Πολυπολιτισμικότητα ;: Culture

Δευτέρα 25 Ιανουαρίου 2010

All cultures are not equal

Western liberals and Islamic fundamentalists both reject ideas of modernity, universality and progress.

by Kenan Malik

'I denounce European colonialism', wrote CLR James. 'But I respect the learning and profound discoveries of Western civilisation.' (1)

James was one of the great radicals of the twentieth century, an anti-imperialist, a superb historian of black struggles, a Marxist who remained one even when it was no longer fashionable to be so. But today, James' defence of 'Western civilisation' would probably be dismissed as Eurocentric, even racist.

To be radical today is to display disenchantment with all that is 'Western' - by which most mean modernism and the ideas of the Enlightenment - in the name of 'diversity' and 'difference'. The modernist project of pursuing a rational, scientific understanding of the natural and social world - a project that James unashamedly championed - is now widely regarded as a dangerous fantasy, even as oppressive.

'Subjugation', according to the philosopher David Goldberg, 'defines......

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The central absurdities of multiculturalism.

Prof Parekh, author of "Rethinking Multiculturalism", said with commendable honesty that "the multicultural movement ..... has so far failed to throw up a coherent philosophical statement of its central principles". It is good to see a sociologist aware of the need for "central principles" or "general theories": second nature to physicists and chemists.

To help plug this gap, the remaining paragraphs of this site are an attempt to set out the "central principles" of multiculturalism, or rather the absurdity of multiculturalism. Numbers refer to relevant sections above.

2. Over the last three hundred years or so, technology has brought a million fold improvement in access to culture, both native and foreign culture. The average person now has instant access to a million pieces of music played by the World's top musicians, a million books, several billion web sites, a hundred different plays, documentaries etc every night on television, and so on. Compared to this, multiculturalism is irrelevant.

3. The word "diversity" as an euphemism for multicultural is devious alteration to the English language. Its main purpose is as a semi technical sounding word designed to impress.

4. When two or more cultures merge, the enrichment that takes place tends to be temporary because human memories are limited. For example the average person uses around five thousand words, thus merging two languages will ultimately lead to a new hybrid language, which has no more words that the two originals: five thousand. The new hybrid culture may or may not be an improvement on the originals - depending on the extent to which the hybrid adopts the best of the two originals. Even if the hybrid is an improvement, it is debatable as to whether the World as a whole has been culturally enriched, since one or more cultures have been lost in order to create the hybrid.

6. Worthwhile or valuable culture travels on its own, that is without the need for migrants. Thus the culture that comes with migrants is low grade culture. In other words multicultural culture is low grade culture.

7. The advocates of multiculturalism have learned from Goebbles's dictum: "Never tell a small lie."

8. One of the fundamental ideas behind multiculturalism is that physical proximity to members of another culture is needed to learn from them. This is unmitigated nonsense: even the advocates of multiculturalism dont make this claim in respect of types of culture other than multicultural culture.

9. The idea that no culture is better than any other culture is a strange one: migrants obviously don’t agree with this.

10. Cultures are as likely to adopt each other's worst aspects as to adopt each other's best aspects.

12. The popular claim that multiculturalism makes us "vibrant" and "dynamic" is not supported by history or the evidence generally. There are plenty of examples of racially pure, yet successful countries.

20 & 22. There is a wealth of evidence that the advocates of multiculturalism do not really believe in it: they advocate it because it is fashionable or politically correct. For example Western advocates of multiculturalism advocate it for the West, but are indifferent to the gross lack of multiculturalism in various large Asian countries. They claim to be concerned about culture, but gloss over the fact that technology has given us a vastly greater access to culture than multiculturalism.(2)

21. Multiculturalists tend to believe that new = good. That combined with their tendency to see the short term but not the long term makes multiculturalists a banal, naοve bunch of folk.

25. The self contradictions by multiculturalists make it difficult to know what the central merits of multiculturalism are supposed to be.

26. Ethnic cuisine is much the largest cultural effect of post WWII immigrants to the UK. Quantifying this is difficult, but if one goes on the purely economic effects, the economic benefits of ethnic cuisine are a total irrelevance compared to another piece of cultural transfer: the adoption of Western technology by China and India. Moreover, the latter occurs largely without multiculturalism, that is, without migration from Europe or the US to China or India.

28. The most vociferous advocates of multiculturalism are society's loudmouths: journalists and politicians. In contrast, academics are relatively non-committal on the subject.

29. The claim by multiculturalists that the variety of clothing introduced to the country by immigrants represents some sort of benefit is suspicious: they never mourned the loss of the bowler hat or the Northern working man's cloth cap.

30. We are often told that "every country is multicultural now". This is nonsense in the case of China and to a lesser extent Japan and India.

Ultimate conclusion: The claims made for multiculturalism do not stand inspection. Multiculturalism is an irrelevance.

by Ralph S Musgrave

The End of Multiculturalism?: Terrorism, Integration and Human Rights by Derek Mcghee

This topical book provides a thorough examination of debates on multiculturalism, in the context of current discussions on security, integration and human rights. Recent debates on national identity and the alleged failure of multiculturalism have focused on the social disorder in Oldham, Burnley and Bradford in the summer of 2001 and the bombings and attempted bombings in London in July 2005. Derek McGhee assesses how these events and the events that have occurred outside Britain, especially the attacks on the USA on 11th September 2001, have resulted in the introduction of a number of high profile debates in Britain with regards to immigration, integration, citizenship, ‘race’ inequality and human rights. McGhee examines these debates on multiculturalism and terrorism in light of enduring questions regarding ‘Muslim integration’ and ‘Muslim loyalty’ in contemporary Britain. He also explores the nature of a diverse range of inter-related areas of public policy, including anti-terrorism, immigration, integration, community cohesion, equality and human rights, critically examining many of the Government’s key strategies in recent years. The End of Multiculturalism? will appeal to a wide readership of students and academics in sociology, politics, international relations and law.

«Το τέλος μίας ουτοπίας:» του Ιωάννη Κολοβού

Σκοπός του βιβλίου αυτού δεν είναι να αντικρούσει την «πολυπολιτισμικότητα» ως θεωρητικό κατασκεύασμα καθώς, όπως υπογραμμίζει και ο καθηγητής Κοινωνιολογίας του Πανεπιστημίου Duke Edward Tiryakian, «δεν υπάρχει επιστημονική μέθοδος που να παρέχει κριτήρια βάσει των οποίων μία κοινωνική φιλοσοφία είναι πιο έγκυρη από μία άλλη». Όμως, μπορεί η εφαρμογή αυτής της κοινωνικής φιλοσοφίας στην πράξη να δείξει αν αυτή λειτουργεί αποτελεσματικά ή όχι. Επιπλέον, τα θεωρητικά κατασκευάσματα έχουν το μειονέκτημα ότι μπορεί να φαίνονται σωστά ... στην θεωρία. Το πόσο σωστά είναι επιβεβαιώνεται από την πρακτική εφαρμογή τους. Και το βιβλίο αυτό εκεί αποσκοπεί. Να καταδείξει την παταγώδη αποτυχία της πολυπολιτισμικότητας όπου και όπως και αν εφαρμόσθηκε στην Δυτική Ευρώπη. Το βιβλίο περιγράφει τα διάφορα μοντέλα πολυπολιτισμικότητας που εφαρμόσθηκαν στις κοινωνίες της Δυτικής Ευρώπης, παραθέτει τα αποτελέσματα της εφαρμογής τους και εντοπίζει τους λόγους πίσω από την αποτυχία τους. Ο εντοπισμός των λόγων είναι πολύ χρήσιμος γιατί η συνειδητοποίησή τους θα βοηθήσει την Ελλάδα να αποφύγει τα ίδια λάθη. Το βιβλίο ξεκινά με την περιγραφή της κατάστασης στην σημερινή Ελλάδα και επεξηγεί την πολυπολιτισμικότητα ως θεωρία και ως πρακτική. Κατόπιν, κάνει αναφορά στην Δυτική Ευρώπη και εστιάζει στις περιπτώσεις της Βρετανίας, της Γαλλίας, της Γερμανίας και της Ολλανδίας. Με βάση τις εμπειρίες των χωρών αυτών το βιβλίο προχωρεί στην εξαγωγή γενικών συμπερασμάτων και κλείνει με την διαμόρφωση προτάσεων για την μεταναστευτική πολιτική της Ελλάδας βασισμένων στα συμπεράσματα αυτά.

Decline and Fall: Europe's Slow Motion Suicide by Bruce S. Thornton

Once a colossus dominating the globe, Europe today is a doddering convalescent. Sluggish economic growth, high unemployment, an addiction to expensive social welfare entitlements, a dwindling birth-rate among native Europeans, and most important, an increasing Islamic immigrant population chronically underemployed yet demographically prolific - all point to a future in which Europe will be transformed beyond recognition, a shrinking museum culture riddled with ever-expanding Islamist enclaves. "Decline and Fall" tells the story of this decline by focusing on the larger cultural dysfunctions behind the statistics. The abandonment of the Christian tradition that created the West's most cherished ideals - a radical secularism evident in Europe's indifference to God and church - created a vacuum of belief into which many pseudo-religions have poured. Scientism, fascism, communism, environmentalism, multiculturalism, sheer hedonism - all have attempted and failed, sometimes bloodily, to provide Europeans with an alternative to Christianity that can show them what is worth living and dying for. Meanwhile a resurgent Islam, feeding off the economic and cultural marginalization of European Muslims, knows all too well not just what is worth dying for, but what is worth killing for. Crippled by fashionable self-loathing and fantasies of multicultural inclusiveness, Europeans have met this threat with capitulation instead of strength, appeasement and apologies instead of the demand that immigrants assimilate. As "Decline and Fall" shows, Europe's solution to these ills - a larger and more powerful European Union - simply exacerbates the problems, for the EU cannot address the absence of a unifying belief that can spur Europe even to defend itself, let alone to recover its lost grandeur. As these problems worsen, Europe will face an unappetizing choice between two somber destinies: a violent nationalistic or nativist reaction, or, more likely, a long descent into cultural senescence and slow-motion suicide.

Πολυπολιτισμικότητα ;

Δευτέρα 25 Ιανουαρίου 2010

All cultures are not equal

Αναγνώστες

Αρχειοθήκη ιστολογίου

Ετικέτες

The central absurdities of multiculturalism.

The End of Multiculturalism?: Terrorism, Integration and Human Rights by Derek Mcghee

Πληροφορίες

«Το τέλος μίας ουτοπίας:» του Ιωάννη Κολοβού

Decline and Fall: Europe's Slow Motion Suicide by Bruce S. Thornton

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