]

It's like this. In the past, immigrants to this country, while they never truly abandoned their cultural roots, learned the language and adopted American culture as their own. Parts of their culture rubbed off on America as well, causing a sort of hybrid culture that drew from the strength of all of its parent cultures. America has included bits and pieces of culture from nearly every European country as well as from China, Japan, and a few other places. The result was like an alloy. Just as mixing molten copper and tin produces bronze, a stronger metal drawing from the strength of both, the melting together of cultures has produced the strong American culture, which is superior in strength to the cultures it is derived from. Then, along comes multiculturalism, which says that we shouldn't melt the cultures, because they're just fine as is. However, trying to make a cohesive culture without blending the cultures is just a disaster. Now we have a sheet of patchwork metal with spots of copper and spots of tin with none of them mixing together. Not only is this creation ugly as hell, but the slightest stress causes the tin and copper to come apart at the seams. This is what is happening in our country, a patchwork culture where we've got the tried and true steel of American culture being forced to share space with the weak, brittle, failed cultures of the Hispanics and American Blacks, and the hippies in this country telling us that it's a good thing.

 

[red states rule]

Assimilation, as you defined it above, has always been what I considered to be multi-culturalism, where the best aspects of one's native culture are nurtured and celebrated by everyone, with the worst aspects discarded. It lends a strenght and vitality to America that most monocultures lack.

Multi-culturalism, as it is represented by the modern conservative movement in America seems little different, though less overt, from the sentiments expressed by French racist Count Joseph Arthur de Gobineau in the late 1800's. He held that "...racial intermingling spelled cultural and political decline..." It seems simply a convenient foil upon which to hang the blame for one's own personal inadequacies and failings.

Why Time Magazine Can't Explain British Muslim Radicalism
Posted by Al Brown on August 14, 2006 - 12:31.
The subhead in this Time magazine article promises enlightenment, but fails to deliver: "Why do so many young British Muslims turn to violence against the land where they were raised?"

Unfortunately, Time's leftward slanted editorial policies don't allow an honest answer. Rather than exploring the root causes of Islamic radicalism, which is, after all, the root cause of British Muslim radicalism, Time offers a sterile hodgepodge of random observations and politically correct standbys; they actually cite "disaffection" with Britain's foreign policy, as if that were a cause rather than a symptom of the disease.

Buried within the article is the symptom that identifies the illness:

And among those British Muslims surveyed, a remarkable 81%--a percentage higher than that for Muslims not just in France and Germany but also in Egypt and Jordan--said they thought of themselves as Muslims first and citizens of their native country second.
The Pew Research poll Time cites also found that 15% of British Muslims sympathize with Muslim fundamentalists. The problem here is that Time, and other western media, steeped in the dogma of cultural relativism, fail to realize that a Muslim fundamentalist is not just a Christian fundamentalist who happens to worship Allah and Mohammed instead of Jehovah and Christ.

Christian fundamentalists and conservative Jews, as a rule, do not consider terrorism a legitimate means of furthering their religions' goals. Evangelicals might come to your door to proselytize, which is obnoxious, but they don't threaten to behead you if you refuse to convert. Nor do they practice their own form of taqqiyeh (lying to serve Islam).

This reflexive and fashionable lumping together of all the major religions prevents Time, and most of the mainstream media, from seeing the fundamental differences that separate them. It's why Time couldn't answer its own question.
http://newsbusters.org/node/6957

 

[Annie]

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/opinion/...GAVCBQYIV0?xml=/opinion/2006/08/15/do1501.xml

Multiculturalism is to blame for perverting young Muslims
By Michael Nazir-Ali, Bishop of Rochester
(Filed: 15/08/2006)


Islamic radicalism did not begin with Muslim grievances over Western foreign policy in Iraq or Afghanistan. It has deep roots, going back to the 13th-century reformer Ibn Taimiyya, through Wahhabism to modern ideologues such as Sayyid Qutb in Egypt or Maududi in Pakistan.

The Soviet occupation of Afghanistan gave it the cause it was looking for, and Afghanistan became the place where Muslim radicals were trained, financed and armed (often with Western assistance).

The movements that were born or renewed do not have any kind of centralised command structure, but co-operate through diffuse networks of affinity and patronage. One of their most important aims is to impose their form of Islam on countries such as Pakistan, Egypt, Malaysia and Indonesia. This may be why they were not regarded as an immediate threat to the West. Their other aims, however, include the liberation of oppressed Muslims in Palestine, Kashmir, Chechnya and elsewhere, and also the recovery of the Dar Al-Islam (or House of Islam), in its historic wholeness, including the Iberian peninsula, the Balkans and even India.

In this cause, the rest of the world, particularly the West, is Dar al-Harb (House of War). These other aims clearly bring such movements into conflict with the international community and with Western interests in particular.

So how does this dual psychology - of victimhood, but also the desire for domination - come to infect so many young Muslims in Britain? When I was here in the early 1970s, the practice of Islam was dominated by a kind of default Sufism or Islamic mysticism that was pietistic and apolitical. On my return in the late 1980s, the situation had changed radically. The change occurred because successive governments were unaware that the numerous mosques being established across the length and breadth of this country were being staffed, more and more, with clerics who belonged to various fundamentalist movements.

There were no criteria for entry, no way of evaluating qualifications and no programme for making them aware of the culture that they were entering. Until quite recently, ministers and advisers did not realise the scale of the problem, even though it was repeatedly brought to their attention. Secondly, in the name of multiculturalism, mosque schools were encouraged and Muslim pupils spent up to six extra hours a day learning the Koran and Islamic tradition, as well as their own regional languages. Finally, there are the grievances. Some of these are genuine enough, but the complaint often boils down to the position that it is always right to intervene where Muslims are victims (as in Bosnia or Kosovo), and always wrong when they may be the oppressors or terrorists (as with the Taliban or in Iraq), even when their victims are also mainly Muslims.

Given the world view that has given rise to such grievances, there can never be sufficient appeasement, and new demands will continue to be made. It is clear, therefore, that the multiculturalism beloved of our political and civic bureaucracies has not only failed to deliver peace, but is the partial cause of the present alienation of so many Muslim young people from the society in which they were born, where they have been educated and where they have lived most of their lives. The Cantle Report, in the wake of disturbances in Bradford, pointed out that housing and schools policies that favoured segregation, in the name of cultural integrity and cohesion, have had the unforeseen consequence of alienating the different religious, racial and cultural groups from one another.

A very significant number of policies will have to be rethought. In this, the Government will need expert help. There must be greater encouragement for moderate Muslim voices to be heard more clearly. All religious leaders, representing any faith, wanting to work here, must be required to show that they are properly qualified, can speak English and are willing to undertake courses in adaptation to culture in this country: a number of suitable institutions offer such courses. Immigration policy should be shaped in such a way as to be able to discover whether potential immigrants have sympathy for characteristically British values and for the way of life here.

The cultural heritage of people who come here must be respected. They should be able to take pride in their language, literature, art and spiritual background. At the same time, if they are to adjust to life in this country, they should be prepared to live in mixed communities, and not on their own. Their children should attend school along with those who come from the host culture, or from other cultures and traditions. They should be willing to learn through the medium of English and to be socially mobile, rather than "ghetto-ised" on the basis of religion, language or culture.

Politicians keep talking about the need to teach British values so that there can be national cohesion. But what are these values, and whence do they come? The most fundamental of these has to do with the innate dignity of all human beings, with fundamental equality, with liberty and with safety from harm. Those learning such values will know how to respect the dignity of people who are quite different from them in appearance, language or belief.

They will not see themselves as superior because of their religious or cultural roots, but regard every human life as of equal worth. They will be committed to freedom of belief and of expression. They will know that their fellow citizens have the right to safety from harm and that this extends not only to individual security, but also the safety of those institutions, such as democracy or a free press, that make liberty possible and actual.

Values, however, are not free-standing; they are deeply rooted in a vision of society. Whether we like it or not, characteristic British values arise out of the Christian faith and its vision of personal and common good. These were clarified by the Enlightenment and became the bed-rock of our modern political arrangements. The Enlightenment, however, by consigning Christianity to the private sphere, also removed the basis and justification for these values in the public sphere.

It is this basis and justification that needs to be recovered if our values are to be secure, and if they are to help inculcate the virtues of generosity, loyalty, moderation and love that lead to personal fulfilment and social wellbeing.

The author is the Bishop of Rochester.