Main reason for seeing 'multiculturalism' as a failure

[Racsoviale]

I would like to invite you over here to the little corner of Europe where I live Quackers, then you will see the "succes" of an anti-multicultural society. where immigration-policy is often critized by amnesty, immigrants(evl moooslemss) are forced to take citizenship tests native born danes cant even get right and and having the name mohammad means you have to feel content with being treated as a second grade citizen the rest of you life. Welcome to the West. And to be honest you wouldnt even have that easy a time here, being english and not a native of this land.

There is also something extremely embarrasing about being measured as the lowest type of society by our good neighbours the Swedes who we usually compare a lot of policy and societal norms with.

 

[holy king]

hm, i live with a half- turk, half german and a half hungarian, half austrian, and i have to say our multiculturalism hasnt really failed.
i mean, yeah, we probably consume way too much alcohol, and the toilet can get quite dirty before someone gets up and cleans it, but i wouldnt call it failed.

 

[Racsoviale]

wait!! he is four parts half-something? I know I'm bad at maths but I dont think that is how you make halves

 

[holy king]

manbearpig lives in the closet btw.

 

[Racsoviale]

uhhh then it all makes sense. you wonderful bastard of a mad scientist. Does that mean you have created this "housemate" of yours? he seems to be made of peoples who at various times tried to rule the world

the true face of multiculturalism has shown itself, and in what more appropriate location but in Vienna?

 

[Yeekim]

This idealised "fortress" of "picking and choosing" that you think exists, doesn't.

O RLY?
Italy alone has probably had to deal with more refugees this past week alone than Australia has seen within half a decade.

EDIT: Will answer the rest later, have to go now.

 

[Cutlass]

Multiculturalism has nothing to do with racial or ethnic differences, even if these differences often coincide. Given this interpretation: - The salad bowl with different cultural and religious divisions keep the society segregated, and for example keeps people from marrying between groups due to social, cultural or religious pressure. It also lowers the competitiveness in some groups that won't adapt, which again ties in to the welfare.

I don't really like either the melting pot or the salad analogies. I'd rather think of it as a stew. You throw parts into a stew and let it simmer and you can still tell some difference between the ingredients, but everything has taken on some of the flavor of everything right. And eventually if you leave it long enough it will all blend into a mush of one thing. But you keep adding more so keep adding flavor. That describes the American experience better.

In the American experience, the only people who haven't mostly assimilated over time have been those groups, blacks, hispanics, native Americans, that have never been permitted to assimilate. Those that have been discriminated against and segregated. But that doesn't hold for all members of those groups. Segregation and discrimination still exists, but is less that it was. So most members of those groups have assimilated, even though all have not.

But that assimilation has not been the elimination of their cultures and the full adoption of the "American" culture. They have instead added to what we are. And they have kept a portion of what they were.

 

[azzaman333]

Blaming minorities is an easy way to gain popularity with those scared of foreigners.

 

[Loppan Torkel]

Ooooh, people from the country where a quarter of the population were born overseas don't understand the evils of multiculturalism? Right.

This idealised "fortress" of "picking and choosing" that you think exists, doesn't. It's not really different to Europe. People mostly enter to work or to be with their families who are already there. Are you telling me you think the people entering Italy or France to work or be with their families are somehow "worse" than the people entering Australia or Canada to work or be with their families?

If your cultures are unwelcoming and your policies unsupportive of newcomers, then you're going to get social problems, but that's a result of not doing multiculturalism sufficiently well. It's not like the numbers in Europe are proportionately higher than in Australia, in fact they're lower virtually everywhere both in "percentage of population which is foreign born" and in "arrivals per year as a percentage of total population" terms. Hell maybe you need more migrants in these countries to get people accustomed to them.

As for refugee and asylum entries (which should, of course, create more problems with social disolcation and such)... refugees and asylum seekers are a small minority of the total population of Europe or Australia, and of total arrivals. We're talking substantially less than half a million applications a year across 50 countries. Only a handful of countries get more than 10 000 applications a year. So don't tell me refugees or asylum entrants are this big uncontrolled flow of foreigners Australians just can't understand.

And as I say, the numbers of entry are lower. France, a country with 3 times the population of Australia, has lower gross numbers enter than Australia does (140 000 per year), foreign-born people make up only 8% of that country. And something like 70% of arrivals each year consist of family entries joining existing citizens, hardly a source of additional social dislocation or instability.

In the case of Sweden, they have about 14% foreign-born and a high asylum intake, but 3 of the 5 largest foreign-born populations are European - Finns, Poles and Yugoslavians. In Norway (11%) there's more Poles and Swedes than Pakistanis, and only 30 000 of those.

Greece and Spain? 10% or less. They're just not used to being recipients instead of sources of migrants. Much like the Irish. They'll get over it.

The difference between Australia and much of Europe is of attitude and policy on the part of host countries, not of the nature, character or size of the migration.

You're trying hard to justify your beliefs with some handpicked and in the end fairly irrelevant numbers. Sweden has permitted residency for about 20 000 Somalis the last three years. Can you give me a number for how many Somalis Australia has accepted over that period? I would appreciate that.

I don't really like either the melting pot or the salad analogies. I'd rather think of it as a stew. You throw parts into a stew and let it simmer and you can still tell some difference between the ingredients, but everything has taken on some of the flavor of everything right. And eventually if you leave it long enough it will all blend into a mush of one thing. But you keep adding more so keep adding flavor. That describes the American experience better.

In the American experience, the only people who haven't mostly assimilated over time have been those groups, blacks, hispanics, native Americans, that have never been permitted to assimilate. Those that have been discriminated against and segregated. But that doesn't hold for all members of those groups. Segregation and discrimination still exists, but is less that it was. So most members of those groups have assimilated, even though all have not.

But that assimilation has not been the elimination of their cultures and the full adoption of the "American" culture. They have instead added to what we are. And they have kept a portion of what they were.

You're still hoping that this glorified stew is true and magically will appear in a multicultural society. It doesn't. In an American society where you're left to take care of yourself to a greater degree, groups that aren't competitive will have to adjust or just get by. That's not true here in Sweden. It's fully possible to not adjust to society and become competitive, but to not learn the language, keep all religious and cultural aspects and live on welfare within a small community.

Blaming minorities is an easy way to gain popularity with those scared of foreigners.

It is, but if a politician raises a valid concern about the present integration policies not being sustainable - he's likely to be called a racist, implied he is one or that he uses it to gain support by xenophobes. The morality in doing this without anything to back it up, is pretty low.

 

[Cutlass]

You're still hoping that this glorified stew is true and magically will appear in a multicultural society. It doesn't. In an American society where you're left to take care of yourself to a greater degree, groups that aren't competitive will have to adjust or just get by. That's not true here in Sweden. It's fully possible to not adjust to society and become competitive, but to not learn the language, keep all religious and cultural aspects and live on welfare within a small community.

I don't have to "hope" that it will work. We have 100s of years of seeing it work. The number of first generation immigrants that doesn't learn the language is small. The number of second generation that doesn't learn the language is trivial. The number of third generation that doesn't learn the language is not worth counting. If that isn't your experience there, then you are fundamentally making a mistake somewhere. And it's not the immigrant's mistake, it's your mistake.

Don't blame them for your failings.

 

[Yeekim]

I don't have to "hope" that it will work. We have 100s of years of seeing it work. The number of first generation immigrants that doesn't learn the language is small. The number of second generation that doesn't learn the language is trivial. The number of third generation that doesn't learn the language is not worth counting. If that isn't your experience there, then you are fundamentally making a mistake somewhere. And it's not the immigrant's mistake, it's your mistake.

Don't blame them for your failings.

I would not have thought I'll see you advocate "get rid of the welfare and start handing out bootstraps" policies.
EDIT: Also "oh, their grandchildren will definitely learn to speak Swedish" is not much of a consolation for someone who must cope with 20,000 Somalis today.

 

[Hakim]

It is, but if a politician raises a valid concern about the present integration policies not being sustainable - he's likely to be called a racist, implied he is one or that he uses it to gain support by xenophobes. The morality in doing this without anything to back it up, is pretty low.

Well you asked and since no-one knows what's in Merkel's head people have to guess. If a politician is vague and don't suggest anything that can be discussed then it's reasonable to think it's positioning - the politician want to shift a bit in one direction or the other in the eye of the voters to take votes from others.

 

[Cutlass]

I would not have thought I'll see you advocate "get rid of the welfare and start handing out bootstraps" policies.
EDIT: Also "oh, their grandchildren will definitely learn to speak Swedish" is not much of a consolation for someone who must cope with 20,000 Somalis today.

I'm not opposed to welfare in general. I always support a strong social safety net. But I do draw the line at welfare that lets someone get away with never trying to do anything for themselves.

 

[metatron]

On topic...

it's the right attacking a strawman for votes.
nothing to see here.

This.
Post #2.
Should have been /thread ...

Wouldn't it be smarter to do it closer to an election?

No, it's smart to do it when you are asked to do so. Merkel for one had to react to the (moron-)hype around Sarrazin's book.

In the case of Sarko and Merkel it's especially silly as neither country has ever truly tried a proper multicultural policy.

Erm...Germany is (and was) a multicultural society. "German culture" - if existant at all - is a very heterogenous and fragile thing.
I for one have way more in common with a Dutch than a Bavarian (and would barely understand the latter any better as well), which conservatives - of course - carefully ignore when they bring up the (mostly artificial) idea of a common German cultural identity.
What they actually mean (for the most part) is economic usefulness. It's, supposedly, ungerman not to work hard for 50 years and die a year later, never costing the state any money. (Yeah, like Germans ever did that recently...).
But no, those pesky immegrants insist on procreating, getting sick, loosing jobs etc. and all of that would annoy the hell out of "conservatives" no matter how excellent speakers of German and law-abiding those immigrants ever become.

What are the goals of multiculturalists anyway? They do know that the "Western" world will cease to be Western if they continue?

No. It will if you get your way.

And the answer to the first question is simple: A secular society in which a citizens nationality is defined as as little more than their allegiance to the constitution as possible.

The Germans ran a "guest worker" program and closed off the main routes for foreigners to integrate, such as citizenship, treating the presence of foreigners as a temporary thing even as the "guest workers" became second and third generation Germans.

Erm, yes. And no.
Theoretically you are right. But the "original plan" is rendered moot by reality.
Everyone has aknowledged that. Like in the early 80s.
Disagrement is mostly about whether that is a good thing or not.
You see, that is a very German thing to do. Similar to the German approach to multireligious society (Catholics/Lutherans). Contrary to Dutch or Swiss custom post war Germans decided that ignoring that this may ever be a problem was an excellent approach.

It does seems like Merkel use the term MultiKulti to describe a feeling or end result rather than a coherent policy. She doesn't seem to have a clear idea of exactly what she's criticizing. I guess you could say that about most politicians though. They throw around terms and statements to evoke feelings and perhaps position themselves.

"Multikulti" in German is a tainted term anyway. It's not just about immigrants but a slur against any kind of post-material, post-gender, (outspoken) atheist society in general.
It's code for "the youth is bad" and "feminists annoy me" as much as for "immigrants are lazy".
Actual proponents of multicultural society have, for the most part, stopped to use the word. It's allmost as ruined as American "liberal".

There are multiple cultures, therefor an approach to social policy that can accept this is a step forward. Seems entirely 1+1 type stuff.

In their efforts to deny science "conservatives" usually start with math anyway.

@Quackers
On a final note i would like to chime in with the others asking you: What is your identity? How is your identity affected by natural born Brits who differ a great deal from you in terms of values and customs?
What are immigrants supposed to do in order to be sufficiently British? What's necessary and what's expendable in terms of their efforts to be British?
Instead of having to watch you and TF fight this out line by line i would very much appreciate a straight-forward proclamation what your values are supposed to be and in which ways most/many/some immigrant's customs run against them.

Such a thing would be great. So on page 8 there could be some actual discussion of the issue. If you don't deliver i see that as further testimony that all the "immigration critics", despite their claims to the contrary and their fear of being "silenced", have no interest in actually debating the issue.
Here they failed to do so for 7 pages. Counting.

For all i know this nonsense is for the most part a European version of "culture war": A strawmen "conservatives" merely use to project all kinds of negative character traits on their political opponents (like naivety or stubbornness) to make an all out attack on all liberal positions easier.
But hey, i may be wrong, enlighten me!


Hey leave some mud for me...

Well then it's Europe's failings. Seems to work okay from the US to Brazil to Canada to Australia to India, which also happens to be a very inefficient flight plan.

Erm, no. In some medieval social-darwinist society where poor people are left in the gutter, barely any institution functions as one would expect and where a "police" is roaming the cities that treats the non-immigrants in a way that German police would not dare treat immigrants, it is hardly possible to fall any shorter in being a decent society for immigrants than being a decent society for non-immigrants.
That's not an accomplishment or a sign of some superior value system.
That's not the kind of equality i want.

Oh, plus...

Yeah, sure it works in Canada. Why shouldn't the policy: "bring us your young, well-educated, and financially solvent (and no one but them!), since we have one of the largest, emptiest countries in the world" work?

Unfortunately, it has been kinda difficult to implement in most European countries.

Couldn't have said it better.

Still @ contre: Sorry for coming on so strong but i get tired of those unfounded and unwarranted Europe-failing-immigration-nonsense claims.

America's a good example of effective multiculturalism.

Building a fence on your border, treating immigrants like trash, downsizing 200 year old civil liberties for the sake of fighting illigal immigration and subjecting immigrants to a brutal and biased police, biased judges, borderline overpowered prosecutors and a darwinist healthcare system are the hallmarks of a good integration policy?

It's worked for Singapore. Maybe Europeans aren't really interested in multiculturalism to begin with?

Singapore doesn't get to be an example for anything ever either. An enclave of elites and millionaires is not a model when it comes to "who has the best education system". Neither is it here.
When you are appalled by how badly integration has failed in Monaco, Singapore might come in handy though.

Quackers already exposes himself to Turkish kebabs regularly.

Yet again:
Kebap - Turkish.
Kebab - Persian.
I suppose this could get you into major trouble. That it doesn't is testimony of the civil attitude and orderly conduct of Britain's immigrants.

Accepting only immigrants who are single, female, hot and easy is definitely something I could vote for.

Well, allegedly Estonia has a sex ratio among people 15-64 of 0.91 males to 1 female.
The lowest in Europe.
So if anything, you have to share...

 

[Loppan Torkel]

I don't have to "hope" that it will work. We have 100s of years of seeing it work. The number of first generation immigrants that doesn't learn the language is small. The number of second generation that doesn't learn the language is trivial. The number of third generation that doesn't learn the language is not worth counting. If that isn't your experience there, then you are fundamentally making a mistake somewhere. And it's not the immigrant's mistake, it's your mistake.

Don't blame them for your failings.

I don't blame them. It's the system that's not working. Multiculturalism won't sort itself out and be a benefit for the society just because it contains more cultures, which is the point. If you handpick your immigrants, let them cope for themselves or kick them out if they can't get a job - fine, it probably works great, but this is not the system here in Sweden. Not to the degree you or the Australians have.

Well you asked and since no-one knows what's in Merkel's head people have to guess. If a politician is vague and don't suggest anything that can be discussed then it's reasonable to think it's positioning - the politician want to shift a bit in one direction or the other in the eye of the voters to take votes from others.

I didn't mean those voting for the first option, it's as you say anyone's guess, but accusations come up pretty quick as soon as a politician, or anyone else for the matter, questions integration or the benefits of multiculturalism.

 

[Hakim]

I didn't mean those voting for the first option, it's as you say anyone's guess, but accusations come up pretty quick as soon as a politician, or anyone else for the matter, questions integration or the benefits of multiculturalism.

Well if you hold something behind your back and refuse to show it then anyone would suspect it's nothing good. Once something tangible is suggested that will be attacked instead.

 

[Loppan Torkel]

Well if you hold something behind your back and refuse to show it then anyone would suspect it's nothing good. Once something tangible is suggested that will be attacked instead.

It is a delicate subject. There could be an unnecessary risk if the politicians make that something that doesn't work 'tangible' for the public. True xenophobia and one group specified as the problem isn't desirable. Was that perhaps what you meant?

 

[Arwon]

You're trying hard to justify your beliefs with some handpicked and in the end fairly irrelevant numbers. Sweden has permitted residency for about 20 000 Somalis the last three years. Can you give me a number for how many Somalis Australia has accepted over that period? I would appreciate that.

So, Somalis are worse than other migrants? Why are they especially bad for multiculturalism? 20 000 is not a very large percentage of a country like Sweden's population, dude. 20 thousand into ten million, I think is 0.002%. There were actually about 10 000 Somalis in Australia in 2006, we'll see how that number has changed with the next census, but I bet the Sudanese population will have risen quite a bit faster than the Somali.

For the record, as of 2006 there's about 20 000 Sudanese born Australians, are they less worse than the same number of Somalis? What about 250 000 Lebanese Australians or 80 000 Iraqi Australians or 60 000 Egyptian Australians?

Again, the difference between Australia and Sweden is not the number or quality of the migrants. You haven't explained why you think people entering European countries to work or be with their families are so much "worse" than people entering Australia doing the same thing - this weird mumbling about Somalis in Sweden doesn't really cut it.

Besides which, a lot of Somalis will be on humanitarian visas, and refugee and asylum seeker entry isn't really the same thing as a country's migration policy.

 

[Cutlass]

Somali and Bantu migration to Maine refers to the migration of ethnic Somalis as well as people from the Bantu minority ethnic group to the American state of Maine.[1]

Background

Bantus are a minority ethnic group in Somalia, a country largely inhabited by Somalis. They are the descendants of people from various Bantu ethnic groups originating from what are modern-day Tanzania, Malawi and Mozambique who were brought to Somalia as slaves in the 19th century. Bantus are ethnically, physically, and culturally distinct from Somalis, and have remained marginalized since their arrival in Somalia.[2][3]

During the Somali Civil War, which first began with the overthrow of Siad Barre in 1991, many Bantus were evicted from their lands by various armed factions of Somali clans. Being visible minorities and possessing little in the way of firearms, the Bantus were particularly vulnerable to violence and looting by gun-toting militiamen. Fearing war and famine, tens of thousands of Bantus fled to refugee camps in neighboring Kenya.[3]

In the year 2000, the United States classified the Bantu as a priority and began preparations to resettle an estimated 12,000 Bantu refugees in select cities throughout the U.S..[4] Most of the early arrivals in the United States settled in Clarkston, Georgia, a city adjacent to Atlanta. However, they were mostly assigned to low rent, poverty-stricken inner city areas, so many began to look to resettle elsewhere in the US.[1]
[edit] Present situation

Word soon spread that the town of Lewiston, Maine, had a low crime rate, good schools and cheap housing.[5] Somalis subsequently began a secondary migration from other states to the former mill town, and after 2005, many Bantus followed suit.[1]

In October 2002, then-Mayor Laurier T. Raymond wrote an open letter addressed to leaders of the Somali community, predicting a negative impact on the city's social services and requesting that they discourage further relocation to Lewiston.[5] The letter angered some persons and prompted some community leaders and residents to speak out against the mayor, drawing national attention. Demonstrations were held in Lewiston, both by those who supported the Bantus' presence and those who opposed it.[6]

In January 2003, a small white supremacist group demonstrated in Lewiston in support of the mayor, prompting a simultaneous counter-demonstration of about 4,000 people at Bates College and the organization of the "Many and One Coalition". Only 32 attended the rally by the white supremacist group. The mayor was out of state on the day of the rallies, while governor John Baldacci and other officials attended.

In 2006, a severed frozen pig's head was thrown into a Lewiston mosque while the faithful were praying. This was considered very offensive by the town's Muslim community, as swine is proscribed in Islam. The culprit admitted to the act and claimed it to be a joke. He later committed suicide.[7]

Many Somali residents have settled in the Kennedy Park neighborhood of Lewiston, alongside other migrants and immigrants from across the world.

In 2001, the non-profit organization United Somali Women of Maine (USWM) was founded in Lewiston, seeking to promote the empowerment of Somali women and girls across the state.[8] According to the USWM, there are now an estimated 4000-5000 Somali and Bantu immigrants in Lewiston.[9]

The Somali Bantu Community Mutual Assistance Association of Lewiston/Auburn Maine (SBCMALA) also serves the local Bantu community, focusing on housing, employment, literacy and education, health, and safety matters.[4]

In 2010, several Somali immigrants, now citizens of the United States and residents of Portland, filed to run for the Maine Legislature. Mohammed Dini ran in District 119 in a Democratic Party primary; Badr Sharif ran in the Republican Party primary for District 116, both of which are located in the city of Portland. Both candidates were defeated in primary challenges.[10]

In August 2010, the Lewiston Sun Journal reported that Somali entrepreneurs had helped reinvigorate downtown Lewiston by opening dozens of shops in previously closed storefronts. Amicable relations were reported by the local merchants of French-Canadian descent and the Somali storekeepers.

Maine population 1,328,361
Somalis in Maine ~ 4000-5000

Maine demographics:
2000 (total population) White 98.08% Black 0.77% Native American 1.03% Asian 0.93% Pacific Islander 0.06%

Result: fairly positive.

So no, Somalis can't integrate.

 

[Masada]

Or Irish. Don't forget the bloody Irish, and their stews and their drinking and their overcrowding of apartment blocks.

Dirty stinking Papist mick buggers. Hang 'em all and send 'em back the Emerald Isle. Awstralia is for the Awstralians.