"saying 'It's their culture' ... It's like saying the culture of Massachusetts is burning witches."
This is a VERY excellent article. I would stand up and applaud it but I think I would get quizzical looks from my co-workers.
(facebookers click through to my blog for the link, as always)
4 comments:
Actually, I thought that article was idiotic. For instance, it's based on a total caricature of what multiculturalism implies:
"the doctrine of multiculturalism ... says a society should be divided into separate cultures with different norms according to ethnic origin."
I suppose that's *one* vision of society to which one could apply the term 'multicultural', but certainly not the only one, and despite the German decisions he lists, I don't think there's a single country out there that applies multiculturalism that way. His vision is reactionary and totally simplistic. He lumps Canada and Germany together despite fundamental differences between those two societies, and despite the fact that Canada has a WAY easier time with its immigrants than pseudo-homogoneous Britain or France.
He decries faith-based schools: "It is multiculturalists, for example, who are the biggest champions of the Government's massive expansion of "faith" schools, where children will be segregated according to parental superstition and often taught the most literalist and cruel strain of a "faith"." Total garbage. I don't know what basis he has to make generalizations like "often taught the most literalist and cruel strain of a 'faith'", but it certainly isn't empirical evidence. It almost seems trite to point out that separate schools in Canada is what allowed the peace to be maintained between the various sectarian and cultural groups. His contemptuous dismissal of Islam as a pseudo-faith (note the quotation marks) or of any faith as 'superstition' is repugnant. His personal epistemology wasn't arrived at through virtue and courage, he ripped it off from his environment like everybody else. I'm an atheist and strongly dislike religion, but that doesn't mean that I think people with religious beliefs are somehow inferior.
This guy strikes me as a self-righteous, bigotted and pompous ass. His problem isn't with multiculturalism, it's with Islam. He doesn't seem to have a problem with Switzerland's version of multiculturalism. The German decisions he refers to seem on the face of it disgraceful, but without reading the whole transcript I'd be hesitant to pass judgment on them. In any case, every country in the western world takes personal circumstances into consideration when it comes to sentencing. These people weren't absolved of their crimes, but rather were sentenced based on the degree to which their intent was malicious. That most certainly will vary from one culture to the next and our notion of justice requires that it be taken into account.
As an aside, it seems risible to me that he would use Germany as a case-study in multiculturalism, a country still won't grant citizenship to people of turkish descent who are 3rd and 4th generation immigrants because of it's ridiculously restrictive citizenship laws.
Erik, your point is well taken but the reason I want to cheer it is precisely because of its attack on fundamentalist islam and how it treats women and our society's tendency to apologise for it because we don't want to be prejudiced. I also thought calling it multiculturalism was a flaw in the argument because "multiculturalism" is a hard term to pin down and therefore hard to attack or defend. No one is against the idea of anti-racism and embracing those culturally diverse traditions that are generally harmless. But I applaud any article that our apologia for cultural practices - our own or anyone elses - should cease as soon as the palpable harm outweighs the palpable good. For me a christian hating gay marriage or an islamist insisting on treating his wife as his chattal is the same to me. And I will back any play that works toward stopping it.
Fair enough. I agree with everything you just said. I think it's important to remember (and some people often forget) that multiculturalism is at root a *liberal* value (i.e. small-l, J.S. Mill liberalism). It's part of a framework of beliefs which emphasizes equality, personal autonomy and the free exchange of ideas. A cultural practice which is incompatible with those core principles can't be defended using multiculturalism.
P.S. after re-reading my comments I realise they sounded kind of strident. Sorry about that--feeling bitter 'cause I'm still at school finishing papers while everyone is done, and I'm very much in need of a vacation.
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