Breaking News - Major Terrorist Attack In Oslo, Norway

[Jacob]

That might be a reason why MC is so popular in europe. In one stroke you can happily ignore the immigrants and pretend they don't exist because they never get out of their ghettos because they don't assimilate and on the other hand you can be tolerant and multicultural when you bother to think about them while you get outraged at the racist patriachal hierachical society which discriminates these poor people forcing them into these ghettos where their criminal, violent and mysogynistic behavoir can only be explain as a reaction to racism and hegemonic oppression.

If that is what happens and that is how it's explained, that is pretty fucked.

That said, I haven't come across any Europeans who were, you know, actually in favour of multiculturalism the way you're describing it... but I could easily have missed them, being in Canada and all. Still, none of the European media I watch and read defend multiculturalism. The only time I'm come across it in European media it's inevitably when people say things like "multiculturalism is a failure".

Who are the staunch defenders of multiculturalism in Norway and Sweden? And what are their main platforms for propagating their views?

[Malthus]

Seems to me your stance is that if there is a general rule, no matter how absurd, it ought to be enforced on everyone.

Well, I'm kinda attached to that weird concept of people having equal rights.

Even if the rule in question happens to be silly, you'd support it because of "equal rights"?

Another aspect you are missing is that creating a prohibition that only affects those who actually want to breach it isn't "equality". This sort of argument got trotted out during the gay marriage debate - that having marriage defined as one woman and one man was fully "equal" and did not offend against equality, because gay men and women could of course "get married" - they just had to get married to each other!  A variant on the old "rich men and poor men are equally prohibited from living under bridges" sort of argument. 

Similarly, saying that animals may be slaughtered in only one way doesn't offend against equality - as long as you overlook the fact that only two groups routinely wish to slaughter in another way.

[Barrister]

Where we differ seems to be in our analysis of the causes of the poor integration and the likely most effective solutions.

I have a question for you that has puzzled me a bit wth regards to solutions to this Euro issue.  If the purpose of Denmark is not as a homeland for the Danish ethnicity what is it?  What sort of universal values of Denmark would I have to embrace to be a Dane?

I'm not a Dane, and can't really answer for them.  But what they might say is that Denmark is home not to the Danish ethnicity, but the Danish culture (no matter what your ethnic heritage is)?  That as long as you, I dunno, love Hans Christian Anderson and eat rotten fish or whatever Danes eat, that you can consider yourself Danish?

It's not exactly multiculutalism, but it isn't racist either.

[Admiral Yi]

I think to a large extent the current kerfuffle in Europe is about folks there fearing losing their own cultural uniqueness, and seeking some sort of government enforcement of that. Which is more or less the opposite of "multiculturalism".

I think that's a massive understatement of the issue.  I think it's mostly about fears of rising crime from a group of people who are hostile to the core values of the host culture, who are less than Lutheran in their efforts to become productive members of society, and who practice coercion on their own offspring in a way that is anathema to the host culture.  It's not about Danes losing their dominance in team handball.

[Jacob]

Yeah, I think overall I cannot really accept Jacobs definition of multiculturalism. I think of it more as a subset of the tolerance he is talking about, or even a rejection that that tolerance is adequate.

MC suggests that more than just tolerance is needed - active accommodation to differing cultures, even at the expense of the "host" culture, is required. The host culture must not only tolerate the other culture, it must even adapt itself to the secondary culture to cater to it if necessary to accomdate those elements that the immigrant culture find important. After all, if all culture are equally valid, then why should Muslim immigrants be required to adapt to French norms? Rather France should actively shift their norms to make room for the secondary culture.

MC is, to me, not so much about allowing other languages, but rather *requiring* that signs be in both languages, even if one is a clear minority (for example).

The American ideal of tolerance is that you can come here, and hang onto whatever culture you like, to whatever extent you like, but you should have no real expectation that American culture will actively change to accommodate you. It might - because cultures are hardly static - but that change will be driven by cultural evolution, so to speak, nt by any active decisions on the part of political parties to protect or integrate portions. American culture will assimilate those things that America as a whole finds culturally useful or compelling, as opposed to those things that the immigrant culture might find important to them.

We love your food, so please open an Indian restaurant so we can eat it. However, that Hindu crap about castes? Yeah, that is stupid, so it is going to have to be left at the border. Beatles yes, boiling our meat, no.

The key is that it is American culture that picks and chooses what gets assimilated. We make no promises that what the immigrant culture finds important will be retained.

Okay, fair enough.

My question to you then is: who is in favour of multiculturalism the way you define it?

I mean, I'm sure we can find a few radical academics and a handful of bright-eyed young activists somewhere. But are there any governments anywhere that have adapted multicultural policies along those lines? Are there any major political parties that have done so? Where have societies attempted to be multicultural according to the definition you're using?

Because from where I'm sitting that's not how we do it in the US or Canada, and it doesn't look like they've tried anything along those lines anywhere in Europe either in spite of all the wailing and gnashing of teeth - and now mass murder.

[Martinus]

Well, you could say that America is willing to spend a lot of money on its military/security (at the cost of stuff like free education, healthcare or social welfare) to "keep the darkies out" as it were - again, something Europe is not willing to do either.

We do not really strive to keep the darkies out...but we pretend to.  Which is classic America really.

But I am not sure even in this charade our military and security forces are raised for that purpose.  Where did you get this idea from?

Well, I think it is helpful to view modern cultural conflicts in terms of a class warfare. The sophisticated well-off "upper class" vs. the barbaric savage uncouth "lower class". The global City vs. the global Slum. You can keep the lower class down only for so long - you need force or you need to open the society otherwise. Seems like Europe is not willing to do either.

[Admiral Yi]

Well, I think it is helpful to view modern cultural conflicts in terms of a class warfare. The sophisticated well-off "upper class" vs. the barbaric savage uncouth "lower class". The global City vs. the global Slum. You can keep the lower class down only for so long - you need force or you need to open the society otherwise. Seems like Europe is not willing to do either.

The American green card lottery doesn't really fit your narrative Marty.

[Valmy]

I think we Americans were not aware what we doing was multiculturalism so I think that is part of confusion.  When we hear the word it sounds like some sort of radical leftist thing people sneer at us for not doing.

If what we are doing is, in fact, what multiculturalism then we are for it!

[Martinus]

Where we differ seems to be in our analysis of the causes of the poor integration and the likely most effective solutions.

I have a question for you that has puzzled me a bit wth regards to solutions to this Euro issue.  If the purpose of Denmark is not as a homeland for the Danish ethnicity what is it?  What sort of universal values of Denmark would I have to embrace to be a Dane?

That's the problem. With a few exceptions, most European nationalism must be lame.

[Jacob]

I have a question for you that has puzzled me a bit wth regards to solutions to this Euro issue.  If the purpose of Denmark is not as a homeland for the Danish ethnicity what is it?  What sort of universal values of Denmark would I have to embrace to be a Dane?

Pickled herring, salt licorice, casual drunk sex in high school, an unshakeable faith that Denmark is in fact the best place in the world and Danes are the most tolerant people in the world whatever the facts might indicate.

... that might be a bit inaccurate now though. My Danish identity is a bit outdated, buffeted by the seductive winds of sweet multiculturalism here in Canada as I am.

[Martinus]

Seems to me your stance is that if there is a general rule, no matter how absurd, it ought to be enforced on everyone.

Well, I'm kinda attached to that weird concept of people having equal rights.

Even if the rule in question happens to be silly, you'd support it because of "equal rights"?

Another aspect you are missing is that creating a prohibition that only affects those who actually want to breach it isn't "equality". This sort of argument got trotted out during the gay marriage debate - that having marriage defined as one woman and one man was fully "equal" and did not offend against equality, because gay men and women could of course "get married" - they just had to get married to each other!  A variant on the old "rich men and poor men are equally prohibited from living under bridges" sort of argument. 

Similarly, saying that animals may be slaughtered in only one way doesn't offend against equality - as long as you overlook the fact that only two groups routinely wish to slaughter in another way.

Yeah I guess you are right.

[Jacob]

Seems to me your stance is that if there is a general rule, no matter how absurd, it ought to be enforced on everyone.

Well, I'm kinda attached to that weird concept of people having equal rights.

Exactly. It should be illegal for all people to sleep under bridges, whether they are rich or poor.

Similarly, it should be illegal for all people to have immoral sex, whether they are men or women.

... that sort of reasoning, right?

[Martinus]

Well, I think it is helpful to view modern cultural conflicts in terms of a class warfare. The sophisticated well-off "upper class" vs. the barbaric savage uncouth "lower class". The global City vs. the global Slum. You can keep the lower class down only for so long - you need force or you need to open the society otherwise. Seems like Europe is not willing to do either.

The American green card lottery doesn't really fit your narrative Marty.

Well, I think you are doing both. Actually, historically, you have been quite open - it's only recently that you are moving into positions of more forceful "besieged fortress", as anti-immigrant sentiments demonstrate.

[Jacob]

I think to a large extent the current kerfuffle in Europe is about folks there fearing losing their own cultural uniqueness, and seeking some sort of government enforcement of that. Which is more or less the opposite of "multiculturalism".

I don't think it's quite that, actually. I don't see Europeans being worried about losing their own cultural uniqueness.

I think it's rather along the lines of what Minsky said earlier, that there are many people who are profoundly uncomfortable with seeing "the other" up close and having to accept them. Especially if that "other" isn't desperate to become just like the locals.

[Martinus]

I think we Americans were not aware what we doing was multiculturalism so I think that is part of confusion.  When we hear the word it sounds like some sort of radical leftist thing people sneer at us for not doing.

If what we are doing is, in fact, what multiculturalism then we are for it!

I think you have to remember that in the Western world you are quite unique because your national identity is a post-enlightenment construct, whereas pretty much everyone else in the West (including the Canadians, since they still have the Queen) is more or less still using the pre-modern elements to define their national identity. In a sense you got it easy (although it's because of your past choices so it is not undeserved easiness).