why did the west commit to multiculturalism?

Are we talking about multicultralism of immigration?

Multiculturalism implies there are sperate spheres of culture within the wider state, which, as an American I have no issue with as long as American law is the be all end all. Not to mention the immigrants will eventually become "American" like everyone else before them.

The west has superior vaules and all we need to do is wait them out

Simply becuase the immigrants have a bit of a tan does not a multicultural society make. No national entity has ever been closed off in history with any real success. So I'm afraid I don't understand the question. No man is an island, no nation is insular

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Originally Posted by Strike For The South

...no nation is insular

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Well, some have tried. The current poster boy would be North Korea, I think.
Miserable failure sooner or later down the road seems to be the nigh-certified reward for the effort.

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But un-managed immigration is not a tenet of multi-culturism or open-culturism. It is a symptom of increasing wealth divide in a ever globalizing world. People from other parts of the world come to Europe in search of wealth and it is that powerful, they travel great distances in some of the worst conditions possible to get a glimpse of it.

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I spoke about this with pater who commented thus; There has always been migrations, it's just that in the late 20th century there was very little, it was a blip, an abnormality. One that your generation thinks is normal.

Certainly made me think.*

*after an ouzo or two!

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Originally Posted by Watchman

Uh, since when did any "western" state have "unmanaged immigration" going on?

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"Really poorly managed immigration"

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Originally Posted by Beskar

"Really poorly managed immigration"

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The KKK wannabes 'round these parts consider everything short of "back to Africa" to be that, you know.
Pray tell what would be your particular criteria for "well-managed immigration"?

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Originally Posted by Adrian II

Since we're in verbal rape mode, I can add my two cents.

Migration began to be perceived as a problem for the West only in the 1980's, when globalisation began to uproot our societies and economies and someone convenient had to be blamed..

Then after the Berlin Wall came down Badmensch was in need of a new enemy and decided on Islam.

Islamic terrorists saw a chance to capitalize on this fear, with overwhelming success.

Hence the shitpile we're in today.

I am not going to document this because nobody else bothers.

AII

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Well in the U.S. the enemy was replaced with, ourselves. I didn't document the conversation I had with a federal law enforcement official but the U.S. cared less about Al-Qaeda then they did about Al-Elf. This inward focus existed during the Clinton administration and exists within Democratic circles today. Probably because it fits under law enforcement and easier to quantify.

The U.S. has never been about multiculturalism (in less you include variations of Western culture). It's that we had so much space we could fill after we got rid of the natives and the bison. We also have the dominant, or "American" culture. Despite this, we're still culturally divided (e.g. Southern, black (urban and rural), New England, West Coast, and etc).

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Originally Posted by Vladimir

Despite this, we're still culturally divided (e.g. Southern, black (urban and rural), New England, West Coast, and etc).

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By that token you'll be hard pressed to find a state larger than Monaco that *wasn't* "culturally divided" - regional differences still doing quite well in spite of the best efforts of the 1800s nationalist unifiers.

Just saying.

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Originally Posted by Watchman

The KKK wannabes 'round these parts consider everything short of "back to Africa" to be that, you know.
Pray tell what would be your particular criteria for "well-managed immigration"?

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That would be a new one, I am being association with the Klu Klux Klan. As for your question, if you read my earlier posts, you would clearly see my criteria.

In short:
If everyone crams onto an island, it is pretty evident that very quickly, this island will not be able to support the population on it. In my example of Britain, Britain cannot support it's population without very heavy reliance on imports, it is simply too crowded. This is where population control comes in as the population of Britain needs to decrease, there needs to be more emigration from the Isles to elsewhere and this number needs to be greater than the influx. On the otherhand, there are other nations (Such as Poland) which require more (and want more) migration so they are able to have better use of the land and for industry.

Thus, waton immigration on the isles is a pretty moronic policy as Britain is no where near self-sufficient and this is decreasing rapidly with the decline of agriculture and industry. While a global trade policy you do not have to be able to be fully sufficient, however, you need your exports to be greater than your imports for viable economic growth and sustainability, which Germany is a very good example of.

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Originally Posted by Watchman

By that token you'll be hard pressed to find a state larger than Monaco that *wasn't* "culturally divided" - regional differences still doing quite well in spite of the best efforts of the 1800s nationalist unifiers.

Just saying.

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There's a heck of a lot of difference between regional variations in things like popular culture/dress/accents etc on the one hand, and entirely different cultures with completely different religions/values/social structures on the other.

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Originally Posted by Papewaio

You do realise that that is a statement tripping into the zone of an oxymoron. The UK is by definition a multicultural society.

The UK = United Kingdom = Many different kingdoms = different cultures (even within the same kingdom). Saxons, Normans, Celts etc

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Nooo! You went there, my pet peeve...

How is it in any way relevant to talk about "Saxons, Normans, Celts etc" when talking about the the UK of 1707 onwards?

As for it being an oxymoron to call the "United Kingdom" homogenous, remember that these kingdoms were feudal creations and in that sense a bit of a blast from the past. The kingdoms of Scotland and England did not denote some sort of cultural or national divide, merely the bounds that various dynasties carved out for themselves.

Scottish nationalism originated as a sort of bourgeoisie romanticism (I'm feeling Marxist today) and has since been propagated as a result of mass Irish immigration which was a detestable assault upon the British nation.

There is one British people, one British nation, and no 'sub-nations' within it!

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Originally Posted by Beskar

Want to sum up some of the successes of "multiculturalism"?
United States of America
British Empire

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What cultures do you think did well in the USA?

Is a socialist resorting to the imperialist adventures of the British Empire to find an example to support his case? Not that it would even be comparable in the slightest to what multiculturalism means today...

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Originally Posted by Rhyfylwyr

There's a heck of a lot of difference between regional variations in things like popular culture/dress/accents etc on the one hand, and entirely different cultures with completely different religions/values/social structures on the other.

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Uhhhhhhhhhh... right. Vlad was using the Eastern and Western US seaboards as an example, which is what I was addressing. In the case you didn't notice or something.

Though AFAIK what you're describing has also been achieved without people murdering each other meaningfully more than normal for the era, so yeah.

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Originally Posted by Watchman

Uhhhhhhhhhh... right. Vlad was using the Eastern and Western US seaboards as an example, which is what I was addressing. In the case you didn't notice or something.

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Eh, no... you were talking about the 19th century nationalist unifications in Europe. It's just not a relevant argument in a thread about modern day multiculturalism and its issues.

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Originally Posted by Beskar

That would be a new one, I am being association with the Klu Klux Klan.

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What, you're one of the Finnish "immigration critical" types?

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As for your question, if you read my earlier posts, you would clearly see my criteria.

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Would it kill you to reiterate? Please. I insist.

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In short:
If everyone crams onto an island, it is pretty evident that very quickly, this island will not be able to support the population on it. In my example of Britain, Britain cannot support it's population without very heavy reliance on imports, it is simply too crowded. This is where population control comes in as the population of Britain needs to decrease, there needs to be more emigration from the Isles to elsewhere and this number needs to be greater than the influx. On the otherhand, there are other nations (Such as Poland) which require more (and want more) migration so they are able to have better use of the land and for industry.

Thus, waton immigration on the isles is a pretty moronic policy as Britain is no where near self-sufficient and this is decreasing rapidly with the decline of agriculture and industry. While a global trade policy you do not have to be able to be fully sufficient, however, you need your exports to be greater than your imports for viable economic growth and sustainability, which Germany is a very good example of.

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Uh, are you talking about the ability to feed the population? 'Cause if so Germany is probably the worst example in Europe, as they essentially starved to death already in WW1. (The Nazis bent over backwards - and made some pretty stupid decisions - in an effort to avoid a rerun.) In fact what you're talking about seems to have no bearing at all on how national nevermind global economies have functioned for well over a century now...

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Originally Posted by Rhyfylwyr

Eh, no... you were talking about the 19th century nationalist unifications in Europe. It's just not a relevant argument in a thread about modern day multiculturalism and its issues.

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Really? 'Cause I daresay the nationalist projects of the Long Nineteenth Century, and especially their many failings and ugly sideshows as well as the fact they were engaged in to begin with, rather illustrate why "multiculturalism" ended up as de rigueur.
Ie. because the alternatives were found out to be rather vile and unworkable.

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Originally Posted by Watchman

Really? 'Cause I daresay the nationalist projects of the Long Nineteenth Century, and especially their many failings and ugly sideshows as well as the fact they were engaged in to begin with, rather illustrate why "multiculturalism" ended up as de rigueur.
Ie. because the alternatives were found out to be rather vile and unworkable.

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Again how can you compare the regional differences of the 19th century with modern immigration. It's a completely different beast, as I said earlier you are talking about different culture/dress/accent etc as if it is the same thing as a group of people with a completely different religion/values/society etc. Not to mention the fact that the geographic distribution is completely different. Having different regions with their own customs is one thing, ramming hordes of foreigners into ghettos and focusing them in poor urban communities is a whole different matter.

Also please tell me what this "vile and unworkable", and apparently only alternative to multiculturalism is.

I do not see anything vile or unworkable about the nation state, it was working fine until a few decades ago.

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Originally Posted by Rhyfylwyr

How is it in any way relevant to talk about "Saxons, Normans, Celts etc" when talking about the the UK of 1707 onwards?

As for it being an oxymoron to call the "United Kingdom" homogenous, remember that these kingdoms were feudal creations and in that sense a bit of a blast from the past. The kingdoms of Scotland and England did not denote some sort of cultural or national divide, merely the bounds that various dynasties carved out for themselves.

Scottish nationalism originated as a sort of bourgeoisie romanticism (I'm feeling Marxist today) and has since been propagated as a result of mass Irish immigration which was a detestable assault upon the British nation.

There is one British people, one British nation, and no 'sub-nations' within it!.

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I call your hand and raise it. For the record I'm half Welsh... kind of. Because there is Irish and Scottish going back a few generations. Add to that a Welsh great grandmother who was born in America... doesn't change her ethnicity, just geographic location of the touchdown.

My mum is very British, but never call her English.

Disregard the genes, look at some of the cultural differences to an atypical Englishman (which doesn't exist except in a census aggregate)... different language, geography and food are all in big enough variation to say that the average Welsh person is not the same culture as the average Englishman. That said neither is a Northern Englishman and a Southern one. There are cultures and micro cultures within Britain. I don't have to live there, I have an Eastender uncle whose rhyming slang clearly denotes that he has a different cultural heritage to someone from the same city.

British culture is a home grown multiculture. It is a combination of all those other vibrant communities.

As for failure of groups of immigrants to intergrate. Well look at the system. How well intergrated are those who have been born and bred on a council estate? Seems a failure of city planning resulting in systemic social issues.

Sydney has a few infamous equivalent areas. The ones that don't make media headlines are the areas that have government housing more thoroughly dispersed within a homeowner zone. Give kids rolemodels and they can succeed.

Some groups do come to new countries and fail to intergrate or have higher barriers. Typically those who don't move in general society become the least intergrated. Mums who stay at home and look after the kids, unemployed adults who don't mix with others and kids who go to schools of the same group without ever intergrating with mainstream kids.

I see the most important thing for schools is socialisation. Ethics and education are up to the parents.

So it comes to a shock to the insulated parents when their kids who go to school, uni and work in a multicultural society end up dating someone outside of their parents group.

Multiculturalism has it's highlights like foodcourts :) and it's lowlights like insularity. I don't want food that all tastes the same so I'm quite prepared to put up with cultural differences. A foodcourt is a laboratory of an ideal multicultural environment, the variety of foods still has to be prepared within the health and safety guidelines of the state. I also expect like a foodcourt that one can pick, choose and mix to ones content.

Back to Britain. I'm pretty sure Vindaloo's and tea don't orginate in Britain but are seen as very British.

Sometimes the best of things aren't home grown, they are home chosen.

I don't really disagree with you Pape, the only thing is (getting back to definitions here), I don't think geographic regional cultural variations are example of multiculturalism. They are not separate cultures, it is fairly petty examples of things like accent etc.

As for Britain adopting foreign things like vindaloos as part of national culture, again this is petty things like food. I don't contest the foreign influence in these things, what I don't like is foreign influence in terms of real values and having any social impact.

How can you compare having a curry with covering your wife in a burkha?

I feel there are many inappropriate comparisons and attempted parallels being flung about in this thread.

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Originally Posted by InsaneApache

I was watching Newsnight last night and a Norwegian politician was being interviewed. He was a year older than me and stated that immigration into Norway didn't start until the early to mid sixties. He admitted that he didn't physically meet anyone other than a white person until he was 17. (1976)

He then went on to say that multiculturalism was the accepted policy in western Europe.

The question I ask is this.

Why did the west commit to multiculturalism?

Who decided to do this?

What, if any, are the benefits?

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Well for an interesting tidbit, in postwar Europe, up to 1968/early 70s, it was the left which resented mass immigration, even multiculturalism, and the right which imposed it. As Casanova (PCF , French Communist Party) understood, 'the working class is racist and imperialist'. Fight the Algerians, prevent their coming over, recruit amongst white Algerians for the left. Meanwhile the right demanded Algerian workers in France, to keep wages down and to limit the power of the unions. The left, especially the PCF, tried to protect the working class from this competition. Where the PCF was in power, social housing was refused to Algerians, their position made miserable by other legal means too.

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Originally Posted by Rhyfylwyr

Nooo! You went there, my pet peeve...

How is it in any way relevant to talk about "Saxons, Normans, Celts etc" when talking about the the UK of 1707 onwards?

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The discussion in the OP implied this is a NEW development clearly it's not.

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Scottish nationalism originated as a sort of bourgeoisie romanticism (I'm feeling Marxist today) and has since been propagated as a result of mass Irish immigration which was a detestable assault upon the British nation.

There is one British people, one British nation, and no 'sub-nations' within it!

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So what by the time of Act of Union other cultures not from the British Isles were livin an workin in Britain and that continued after Union, multiculturalism does not implode because there is only one Britain

In the fifties my father worked on the sites and roads of England, most were Irish but there were plenty Poles, West Indians, Lithuanians and on and on.

Britain was most deffo multicultural long before the Daily Mail decided it was a new thing.

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Originally Posted by Rhyfylwyr

How can you compare having a curry with covering your wife in a burkha?

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One is a food fashion, the other is a clothing fashion. Doesn't seem too hard to compare them.

What is culture? Well what is the quickest way to ingratiate oneself in a new society when traveling overseas?

The answer to the second highlights some of the first. When traveling if you can appreciate the local food and customs whilst being able to say an understandable please & thank you in the local tongue you're doing well.

Communication is the underpinning of community which is the habitat of culture. Food and drink are the way we show inclusion and respect for each other.

Food is vitally important to civilization. Give them bread to keep popularity in the Roman Empire. Mistakenly say cake to topple the French Empire. We are but 3 meals away from the breakdown of civil concord.

A restaurant to me is only possible because of civilization and culture. It is the most concrete opposite to extremism, hostility and terrorism. A restaurant is hospitality, culture and cuisine. So food to me is a very real part of any deep understanding of a culture.

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Originally Posted by Beskar

If everyone crams onto an island, it is pretty evident that very quickly, this island will not be able to support the population on it. In my example of Britain, Britain cannot support it's population without very heavy reliance on imports, it is simply too crowded.

Thus, waton immigration on the isles is a pretty moronic policy as Britain is no where near self-sufficient and this is decreasing rapidly with the decline of agriculture and industry. While a global trade policy you do not have to be able to be fully sufficient, however, you need your exports to be greater than your imports for viable economic growth and sustainability, which Germany is a very good example of.

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the problem britain has isn't the absolute level of immigration, we can easily choose to import more.

no, the real problem with immigration in britain is:
> the relative level of change, which cannot easily be accommodated by the population centres where immigrants tend to accumulate, where people tend to be poorer and thus more reliant on a stable and recognisable community.

this 'dissatisfaction' is further catalysed by the following:
> the degree of difference of the immigrant culture, and its perceived compatibility
> an orthodoxy that discourages the native culture from expecting the immigrant culture to adapt to their sensitivities.

to turn it into an argument about demographic sustainability is rather irrelevant, the man on the street doesn't give a damn about that.

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Originally Posted by Papewaio

Disregard the genes, look at some of the cultural differences to an atypical Englishman (which doesn't exist except in a census aggregate)... different language, geography and food are all in big enough variation to say that the average Welsh person is not the same culture as the average Englishman. That said neither is a Northern Englishman and a Southern one. There are cultures and micro cultures within Britain. I don't have to live there, I have an Eastender uncle whose rhyming slang clearly denotes that he has a different cultural heritage to someone from the same city.

British culture is a home grown multiculture. It is a combination of all those other vibrant communities.

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If your Mam's family are Welsh then surely you know Britian has not been multicultural until very recently, the way to get on was to be English and no one know this better than the Welsh, whose language and culture were brutalised in an attempt "civilise" them "for their own good".

Of course, that hasn't changed - except that now you have to be a different kind of English and it's more sneaky.

My mum speaks fluent Welsh and considers herself Welsh or British not English. Mum sees a clear difference in culture, heritage and the ability to use both languages. The very act of being bilingual in her eyes sets her in a different culture to the likes of my monolingual self. Multiculture isn't as dramatic as yin-yang.

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Originally Posted by Papewaio

My mum speaks fluent Welsh and considers herself Welsh or British not English. Mum sees a clear difference in culture, heritage and the ability to use both languages. The very act of being bilingual in her eyes sets her in a different culture to the likes of my monolingual self. Multiculture isn't as dramatic as yin-yang.

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Multiculturalism is an ideoligy, some posters here make the mistake of confusing it with multi-ethnic. It's true that culture has always been multi-ethnic, but that was a given not a goal. Multiculturalism is a modern day religion and religion accepts no faillure, that is all there is

First everyone can be of the same ethnic background but have a different culture. Just look at suburbanites vs country folk. Heck you can have the same family members living cultural diverse lifestyles.

Multiculturalism is allowing people to have keep their cultures within the law of the land. That is why I use a food court as an example. Many types of food and cooking styles but they have to maintain hygeine standards of the country they are in, not where they are from.

I'm fine with cultures having differences. However I'm against special laws for certain cultures or religions this includes priests not having to report a crime they have heard in confession. Everyone atheist, catholic, jew, buddhist, muslim, tin hat brigade should have the same expectations to be treated the same under the eyes of the law, both in being looked after and duties towards being a good citizen.

I do not see multiculturalism as a religion in Australia. One quarter of the population is born overseas. We have tangible benefits from it. It isn't an easy thing to implement, but in general the ROI is pretty good, but it does take 25 years plus to normally see the fruits come true.

I don't think you should have to report crimes that you knew were commited in the past, rather only things that you learn were committed in the past and may have something to do with future action. Ie someone confesses that they've killed a guy at a bar because they were attacked. This would not need to be reported. If someone told you that they killed a guy at a bar and they liked it, then it has future criminal implications. Child sexual abuse would be an example of something that would need to be reported as the act itself suggests future behaviour. Similar to privelages given to attorneys and psychiatrists and training should be included in seminary (im pretty sure it already is).

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Originally Posted by TuffStuffMcGruff

I don't think you should have to report crimes that you knew were commited in the past, rather only things that you learn were committed in the past and may have something to do with future action. Ie someone confesses that they've killed a guy at a bar because they were attacked. This would not need to be reported. If someone told you that they killed a guy at a bar and they liked it, then it has future criminal implications. Child sexual abuse would be an example of something that would need to be reported as the act itself suggests future behaviour

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:confused: did you post in the wrong thread by any chance??

I was agreeing with pape minus the aforementioned caveat. I peruse existing threads for interesting ideas that I either agree with or disagree with. I honestly like sidetracks within a thread to a point

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Originally Posted by TuffStuffMcGruff

I was agreeing with pape minus the aforementioned caveat. I peruse existing threads for interesting ideas that I either agree with or disagree with. I honestly like sidetracks within a thread to a point

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Well I'm still confused then what does reporting of crime have to do with the OP.

If you talk with a guy from the street about fear of multiculturalism. The thing you get is that he/she is afraid that his/hers own culture might change towards direction he/she does not want it to go, because of immigrant influence, aka they do not want to be under sharia law in Finland for example. So in the end is opinion concerning multiculturalism even about multiculturalism in the end? Or just more about fear in general?