Why Are Only a Few Countries Required To Be Multicultural

[2grow]

Why is it that only the U.S., Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and the nations of Europe are required to be "multicultural"? Why those nations specifically? Why not, for example, China, India, Saudi Arabia, Zimbabwe, or Guatemala? None of those nations, nor most of the world's nations have a multicultural imperative, where that the host culture is smothered with cultures from all over the world and sucess at the endeavor is gauged by how heavily the host culture is impacted, if not erased entirely.


I'm refering to -- popular culture, educational systems, worklife, political leaders -- it's a question of where is there *not* a multicultural imperative, as if the U.S., Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and Europe would all shrivel and die without multiculturalism, despite the fact that multiculturalism is a new concept in these regions, not more than 40 or so years old, and without any previously successful trial.

Regarding imperialism, it was a benefit to the countries it affected, so it's not a case of fair play via turnabout. Imperialism in most cases brought countries out of stone aged lifestyles and introduced them to paved roads, running household water, etc.

It seems Africa for Africans, Asian for Asians, Latin America for Latinos but North America, Australia, NZ and Europe is for Everyone.

[Watser?]

Good fucking grief. I suppose slavery was beneficial as well?

How do you even address a post that has almost everything in it wrong?

Okay, initial hunch has proven correct. G'night, and good... well, g'night.

[LadyShea]

Say hello to my ignore list, bigot!

[Ensign Steve]

Originally Posted by Watser?

Good fucking grief. I suppose slavery was beneficial as well?

How do you even address a post that has almost everything in it wrong?

[Watser?]

Oh yeah...

[godfry n. glad]

Just to point out one erroneous claim:

See here.

Some of those groups even have their own "Autonomous Region", which allows them some measure of self-governance.

[ZEZOZE]

wow...i don't think this person seems evil or nasty.

i'm more for keeping it local, so i actually see a bit where they are coming from.

oh wait- i'm the jew-hating nazi.

seriously...how is this person a bigot? why do they deserve to get ignored? isn't that action the same thing you're accusing that person of? i will answer for you...yes it is.

[ChuckF]

That didn't take long. and @ India & China not being multicultural.

[ZEZOZE]

look...even i can say it's a poorly worded and thought out op, but i don't necessarily think this person is being a bigot either...

[ChuckF]

Originally Posted by InTheServiceOfZeke

look...even i can say it's a poorly worded and thought out op, but i don't necessarily think this person is being a bigot either...

Yeah. Don't care.

[ZEZOZE]

i do think that it is funny that north america should be for north americans because then we might all be meeting in long houses to discuss this...

[Farren]

South Africa is multicultural. From the CiA world factbook - black African 79%, white 9.6%, colored 8.9%, Indian/Asian 2.5%. AFAIK, one of the largest Indian populations outside of India.

And some nations that are ostensibly single culture are in fact extremely diverse. India has more than 10 languages (I can't remember the exact number), a large Muslim minority and many offshoots of Hinduism. The odd thing about India is that their language diversity makes English the lingua franca between various groups. When I went there in 2000 for an Oracle course it was because it was cheaper than doing the same course in SA and it was in (Indian) English, which is so widely spoken it's developed a huge range of local idioms and words (to the detriment of my Oracle DB education).

[AspenMama]

Originally Posted by godfry n. glad

Just to point out one erroneous claim:

See here.

Some of those groups even have their own "Autonomous Region", which allows them some measure of self-governance.

Well you know all those darn Asians look and sound alike....

[Farren]

I read an article by a Nigerian (Igbo) a year or two back where he lamented Africa's apparent rule about not messing with colonial borders on the grounds that Europe's success is premised, in part, on having clearly dominant cultures within each set of national borders.

His proposition wasn't based on racist thinking. It was just about efficiency. Culturally homogenous nations, he said, spend less time agonizing about divisive issues and more time moving forward. Which kind of makes sense. On the other hand we have (the fruitful half of) America, which seems to have benefited from being a nation of immigrants.

I think that cultural diversity is beneficial when you have a uniting ideology which appeals to a lot of people from different cultures and lots of resources, but messy when you have resource scarcity. By resources which I refer not just to natural resources like oil and coal, but more abstract resources like education and money. Competition for scarce resources brings out the worst tribal instincts in people.

I recall a friend, several years ago, recounting travelling through Africa and being struck by how overpopulated and poor both Burundi and Rwanda are. Rwanda, for those who don't see the relevance, being the site of the last major genocidal event in the previous century.

[AspenMama]

Originally Posted by 2grow

Why is it that only the U.S., Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and the nations of Europe are required to be "multicultural"?

Required? Imperative? What exactly is required here in the U.S.?

It seems Africa for Africans, Asian for Asians, Latin America for Latinos but North America, Australia, NZ and Europe is for Everyone.

Are you serious? You don't think these continents, countries and regions you mentioned have numerous and widely varied cultures integrated into their own??? Here's a simple assignment for you: Why don't you start by researching where French is spoken around the world. Then count all the other languages that are spoken across Africa; then come back and tell me if you still think there's no multi-culturalism there.

[Brimshack]

Originally Posted by 2grow

Why is it that only the U.S., Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and the nations of Europe are required to be "multicultural"? Why those nations specifically? Why not, for example, China, India, Saudi Arabia, Zimbabwe, or Guatemala? None of those nations, nor most of the world's nations have a multicultural imperative, where that the host culture is smothered with cultures from all over the world and sucess at the endeavor is gauged by how heavily the host culture is impacted, if not erased entirely.


I'm refering to -- popular culture, educational systems, worklife, political leaders -- it's a question of where is there *not* a multicultural imperative, as if the U.S., Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and Europe would all shrivel and die without multiculturalism, despite the fact that multiculturalism is a new concept in these regions, not more than 40 or so years old, and without any previously successful trial.

Regarding imperialism, it was a benefit to the countries it affected, so it's not a case of fair play via turnabout. Imperialism in most cases brought countries out of stone aged lifestyles and introduced them to paved roads, running household water, etc.

It seems Africa for Africans, Asian for Asians, Latin America for Latinos but North America, Australia, NZ and Europe is for Everyone.

You're claims about the impact of imperialism are wildly inaccurate.

Also, why are you concerned about inconsistency when there is no subject responsible for each of the instances in question. China doesn't care about Multiculturalism. Ok. The U.S. does (or some in the U.S. do). Okay. So what? These are two entirely different nations with two entirely different groups of people in charge. There is no one person that we can hold accountable for the inconsistency.

I suppose we could hold people accountable for the inconsistency in what they want from others, but that ignores genuine questions about the political prospects of the day. Could we wish China was more tolerant of its own diversity? Sure. Is that a plausible goal at present? No.

I'll use myself. I can actively promote multiculturalism (to the degree that I wish to) here in the U.S. because aspects of that agenda are actually possible here. I can for example work to ensure that history textbooks actively give a fair shake to various minorities here in the U.S. It's a goal that is more or less attainable, depending on the details and the course of a policy discussion. Could I do the same with China? No. I couldn't do that if I were actually IN China, much less sitting here in Northern Arizona. So, in the U.S. I promote some aspects of multiculturalism. With respect to China, I am more concerned with getting them to stop slave labour and political executions. Fact of the matter is that I am unlikely to get anywhre with that agenda even, because key interests in the world market much prefer to have China closed, brutal, and rich in oppressive labour conditions. So, when China comes up, the goals are much more simple, much more strident, and much further from achieving anything I would consider a positive state of affairs. Lots of things I might want for China will never get on the table these days. Multiculturalism is just one of them.

Hell, if it was till legal to kill or rape Indians for sport here in the U.S., I don't think I'd be too worried about multicultural history either. I think I'd be more concerned about life and death issues.

You have to measure what's possible and what's not.

[godfry n. glad]

Brim...The government of the People's Republic of China already actively supports multiculturalism, in all probability better than does the US.

[Watser?]

It is a bit hard to take American claims that their dominant culture is threatened seriously anyway. American culture is the biggest threat to other cultures all over the world. I read where the leader of the Vlaams Belang extreme right Flemish Belgian party was having the press over and pointing out how Flemish culture was being threatened because some shops in a certain neighborhood had Arabic signs (they also had Dutch and French signs as the owner pointed out to the journalists). Meanwhile if he had entered a video store anywhere in the country he would have found most of the films there to be American,. If he had listened to the radio, half the songs played would probably have been American. Most of the programs on tv are American. Some of the commercials are completely in English, without any subtitles even. Geert Wilders, the leader of the extreme right 'Freedom Party' here calls himself a zionist, which IMO means he has a loyalty to another country than this one. Yet all this seems to be fine. Talk about inconsistencies.

[Brimshack]

Originally Posted by godfry n. glad

Brim...The government of the People's Republic of China already actively supports multiculturalism, in all probability better than does the US.

Okay. I wouldn't have thunk it. Still a bit spektial, but then again I'm skeptical of the value of many "multicultural" policies here when we get into the details. Could you recommend any source material to learn up on the Chinese policies a bit?

[godfry n. glad]

Originally Posted by Brimshack

Okay. I wouldn't have thunk it. Still a bit spektial, but then again I'm skeptical of the value of many "multicultural" policies here when we get into the details. Could you recommend any source material to learn up on the Chinese policies a bit?

Well, to be honest, I'd be skeptical about the goals of Chinese "multi-culturalism", too. It's been a tool to move Han Chinese into other cultural areas to tip the balance of the regional ethnic representation to majority Han (the one I'm familiary with is Xinjiang, where the Uighur peoples have been the predominant cultural agglomeration for centuries, only to have been recently outnumbered thanks to Han immigrants, who were encouraged and subsidized to move to places like Xinjiang).

Here's some evidence. Searching the 'net using "China" and "minorities" should provide a ample set of data. Sorry, but I don't have a ready book source on Chinese multiculturalism.

[Naru]

Originally Posted by 2grow

Why is it that only the U.S., Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and the nations of Europe are required to be "multicultural"? Why those nations specifically? Why not, for example, China, India, Saudi Arabia, Zimbabwe, or Guatemala? None of those nations, nor most of the world's nations have a multicultural imperative, where that the host culture is smothered with cultures from all over the world and sucess at the endeavor is gauged by how heavily the host culture is impacted, if not erased entirely.


I'm refering to -- popular culture, educational systems, worklife, political leaders -- it's a question of where is there *not* a multicultural imperative, as if the U.S., Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and Europe would all shrivel and die without multiculturalism, despite the fact that multiculturalism is a new concept in these regions, not more than 40 or so years old, and without any previously successful trial.

Regarding imperialism, it was a benefit to the countries it affected, so it's not a case of fair play via turnabout. Imperialism in most cases brought countries out of stone aged lifestyles and introduced them to paved roads, running household water, etc.

It seems Africa for Africans, Asian for Asians, Latin America for Latinos but North America, Australia, NZ and Europe is for Everyone.

As they say at 4chan,

"obvious troll is obvious"

[Nullifidian]

Originally Posted by 2grow

Why is it that only the U.S., Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and the nations of Europe are required to be "multicultural"? Why those nations specifically? Why not, for example, China, India, Saudi Arabia, Zimbabwe, or Guatemala?

It seems Africa for Africans, Asian for Asians, Latin America for Latinos but North America, Australia, NZ and Europe is for Everyone.

Not to belabor the obvious, but Guatemala is part of the continent of North America.

Since that was the most accurate thing you said, the rest of it hardly warrants any response, however I will mention that you should read Mike Davis' Late Victorian Holocausts: El Niño Famines and the Making of the Third World, where you will find that the British engineered a famine in India by exporting rice at consistent or even increasing levels even though yields were down, and put the starving Indians on an employment program where their daily ration of food included less caloric intake than that given to the inmates at Buchenwald.

Or you could read Caroline Elkins' Imperial Reckoning: The Untold Story of Britain's Gulag in Kenya, a book about Britain's eight year state of "emergency" where over a million were herded into camps and starved, tortured, and sometimes killed.

Marnia Lazreg's Torture and the Twilight of Empire: From Algiers to Baghdad examines in depth the campaign of brutality waged by the French against the FLN in Algeria.

You could also read Killing Hope: US Military and CIA Interventions Since World War II for a detailed look at American empire. Some portions of it are even available online.

Or you could just walk into a pub in County Derry and ask the people you meet there how they feel about the British.

And you should start reading about the regions of the world you're so content to talk about in ignorance, where you'd learn that a significant amount of them had paved roads long before the imperialists came by to so graciously oppress them.

[Corona688]

About Canada being multicultural... we kind of have room for it. People don't have to mix if they really don't want to; if one can put up with a certain measure of hardship, there's almost always somewhere else to go. Travelling in rural areas will find little pockets of all sorts of things.

[godfry n. glad]

Originally Posted by Nullifidian

Not to belabor the obvious, but Guatemala is part of the continent of North America.

Since that was the most accurate thing you said, the rest of it hardly warrants any response, however I will mention that you should read Mike Davis' Late Victorian Holocausts: El Niño Famines and the Making of the Third World, where you will find that the British engineered a famine in India by exporting rice at consistent or even increasing levels even though yields were down, and put the starving Indians on an employment program where their daily ration of food included less caloric intake than that given to the inmates at Buchenwald.

Or you could read Caroline Elkins' Imperial Reckoning: The Untold Story of Britain's Gulag in Kenya, a book about Britain's eight year state of "emergency" where over a million were herded into camps and starved, tortured, and sometimes killed.

Marnia Lazreg's Torture and the Twilight of Empire: From Algiers to Baghdad examines in depth the campaign of brutality waged by the French against the FLN in Algeria.

You could also read Killing Hope: US Military and CIA Interventions Since World War II for a detailed look at American empire. Some portions of it are even available online.

Or you could just walk into a pub in County Derry and ask the people you meet there how they feel about the British.

And you should start reading about the regions of the world you're so content to talk about in ignorance, where you'd learn that a significant amount of them had paved roads long before the imperialists came by to so graciously oppress them.

Have you read Confessions of an Economic Hit Man by John Perkins?