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Source: (consider it)
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Thread: Purgatory: Failing our Muslim Sisters in the name of Multiculturalism
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mdijon
Shipmate
# 8520
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by gbuchanan:
If multiculturalism is used to excuse "hands off" approaches (which it sounds to me that you're suggesting), I don't buy it at all.
Maybe we are both reading things into each others posts that aren't there.
I'm most worried by the part that you thought was a personal attack. I'm not necessarily saying that you are an unsympathetic person..... but I am suggesting that it would be very difficult to express the sentiments you do, in the way you do, without someone from a minority group - with the previous experiences I describe - finding the approach antipathic. Without it tending to produce a "Sort your own house out first" kind of response.
And that, to me, is the question here. If societies really do want to do something about the honour killings, for instance, and the cultural factors which support them, then they need to be able to intervene within those cultures, to voice dissapproval, to take action without further polarizing the culture against them. Without increasing the sense of "us and them" as it's done.
And it seems to me, that statements like "then clearly the factors are more to do with the endemic origins of the community than the nationality/race or, indeed, the religion or host community" are unlikely to head in that direction.
I'm saying this thinking of my misguided past as a black-supremecist, thinking how entrenched I was in my views, and what sort of encounters with white people further alienated me.... and what sort of encounters were my salvation.
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mdijon nojidm uoɿıqɯ ɯqıɿou
ɯqıɿou uoɿıqɯ nojidm mdijon
Posts: 12277 | From: UK | Registered: Sep 2004
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Rat
Ship's Rat
# 3373
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Posted
I can only assume we're all misreading each other - I've lost track at least!
I've never intended to suggest that race relations are one dimensional, or that the attitude of the host community is the only factor. There are obviously lots of variables both in how a particular group is treated, in how they behave and in how they react to a particular context.
For instance, I'd think it's so obvious as not to need stating that, for example, a middle-class well-educated Indian coming to Scotland to study medicine, or with enough financial support to start a business, will be very different and have a very different experience to a non-English-speaking, uneducated Indian coming from poverty to provide cheap labour in an ailing textile industry that promptly died. There will also be huge differences in how the host community reacts to them in each case. I don't think I've said anything that would suggest immigrant communities are homogeneous.
Nor do I think I've suggested a 'hands-off' approach to crime in any community.
However, I do think that (from a purely pragmatic point of view if nothing else) it behooves the host community to look at their own behaviour and communication to see whether they are making things worse than they need to be, especially in terms of hampering effective policing or discouraging victims from coming forward. Which I think is also part of what mdijon is saying, though going on today's performance I may be entirely wrong about that ![[Biased]](wink.gif)
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It's a matter of food and available blood. If motherhood is sacred, put your money where your mouth is. Only then can you expect the coming down to the wrecked & shimmering earth of that miracle you sing about. [Margaret Atwood]
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mdijon
Shipmate
# 8520
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Posted
No, you're entirely correct.
And BTW, the rest is what I thought you were saying.
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mdijon nojidm uoɿıqɯ ɯqıɿou
ɯqıɿou uoɿıqɯ nojidm mdijon
Posts: 12277 | From: UK | Registered: Sep 2004
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gbuchanan
Shipmate
# 415
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Rat:
I can only assume we're all misreading each other - I've lost track at least!
It seems to be heading that way.
quote:
Nor do I think I've suggested a 'hands-off' approach to crime in any community.
Well, what remains, not at all clear to me is how you foresee being able to engage against the sort of practices that instigated this thread without some of the problems of "put your own house in order" claims emerging.
In a sense, I get the impression now that we agree on the pinpointing the problem phase, but I'm not at all clear where we stand on how to respond.
quote:
However, I do think that (from a purely pragmatic point of view if nothing else) it behooves the host community to look at their own behaviour and communication to see whether they are making things worse than they need to be, especially in terms of hampering effective policing or discouraging victims from coming forward. Which I think is also part of what mdijon is saying, though going on today's performance I may be entirely wrong about that
So far as that goes, I think we're again in agreement.
I suppose, on reflecting, that any attempt to socially address these problems has to engage the support of near-relative communities (e.g., say, taking your example I cut, the Indian community in, say, the UK) when addressing the problems of a subsector of it, and also doing all one can to work on "hearts and minds" on the community where the problem is centred. Certainly positive race relations are needed there too. Like so many problems in society we need to use many levers to be effective.
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mdijon
Shipmate
# 8520
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Posted
I think that's it, that's what we're talking about.
Some of the initiatives to "win hearts and minds" seem quite contrived.... patronising even (PCs being filmed for the 9 O'clock news hanging around hindu prayer rituals and eating a curry)..... and the phrase now makes me think first of Iraq.
There is probably a parallel with evangelism. Making friends with someone to "win them for Christ" often leaves a bit of a bitter after-taste..... one would hope that if one cared enough for another individual to want to save their soul altruisticly, one would actually want to be their friend for it's own sake as well..... and perhaps this is the same.
(Only the first sentence directed at you, G Buchanan)
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mdijon nojidm uoɿıqɯ ɯqıɿou
ɯqıɿou uoɿıqɯ nojidm mdijon
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gbuchanan
Shipmate
# 415
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Posted
..never thought otherwise!
One real difficulty is discerning crossing-points: when, for example, one tips between (say) effectiveness and ineffectiveness, and challenge and confrontation. I think that your parallel with evangelisation is a very pointed one. However, even that is not quite adequate when it is going hand-in-hand with the urgency of trying to eliminate, or at least seriously reduce, criminal acts.
Also how does one continue when there is an absolute refusal, because the cultural tradition is so ingrained? Persuasion will still perhaps succeed in the long run, but it is a challenge to gauge that task well.
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Russ
Old salt
# 120
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Posted
I was going to say that there are two straw men around here.
One goes something like "immigrants are basically victims; the underlying problem is racism; what we need to do is be more accommodating and sympathetic of other cultures so that persecuted individuals feel comfortable coming to the institutions of the host country for help"
And one goes something like "the underlying problem is that non-Christian immigrants don't share our values; the intrinsic male chauvinism of some Islamic cultural practices demonstrates this; elements of Islamic culture are symbols of repression; what we need to do is to insist that immigrants adopt more western cultural ideas."
And that somewhere between surrender of all our standards and launching a new crusade (at Bradford ?) we need a middle way...
But the last few posts have been so intelligent and nuanced that maybe it doesn't need saying...
Russ
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Wish everyone well; the enemy is not people, the enemy is wrong ideas
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mdijon
Shipmate
# 8520
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Posted
I don't know about unnecessary, Russ, sums it up nicely.
I'd like to think, though, that it isn't just finding the middle way (although that's probably what I do mean in practice) but about each side erring on the other sides behalf in attitude.
In practice, as gbuchanan hints at, where the rule of law is concerned, and individual human rights.... morality demands action.
I think, gbuchanan, one can differentiate between two situations; not to call for cultural awareness in the sentancing of murderers, the protection of the innocent.... but to reserve it for the general approach to the population, the systems put in place, the communication to persuade people to compromise their way of thinking.
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mdijon nojidm uoɿıqɯ ɯqıɿou
ɯqıɿou uoɿıqɯ nojidm mdijon
Posts: 12277 | From: UK | Registered: Sep 2004
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Laura
General nuisance
# 10
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Posted
This just in from Pakistan:
Pakistani Man relates the honor killings of all four of his daughters. He killed the eldest for her adultery (though this is disputed -- "Despite Ahmed's contention that Muqadas had committed adultery — a claim made by her husband — the rights commission reported that according to local people, Muqadas had fled her husband because he had abused her and forced her to work in a brick-making factory" , and then the 8, 7 and 4-year olds so that they wouldn't follow her example.
Bastard!
quote:
Bibi recounted how she was woken by a shriek as Ahmed put his hand to the mouth of his stepdaughter Muqadas and cut her throat with a machete. Bibi looked helplessly on from the corner of the room as he then killed the three girls — Bano, 8, Sumaira, 7, and Humaira, 4 — pausing between the slayings to brandish the bloodstained knife at his wife, warning her not to intervene or raise alarm.
"I was shivering with fear. I did not know how to save my daughters," Bibi, sobbing, told AP by phone from the village. "I begged my husband to spare my daughters but he said, 'If you make a noise, I will kill you.'"
"The whole night the bodies of my daughters lay in front of me," she said.
He bought the machete after prayers at the mosque.
Apparently, these crimes are rarely prosecuted in Pakistan, so the fact that he was arrested is big news.
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Love is the only sane and satisfactory answer to the problem of human existence. - Erich Fromm
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mdijon
Shipmate
# 8520
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Posted
This has nothing to do with multiculturalism or religion. This is a psychotic, sick man in a country where the law enforcement and government tend to be negligent in protecting women and children from this kind of evil father.
Thank God things appear to be changing.
Similar human rights abuses occur all over the world, muslims and non-muslims, islamic states and secular states... and the UN/international agencies/individual powerful nations seem unable to put them to rights.
It's not a sin of multiculturalism.
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mdijon nojidm uoɿıqɯ ɯqıɿou
ɯqıɿou uoɿıqɯ nojidm mdijon
Posts: 12277 | From: UK | Registered: Sep 2004
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Laura
General nuisance
# 10
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Posted
No, it isn't (to do with multiculturalism). But you can't just write this guy off as a sicko when this sort of thing happens all the time in Pakistan. And that mentality is exported regularly to other places where these communities form.
[typo]
And my point wasn't that multiculturalism is driving or causing honor killings or forced marriages of 13 year olds. The fault at its heart lies in parts of the Islamic community or any community that tolerates such things. My point is that multiculturalism stated as a positive value (which is mostly a good thing) blinds itself to the above-type mentality because it's too hard to just come right out and say "we aren't going to tolerate violations of women's rights in our country, no matter why you do it".
[ 29. December 2005, 13:42: Message edited by: Laura ]
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Love is the only sane and satisfactory answer to the problem of human existence. - Erich Fromm
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mdijon
Shipmate
# 8520
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Posted
I don't think even the most ardent, PC-cool supporters of multiculturalism would have any problem with the murderer being brought to justice.
I think this guy is sick, and not indicative of the state of islam - any more than T. McVeigh was normative of anything Western or Christian.
And that this kind of thing happens a lot... I'm not sure it does. Murders of children are rare in the UK - immigrant or indigenous.
I'll accept that there is a certain reticence to get involved in defending women's rights within immigrant groups. And perhaps some of that results from multiculturalist considerations. But also from the recognition that it is very difficult to get involved, and that our involvement might actually be counterproductive sometimes.
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mdijon nojidm uoɿıqɯ ɯqıɿou
ɯqıɿou uoɿıqɯ nojidm mdijon
Posts: 12277 | From: UK | Registered: Sep 2004
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Rat
Ship's Rat
# 3373
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Laura:
But you can't just write this guy off as a sicko when this sort of thing happens all the time in Pakistan.
What do we write these people off as?
Woman imprisoned tortured and murdered by husband and in-laws
87-year-old kills 86-year-old wife by beating and stabbing
Husband cuts throat of sunbathing wife
After failing twice to knife husband, wife attempts to hire hitman
Estranged husband suffocates sleeping wife
Husband kills wife and smuggles body to France in car boot
Man kills wife and hides body in woods
Swindon man attempts to murder his two children
Mother watches while father beats and kills 13-month-old
That was from a very quick, unscientific search, and I didn't even have to go back past October! I picked ones with no 'ethnic' component, but frankly there were only a couple of non-white sounding names, probably about the distribution you'd expect given UK demographics. Evidently this sort of thing happens all the time in the UK too.
I'm not trying to play down the seriousness of 'honour' killings in some communities, or the culpability of certain governments all over the world in not treating crime against women with the seriousness it deserves, but I do think there is a danger of focussing on something dreadful that happens in Pakistan while losing sight of the dreadful somethings that are happening on the next street, all the time.
Can we write the people in the links above off as sickos, or should we be looking for some deeper reason? What is it about white British society that makes men want to kill their wives and children in such apparent numbers? Beyond cultural trappings, is it qualitatively different from whatever makes Pakistani men do the same?
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It's a matter of food and available blood. If motherhood is sacred, put your money where your mouth is. Only then can you expect the coming down to the wrecked & shimmering earth of that miracle you sing about. [Margaret Atwood]
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Laura
General nuisance
# 10
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Posted
Crazy people will use whatever justification or none to do their craziness. But are these cases you cited those in which persons in authority are giving the perpetrators a pass? I looked at them, and I don't see one in which that is happening.
The honor-killing system is tolerated and even encouraged in some places, as supporting a general philosophy regarding the status, rights and purpose of women. It is one in which religion and social ethos combine fatally. These killings take place all over the world. The examples you cite are not part of that system. They are just as wrong, and just as desirable to prevent. But the perpetrators in question will be prosecuted without any sympathy given to the views behind the abuse or killing. I would imagine in Pakistan as well as anywhere else, random murder/abuse is not tolerated in the way that honor killings often are.
Look at it another way. I once defended an asylum claimant (successfully, I'm relieved to say) who came from a country in which she could receive no protection from the government from her husband's nearly constant abuse. Normally, spousal abuse is specifically not a ground for asylum, because it is not perpetrated by a state actor for reasons of the woman's membership in a political or social group. But in her case, we argued that it was as good as that, because her husband was highly placed enough that she had no recourse from court or police. They would never prosecute him, and most likely, he would finally kill her, and get away with it. In support, we had to prove that in her country, wife abuse was a staple of daytime comedy television, and provided countless examples of non-prosecution in cases of spousal murder.
Where the women have no recourse, to civil or religious courts for this sort of abuse, the government or the religious system in power itself is essentially supporting it.
And that's really my point.
[ 29. December 2005, 16:20: Message edited by: Laura ]
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Love is the only sane and satisfactory answer to the problem of human existence. - Erich Fromm
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Rat
Ship's Rat
# 3373
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Laura:
Crazy people will use whatever justification or none to do their craziness. But are these cases you cited those in which persons in authority are giving the perpetrators a pass? I looked at them, and I don't see one in which that is happening.
I agree with you entirely. Governments like the ones you cite should be subject to whatever trade and diplomatic sanctions are available, IMO, as well as carrots like EU membership (that's encouraging Turkey to put its house in order). And we should support organisations like Amnesty when they focus on these abuses. But in the end, short of invading, what can we do? They have to sort out their own problems.
In terms of domestic policy, though, I simply haven't seen any evidence that ethnic groups in this country are being 'given a pass' to murder and abuse (although - quite seperately from this discussion - I've always suspected that cases of longstanding domestic abuse in all communities do usually involve some level of social or peer-group acceptance).
'Honour' killings are investigated and the perpetrators charged and (hopefully) convicted. Muslim schools are subject to the same inspections and standards as the rest, as Louise's Dundee example showed. Services for battered women are available to everyone, and great efforts are made to provide information about them to all communities in all languages.
I'm not claiming perfection, or that it's easy - but short of putting CCTV in everybody's homes, what else is to be done?
With reference to your asylum example (well done, by the way, I think you'd have been lucky to win that case here) I think it's worth mentioning that within my memory wife abuse was a staple of comedy television here, as was racism. The police would have been very unlikely to respond to a 'domestic matter' with more than a smile and a shrug. When my dad first hit my mum, in the early 70s, she stomped off home to her parents - who put her straight on the bus home with instructions get on with marriage. My dad is not - I must emphasise - a crazy person. He very rarely hit my mum during 25 years of marriage and there was never a pattern of abuse - but he was representative of a time when it was acceptable, even expected, for a working-class man to physically chastise his wife.
We've moved away from that remarkably quickly, to a state where most agencies and most people accept that domestic abuse is wrong and largely only crazy people beat their spouses. I know I'm not telling you anything you don't know already, but my point (finally!) is that I see no reason why people from other cultures with different opinions who come here won't respond to the same pressures and the same legal structures, without any need for special measures.
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It's a matter of food and available blood. If motherhood is sacred, put your money where your mouth is. Only then can you expect the coming down to the wrecked & shimmering earth of that miracle you sing about. [Margaret Atwood]
Posts: 5285 | From: A dour region for dour folk | Registered: Oct 2002
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Laura
General nuisance
# 10
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Rat:
With reference to your asylum example (well done, by the way, I think you'd have been lucky to win that case here) I think it's worth mentioning that within my memory wife abuse was a staple of comedy television here, as was racism. ...
We were extraordinarily lucky to win it here, actually. It was granted at the discretionary administrative stage within the agency responsible where it could be done without a court decision that would have established a precedent.
In general, courts have refused to recognize such as grounds for political asylum, because if we called domestic abuse a ground for political asylum, we'd be up to our ears in asylees, wife abuse being as you note a form of entertainment in many countries.
quote:
Originally posted by Rat:
is that I see no reason why people from other cultures with different opinions who come here won't respond to the same pressures and the same legal structures, without any need for special measures.
And that was my point in starting the thread, that we need to be vigilant about not letting any concern for interference in another's culture stand in the way, in our own countries, of protecting women's rights and preventing such abuse. And further, putting political pressure, like that which has been brought to bear against genital mutilation against honor killings, forced arranged marriage of 13 year olds and the lik in other countries.
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Love is the only sane and satisfactory answer to the problem of human existence. - Erich Fromm
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mdijon
Shipmate
# 8520
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Posted
I'm unaware of any situation where considerations related to multiculturalism have prevented prosecution of a murderer, child abuser or allowed female genital mutilation to go ahead.
I think one can make a case that not enough work is being done within immigrant communities to encourage women to get to work - report abuse to the police - become literate - and one could make some sort of case that our views on multiculturalism get in the way. (I still would argue, mind, but at least there's some sort of case there.)
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mdijon nojidm uoɿıqɯ ɯqıɿou
ɯqıɿou uoɿıqɯ nojidm mdijon
Posts: 12277 | From: UK | Registered: Sep 2004
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Laura
General nuisance
# 10
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Posted
mdjon:
With all due respect, the article cited in the OP describes a situation in Germany in which, to cite one example, the state is funding schools in which Islamic fundamentalists teach girls this philosophy of women which supports a parallel society which German laws largely do not reach. I would say that the state is in this case directly implicit in teaching girls not to pick up that telephone, not to protest.
I'll quote the OP again:
quote:
This story in the New York Times, The New Berlin Wall (not sure how long it's available for free) describes how the work of three women Muslim dissidents have exposed the parallel society that has grown up in Germany among Muslim communities in Berlin, in which girls are very frequently forced into marriage pre-minority, girls are imported from Turkey and elsewhere to be pressed into forced marriages, and the official permission to have Islamic-approved instruction (in state schools) has fueled a rise in honor killings for dissident women, and full veiling and early school dropout and marriage for girls. In "tolerating" all of these things, Germany, and any western country that permits this parallel society to be protected in these activities (I'm especially struck by the state schools being used as vehicles of shari'a) we are failing the girls and women growing up among us. These girls and woman are being denied those freedoms to which we are all entitled.
The article sets forth the great discomfort western countries have in interfering with these communities, as well as the practical difficulties in doing so (which are enormous). The discomfort stems in part from the tolerance that, especially in Germany, is embedded in the laws.
I think we're talking at cross-purposes about multiculturalism again, however. I'm talking about the concern for interference that stems from wholly laudable goals, but when observed to the extreme, allows a lot of really bad stuff to go on unchecked by the country's laws.
[ 30. December 2005, 13:20: Message edited by: Laura ]
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Love is the only sane and satisfactory answer to the problem of human existence. - Erich Fromm
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ken
Ship's Roundhead
# 2460
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Posted
How is this "paralel society" of (one kind of) Muslim education any different from the paralel society of (one kind of) Christian education that some Americans bring up their children in through home-schooling and the like? Does the state have the right to remove these children from their parent's schools and force them to go to government schools?
How does it differ morally from the paralel society of (another kind of) Christian education run by the Roman Catholic church all over the world (and supposedly to drastically divisive effect in parts of Ireland and Scotland). How does it differ morally from the paralel society of Mormon education run by LDS all over the USA, that is in fact the dominant education system in parts of Utah? How does it differ morally from the paralel society of so-called "public school" education by which a significant proportion of the upper middle classes of England ensure that their sons are brought up in a way utterly different from mainstream English society?
Posts: 39579 | From: London | Registered: Mar 2002
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Laura
General nuisance
# 10
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by ken:
How is this "paralel society" of (one kind of) Muslim education any different from the paralel society of (one kind of) Christian education that some Americans bring up their children in through home-schooling and the like? Does the state have the right to remove these children from their parent's schools and force them to go to government schools?
In the US, these schools cannot receive gov't funds for any religion-related function. Home-schooling is not funded by the state at all.
I'm a litte surprised at the drive to moral equivalence here, especially in you, ken. Eton is the same as Islamic teaching a girl that she is her father's and then husband's property and must act accordingly? I'd argue a huge moral difference here.
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Love is the only sane and satisfactory answer to the problem of human existence. - Erich Fromm
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ken
Ship's Roundhead
# 2460
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Posted
The equivalence is in the state not picking and choosing which subcultures to tolerate or subsidise.
There are countries in which the kind of Muslim education talked about here would be illegal - for example Turkey (where you could go to prison for it) or Britain (where the school could get closed down for not teaching an adequate curriculum).
RC or evangelical Christian schools would also be illegal in Turkey, though not England where they would be subsidised by the government if they had open recruitment and taught the national curriculum)
In the USA I assume both would be equally tolerated? A school like the one described would not get government money, but would not be closed down?
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Ken
L’amor che move il sole e l’altre stelle.
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mdijon
Shipmate
# 8520
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Posted
I'd missed that part - or forgotten that part - of the OP.
But I'd argue the main problem here is not multiculturalism - the problem is state funding of any religious school.
To make a link between multiculturalism/allowing islamic schools and forced marriage and honour killings requires one of two arguments; either that the islamic schools in question have demonstrable promoted forced marriage or honour killing, and the government done nothing about it because of multiculturalism; or that islam per se inevitably promotes honour killing and forced marriage.
I don't accept the latter, and I'd want to see the evidence for the former.
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mdijon nojidm uoɿıqɯ ɯqıɿou
ɯqıɿou uoɿıqɯ nojidm mdijon
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GoodCatholicLad
Shipmate
# 9231
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Posted
quote:
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All you have is right now.
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GoodCatholicLad
Shipmate
# 9231
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Posted
LutheranChik states[Political incorrectness alert]
"Speaking from an American perspective: Our country is, or at least used to be, a country where citizenship was based on acceptance of a shared vision of rights/freedoms/responsibilities. Persons emigrating to the United States used to have to make an effort to indicate that they were willing to "get with the program" insofar as embracing the values of our Constitution and Bill of Rights.
Why would Islamists want to live in a western society whose values they despise? If people don't like the concepts of secular government, gender equity, etc., etc. -- then for pete's sake don't live here. I hear Iran is lovely in the spring. If they're so freaking religious, taking a cut in income in order to live among others of the One True Faith would be, I think, a small price to pay for their integrity.
I think Germany's situation is complicated by residual shame about the Nazi times, and the tendency of some groups to exploit that by crying "Racism!" if the German authorities try to enforce the law evenly."
I love it! you always get to the point with no BS! ICAM
James
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All you have is right now.
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GoodCatholicLad
Shipmate
# 9231
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by ken:
quote:
Originally posted by LutheranChik:
I remember being on a discussion forum, talking about multiculturalism, where one person kept insisting that one value system is just as good as the other.
As far as I remember I've never met anyone who actually really argued for that.
If that sort of immoral stupidity is what the right-wing media mean by "multicultural" than they are right to oppose it. But its not what most of us mean by it nor what happens in the places most of us live.
Perhaps you have never been to Berkeley California because I hear this rhetoric all the time
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All you have is right now.
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Cod
Shipmate
# 2643
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Posted
We get it down here too. It is common to hear a theory dismissed as "colonialist" which is really a meaningless pejorative. As it is frequently not linked in with any objective measure of whether A is better than B, one assumes that "one system is as good as another" is assumed.
I frequently hear variants of this on the campus of the university ranked tenth best in Asia / Pacific.
Partly this is produced by the Maori renaissance. Partly by postcolonial guilt, which I'm sure there is plenty of in Germany.
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"I fart in your general direction."
M Barnier
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mdijon
Shipmate
# 8520
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Posted
Probably as commonly as multiculturalism is dismissed as politically correct and pandering to human rights abuses.
Neither approach is terribly helpful to the debate.
Similarly the suggestion that islamists stay in Iran; hardly the point here.
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mdijon nojidm uoɿıqɯ ɯqıɿou
ɯqıɿou uoɿıqɯ nojidm mdijon
Posts: 12277 | From: UK | Registered: Sep 2004
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Primrose Path
Shipmate
# 9137
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Posted
On a (zoological) research trip to a remote region of Papua New Guinea where women still wore grass skirts and nothing else, I was told that everyone was totally shocked by the shorts I and another female team member were wearing. Apparently in local culture the area between the a woman's hips and the knees are totally taboo, in the same way as breasts are in Western culture. (The same does not apply to men, except in relation to the penis, which is usually tucked into an enormously phallic penis-guard. Or shorts). Fortunately no-one reckoned we were worthy of an "honour killing", possibly because with our anemic see-through skin, dead-pale eyes and lank drowned-persons hair we looked more like zombies than real people. (Children would run terrified from villages at our arrival).
My point is that the hijab - and ideas of modesty - are matters of culture and habituation. I really don't think it's helpful to over-react to the hijab (or any other dress code). The issue we should be fighting for is the proper exercise of those fundamental rights and freedoms on which our society is based, not the dress or the religion. There are plenty of feisty, liberated, and powerful women who are observant muslims or catholics (eg. Benazir Bhutto; Mary Robinson.)
The EU (if not the Uk) has a constitution and legal structure that bans forced marriages and honor killings. The problem is not the burka, but finding ways (and the will) to enforce these without infringing the concomitant right to privacy and family life. Freedom of religious expression should not be allowed to condone or mask rape, torture and false imprisonment and I think EU law enforcement bodies are finally starting to lose their shyness on this point.
I suspect the most effective long-term solution is to give all children the education they need to realise they are being opressed and, hopefully, fight it from within. This means obligatory, heavily state-supervised education in all schools - faith based, state, and private - about:
(1) the legal rights, freedoms, and obligations of the country these children find themselves in, including divorce; and
(2) the language those rights are written in.
Parents who unreasonably prevent their children from receiving this education should be prosecuted and the children, if necessary, taken into care. What the children wear during education - hijab, school uniform, grass skirts - really isn't an issue (as long as they're not cold).
The other necessary limb, as many posters have pointed out, is to crack down hard on racial discrimination in the job market, so that these kids can get jobs and lives - or escape to liberal relatives with jobs and lives - far away from their families. If they want to keep wearing the burka then, why not?
I also a think a clear message needs to go out to all communities (host as well as immigrant)that multiculturalism involves compromise and loss of some dearly-loved Old Country habits and customs, in service to the Constitution. I think Europe has treasured a sort of fairytale idea that this could be avoided.
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"The glory to which man is called is that he should grow more godlike by growing ever more human" (Fr Dumitru Staniloae)
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Primrose Path
Shipmate
# 9137
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Posted
sorry about the double-post - but is anyone else old enough to remember the feminist Germain Greer's wonderful tirade against the journalist Fay Weldon: "Bird's nest hair ... fuck-me shoes ... brain rotted by lipstick".
Some of the anti-hijab tirades reminded me of it, that's all; as I suspect it was what Fay wrote that really upset Germaine, not her clothes.
Germaine - yet another example of a person who escaped an oppressive and misogynistic upbringing through education and a job.
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"The glory to which man is called is that he should grow more godlike by growing ever more human" (Fr Dumitru Staniloae)
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Mrs Tea
Shipmate
# 10570
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Primrose Path:
I suspect the most effective long-term solution is to give all children the education they need to realise they are being opressed and, hopefully, fight it from within. This means obligatory, heavily state-supervised education in all schools - faith based, state, and private - about:
(1) the legal rights, freedoms, and obligations of the country these children find themselves in, including divorce; and
(2) the language those rights are written in.
Parents who unreasonably prevent their children from receiving this education should be prosecuted and the children, if necessary, taken into care.
You may be right that this is the most effective long-term solution. But a country where that was thoroughly carried out would be one where home schooling was illegal, and private schools pretty much as heavily legislated-for as state ones. The state would be able to teach all children pretty much anything it liked, which might start off as anti-racism and good citizenship but could later become something more like Nazi-ism or Newspeak. And nobody would be allowed to opt out. That degree of societal control by the government is not a country where I'd want to live.
Posts: 58 | From: England | Registered: Oct 2005
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Primrose Path
Shipmate
# 9137
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Posted
quote:
Posted by mrs Tea:
But a country where that was thoroughly carried out would be one where home schooling was illegal, and private schools pretty much as heavily legislated-for as state ones. The state would be able to teach all children pretty much anything it liked, which might start off as anti-racism and good citizenship but could later become something more like Nazi-ism or Newspeak. And nobody would be allowed to opt out. That degree of societal control by the government is not a country where I'd want to live.
Are you so sure you don't?
I meant to include homeschoolers. In the USA they are required to follow a basic curriculum (people are supposed to check up on this); and I believe they are eventually subject to the same public exams as the other schools in order to claim high school graduation.
I'm not advocating special classes for immigrants; think all kids should be taught this stuff as standard. No future voter should leave school without understanding how the constitution affects them, and how the political system works (and how they can affect it). How can this be controversial, unless the system itself sucks? (In which case, shouldn't it be discussed out in the open by educators?) And I'm sorry, the Story of the Magna Carta and Roundheads and Cavaliers won't do it - teenage school leavers need to understand the modern system, as simply as possible, and enlivened with plenty of topical class discussion. And if it's impossible for educators to agree on the basics, well - how the */!* does anyone manage to govern fairly, or control the governers adequately?
Equally, I feel that no future parent or spouse should leave school ignorant of the realities of marital law and the welfare system; as with sex education, TV, peers and parents are not always an accurate guide. But as you've pointed out, teaching this would be even more controversial than sex education.
As someone else pointed out, many immigrants have backgrounds of poverty and poor education, and I'd say many of the issues in the OP arise from that rather than religion. Leading on from that, I'd like to point out that very similar problems are rife among the catholic and protestant Caucasian poor in sink estates around Glasgow. Plenty escape this every year through the excellent Scottish state education system - but leave behind many who continue as before. Why? Why are levels of religious hatred, nepotism and corruption in these districts still so high? Is education the answer? Money?(surely not, millions have been redistributed to cronies and relatives already) Or is it something else?
If a society can't set out some simple common goals, independent of ethnic or cultural background, which are uncontroversial enough to be enforced on everybody (including immigrants)without apology, how is it going to cope with the tide of new citizens with very different goals and customs? The US has a bland, secular and materialistic "American Way" underwritten by very strong ideas about free speech and welfare. Ataturk came up with the Turkish "secular" state; Iraq came up with a dictatorship.
Is pragmatism the UK way? If so, how can that be expressed to its newest citizens in a way that sounds fair?
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"The glory to which man is called is that he should grow more godlike by growing ever more human" (Fr Dumitru Staniloae)
Posts: 72 | From: Maryland, USA | Registered: Feb 2005
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Mrs Tea
Shipmate
# 10570
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Primrose Path:
Are you so sure you don't?
I meant to include homeschoolers. In the USA they are required to follow a basic curriculum (people are supposed to check up on this); and I believe they are eventually subject to the same public exams as the other schools in order to claim high school graduation.
... think all kids should be taught this stuff as standard. ... How can this be controversial, unless the system itself sucks? (In which case, shouldn't it be discussed out in the open by educators?) ... teenage school leavers need to understand the modern system, as simply as possible, and enlivened with plenty of topical class discussion. And if it's impossible for educators to agree on the basics, well - how the */!* does anyone manage to govern fairly, or control the governers adequately?
... As someone else pointed out, many immigrants have backgrounds of poverty and poor education, and I'd say many of the issues in the OP arise from that rather than religion. Leading on from that, I'd like to point out that very similar problems are rife among the catholic and protestant Caucasian poor in sink estates
... If a society can't set out some simple common goals, independent of ethnic or cultural background, which are uncontroversial enough to be enforced on everybody (including immigrants)without apology, how is it going to cope with the tide of new citizens with very different goals and customs? ... Is pragmatism the UK way? If so, how can that be expressed to its newest citizens in a way that sounds fair?
These are all very fair questions! My understanding of the UK education system is that it's incumbent on parents (not the state) to provide an education that is adequate and appropriate for their child. If they choose to send their child to a state or private but state-inspected school, that is enough to fulfil the obligation. If they don't, the state has the right to check that the education provided is adequate, but not to make any demands about the curriculum followed. When I was at school not that long ago, there was no National Curriculum (an invention of the late 80s or early 90s): the only subject state schools were obliged to teach was Religious Education. In practice of course, the demands of universities and employers meant that everyone studied for a core of generally-recognised exams so pretty much everyone had to cover similar ground, and the large majority of schools and Local Education Authorities weren't so daft as not to teach what most people would consider "the basics". But this took place with hardly any state prescription.
Yes, I'd agree that kids should be taught certain things as standard, but I'd worry about the level of prescription that says they must be. In UK state schools nowadays, a Citizenship curriculum is generally agreed upon and inspected, but I understand it can't be enforced in private schools. Of course most private schools teach something pretty similar, and I know of Christian schools workers who regularly visit private Muslim schools to teach the kids about Christianity -- very diplomatically sensitive work!
In practice, I don't think what goes on in private Muslim schools is terribly significant to this debate though. Not many recent immigrants can afford anything but the local state school. What happens there, especially if Muslims make up the majority of its pupils, is much more relevant.
If society can't agree on some simple common goals -- I don't know how it's going to cope. Yes, as you say, I think pragmatism is the UK way. Generally we get by, but the 7 July bombings exposed the weaknesses, especially as on 6 July the perpetrators had all appeared to be well assimilated into mainstream UK society. We've been searching for answers for the last 6 months. All suggestions gratefully received, but one answer most Britons aren't prepared to accept is turning a fairly free society into a totalitarian state. Where you draw the line is a matter of fierce current politics...
Posts: 58 | From: England | Registered: Oct 2005
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Primrose Path
Shipmate
# 9137
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Posted
quote:
Mrs. Tea wrote:
...but one answer most Britons aren't prepared to accept is turning a fairly free society into a totalitarian state.
We have similar concerns over here with the US Patriot Act - but having recently moved here from Britain I worry that Britain is much closer to being a totalitarian state. I can't imagine the revelation that the Prime Minister (or MI6) was routinely listening in to UK telephone calls in a bid to prevent terrorism would raise more than an eyebrow in the UK, but it has sparked a firestorm here. Part of this is because constitutional rights and freedoms form such a large part of the US school curriculum - ad nauseum, really - those who manage to stay awake at school are very clued up on what is and is not allowed. This just isn't so in Britain - partly because the unwritten British constitution is fluid and can be hard to pin down. That's why UK lawyers are using the European Charter of Human Rights more and more - but unfortunately it's not nearly as cut and dried as the US Constitution. So it's harder - and more expensive - to use it as a curb on state power - and to teach. But that doesn't mean it shouldn't be taught in schools, quite the reverse!
An example: here
A student was suspended from school for speaking Spanish in the hallway. This particular link doesn't mention that the student's immigrant laboror father had just passed his US citizenship exam and therefore knew immediately that the suspension was an unconstitutional one. It was the father that raised the legal complaint and had his son reinstated.
[ 07. January 2006, 15:29: Message edited by: Callan ]
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"The glory to which man is called is that he should grow more godlike by growing ever more human" (Fr Dumitru Staniloae)
Posts: 72 | From: Maryland, USA | Registered: Feb 2005
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Laura
General nuisance
# 10
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Primrose Path:
An example: here
A student was suspended from school for speaking Spanish in the hallway. This particular link doesn't mention that the student's immigrant laboror father had just passed his US citizenship exam and therefore knew immediately that the suspension was an unconstitutional one. It was the father that raised the legal complaint and had his son reinstated.
Can I just note that I love stories like this? Some of our very best citizens in the sense of actually knowing what citizenship entails and valuing it, are our most recent immigrants, and not just because they have to learn it for the exam, but because a lot of them think it really matters. As it does, of course.
Now, the problem that is raised vis-a-vis ensuring free and comprehensive tightly supervised education is that for similar reasons it would never fly here. You have the right to send your children to schools that impart Christian doctrine and or teach that evolution is evil or teach that the end times are near, or you can do it at home. Forcible public education in which a certain agenda is delivered would be seen as totalitarian by many, including myself.
It is a balancing test -- I wouldn't support state funding of a school that taught that evolution was evil and wrong or the end times were near. I do support vibrant free speech so that when your miseducated children get free they can hear other ideas and noone can stop that from happening.
Back to the OP issue though, I do think that concern for not interfering with religious exercise has protected certain darker practices in certain immigrant comunities. Without saying that it is the fault of Islam, you can still say that laudable concern for tolerance has had this darker side. I'd like to know what we can do about it.
It's very instructive to look at FGM, actually, because what's really made changes in this has been international health and local health education on the problems associated with FGM, along with a shift to denouncing it by Islamic leaders (just heard a good story on this on BBC World Service, actually). In lots of places, the practice has fallen wayyy off. A lot of the initial furor was generated by international recognition and protest, but the changes were made at the local and national levels in the affected countries. But people had to be willing to get involved.
So what is needed to improve the lot of these young girls in our own midst and in other places? What can we do? Because I do think it's an indictment of our liberal societies if there are 13 year olds being forced into marriage and motherhood t pre-minority ages, and being taught that they have no rights and are property. How can we reach these people?
[ 07. January 2006, 15:30: Message edited by: Callan ]
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Love is the only sane and satisfactory answer to the problem of human existence. - Erich Fromm
Posts: 16883 | From: East Coast, USA | Registered: Apr 2001
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mdijon
Shipmate
# 8520
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Posted
I think they do get reached; perhaps not as much as we'd like, and not enough to stop all the abuse .... either way, I'm pretty sure the way you to reach them is not by attacking the name or concept of multiculturalism.
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mdijon nojidm uoɿıqɯ ɯqıɿou
ɯqıɿou uoɿıqɯ nojidm mdijon
Posts: 12277 | From: UK | Registered: Sep 2004
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ken
Ship's Roundhead
# 2460
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Laura:
Can I just note that I love stories like this? Some of our very best citizens in the sense of actually knowing what citizenship entails and valuing it, are our most recent immigrants, and not just because they have to learn it for the exam, but because a lot of them think it really matters. As it does, of course.
But it looks weirtd to us, not because we have a constitutional right to speak any language we like, but because we can't imagine a school punishing someone for speaking their own language. It seems absurd to us. Even though it happened in parts of Scotland and Wales less than a century ago.
Or perhaps, come to think of it, precisely because it used to happen here. It seems old-fashioned. Something we've left behind. We don't so that sort of thing any more. Any more than we stone women for marrying the wrong man. OK, we never actually did do that, but you know what I mean.
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Ken
L’amor che move il sole e l’altre stelle.
Posts: 39579 | From: London | Registered: Mar 2002
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Laura
General nuisance
# 10
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by mdijon:
I think they do get reached; perhaps not as much as we'd like, and not enough to stop all the abuse .... either way, I'm pretty sure the way you to reach them is not by attacking the name or concept of multiculturalism.
Mdijon -- I think I suggested ages back on this thread that we were not apparently talking the same language when we used the word "multiculturalism". Can we not let the word go and try to focus on the issue? I've been trying to do that, but every single time you come back and post, "yes, but you can't blame this on multiculturalism (your definition of it)". If you redefine multiculturalism in such a way that it cannot be responsible for or even inform something that doesn't work in a positive way every time, the debate is pointless. In this country, multiculturalism (understood as a general warm and fuzzy feeling toward a society in which many cultures are embraced and tolerated, which is, generally, imho a Good Thing) has also sometimes supported a balkanization that is not helpful to democratic values.
But I don't think that we're going to find what you seem to demand, that is, an empirical study that demonstrates conclusively that for X value of a quantity "multiculturalism" (defined as you define it), there will be a corresponding Y value of tolerated child abuse. Does that mean that we cannot even consider the role that our own hesitation in criticising other cultures plays in tolerating such child abuse? Nor consider what we can do to improve meaningful multiculturalism while demanding that those communities that live among us not marry off their 13 year old daughters in violation of our laws? You seem to be saying that there's no problem here, or at least, nothing that really amounts to anything. Keep in mind that I'm not some Daily Telegraph reading anti-immigrant -- I'm a card carrying member of the liberal elite that the folks in power in the US love to hate. And I think my own peer group has inadvertently contributed to this problem out of well-meaning intention. Which I feel responsible for to some degree. So this thread is meant to criticise me, myself and my political compatriots, not Bad Evil Muslims.
I'm genuinely at a loss at how to proceed here.
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Love is the only sane and satisfactory answer to the problem of human existence. - Erich Fromm
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Laura
General nuisance
# 10
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by ken:
quote:
Originally posted by Laura:
Can I just note that I love stories like this? Some of our very best citizens in the sense of actually knowing what citizenship entails and valuing it, are our most recent immigrants, and not just because they have to learn it for the exam, but because a lot of them think it really matters. As it does, of course.
But it looks weirtd to us, not because we have a constitutional right to speak any language we like, but because we can't imagine a school punishing someone for speaking their own language. It seems absurd to us. Even though it happened in parts of Scotland and Wales less than a century ago.
I can't imagine it, either. I thought we didn't do this sort of thing, anymore either. That and the fact that it's plainly unconstitutional are what make it stick out.
But I forgot. There aren't prejudiced people
who do dumb-ass things in British schools anymore, ever. ![[Big Grin]](biggrin.gif)
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Love is the only sane and satisfactory answer to the problem of human existence. - Erich Fromm
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Zorro
Shipmate
# 9156
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Posted
Multiculturalism's something which Glasgow's having a pretty big problem with at the moment, largely because we have, as far as I'm aware, the 2nd largest immigrant population outside of London.
I'm all for multiculturalism, I mean that sincerely, but often it's tested by the groups who move here (the majority of my experience is Pakistani Muslim guys, as they're the largest immigrant group at our school).
For example, it's well known that Pakistani boys are brought up to think that a) Women are inferior, and that b) they are superior to anyone else they meet, with the exception of other muslim Pakistani guys.
It's not 3 weeks since a boy, 14, at a secondary school near me was macheted for no other reason than he was an Indian Sikh, and the gang who did it (they came into the school) were muslim Pakistanis.
2 months ago, I was walking across the playground carrying the rugby ball, talking to my mate. We're both decent, intelligent guys, and are known to be vehemently anti racist. One of the muslim Pakistani guys turns up, backed by his mates (about 20, most of whom I get on with very well) and hooks me in the face, before stealing the ball. I turned to hit him before reconsidering as I knew too well that if I touched him his mates would forget our friendship and take me out, and they're probably armed, (I've been on trains with the same pakistani guys and seen the knives they carry.)
Also it's well known that even if it's one of those guys who's done something wrong they'll happily blame it on a white guy. And if said white guy argues with this, they'll go to the management staff in the school and say "Oh yeah, well he called me a paki so and so." At this point that staff person will forget all previous knowledge that "Zorro's a nice kid, does well at school, and has been known to stand out against racism," and go down the "That racist scum, we can't have this," road, and Zorro ends up suspended.
I'm not fabricating this, I've seen it happen and it's not funny. I've seen some majorly decent people be totally dumped by the authorities in the school and end up in massive strife. The problem I think we face is that, and I won't pretend it's not present in the white community, there are those on both sides who feel "this is my place, get out." You cannot have multiculturalism in a community where one side totally reuses to accept the validity of the others status as human beings.
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It is so hard to believe, because it is so hard to obey. Soren Kierkegaard
Well, churches really should be like sluts; take everyone no matter who they are or whether they can pay. Spiffy da wondersheep
Posts: 2568 | From: Baja California (actually the UK but that's where my fans know me from) | Registered: Mar 2005
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Laura
General nuisance
# 10
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Zorro:
I'm all for multiculturalism, I mean that sincerely, but often it's tested by the groups who move here (the majority of my experience is Pakistani Muslim guys, as they're the largest immigrant group at our school).
For example, it's well known that Pakistani boys are brought up to think that a) Women are inferior, and that b) they are superior to anyone else they meet, with the exception of other muslim Pakistani guys.
That's so weird -- I was just listening to a friend, a teacher, telling me exactly this. She adores all children, and is a gifted teacher (and a card-carrying liberal) in a very diverse district, and was saying it's the Pakistani boys she's having the hardest time reaching as a group, and she doesn't know what to do. They don't take her seriously, treating her with disrespect even at young ages, explicitly because she's a woman and they don't have to. They're generally unpleasant to the girls in the class. But they treat the few male teachers with respect.
Here's where I think you really need to demand respect and get the parents to back you up (if you can get them to come in.....)
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Love is the only sane and satisfactory answer to the problem of human existence. - Erich Fromm
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ken
Ship's Roundhead
# 2460
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Laura:
I think I suggested ages back on this thread that we were not apparently talking the same language when we used the word "multiculturalism". Can we not let the word go and try to focus on the issue? I've been trying to do that, but every single time you come back and post, "yes, but you can't blame this on multiculturalism (your definition of it)".
The trouble is, when you (or rather when the conservative press who are always on about it) start going on about "multiculturalism" being to blame what we hear is "immigrants and ethnic minorities are dangerous and should be forced to conform to the established ideas".
If you said "locking girls up, forcing them to marry men they don't like, and killing them if they try to run away is wrong and people who do it should be punished" no-one would disagree with you. (No-one who didn't need locking up anyway).
Instead of blaming the behaviour of these criminals it sounds as if you are blaming political or religious beliefs which have nothing to do with their crimes. So it gets people's backs up.
Also the attempted redefinition of the word "multiculturalism" is itself part of a right-wing strategy to control the language of politics. A successful one so far in the USA, and partly so after here, with their complete destruction of the once useful word "liberal", the demonisation of the word "socialism" (which we simply can;t use when taling to Americans any more) and the absurd currency of their pathetic whinges around the phrase "politically correct" (Actually we lefties never said "politically correct" in the first place - when we made those jokes we would have said "ideologically sound" - but they landed their punches well)
. Some of us don't want to lose yet another once useful word to them.
So why not drop the word? You are the one insisting on using it in this context.
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Ken
L’amor che move il sole e l’altre stelle.
Posts: 39579 | From: London | Registered: Mar 2002
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Laura
General nuisance
# 10
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Posted
Well, it's part of the OP, now, but I've actually been trying to drop it, and not use it very much on the thread. I'm just not sure what to replace it with. "Excessive sensitivity to possible accusations of insensitivity?" ("ESPAS"?)
Also, why do we let the right control the terms of the debate? We have to be able to criticise ourselves, even using the terms the right uses to vilify the left (and everyone else) or we lose some credibility. IMHO, of course. Political correctness is a good example. There is too much of it. So I call due sensitivity something different, but criticise political correctness when I see it. I haven't a lot of patience for euphemisms as it is.
[ 03. January 2006, 17:41: Message edited by: Laura ]
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Love is the only sane and satisfactory answer to the problem of human existence. - Erich Fromm
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Primrose Path
Shipmate
# 9137
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Posted
Jonathan Sacks, the Chief Rabbi of the Hebrew Congregation in Britain, has been writing a lot about multiculturalism in Britain recently. Here's a thoughtful and thought-provoking example. I like his analogy of society as a hotel:
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,1072-1805541,00.html
I don't think anyone expects current immigrants to assimilate to the extent that Sacks describes; but the point about having something worthy to assimilate towards rings true.
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"The glory to which man is called is that he should grow more godlike by growing ever more human" (Fr Dumitru Staniloae)
Posts: 72 | From: Maryland, USA | Registered: Feb 2005
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Primrose Path
Shipmate
# 9137
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Posted
Correction: lots of people probably expect immigrants to assimilate just as Jonathan Sacks describes; I don't.
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"The glory to which man is called is that he should grow more godlike by growing ever more human" (Fr Dumitru Staniloae)
Posts: 72 | From: Maryland, USA | Registered: Feb 2005
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Rat
Ship's Rat
# 3373
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Laura:
Well, it's part of the OP, now, but I've actually been trying to drop it, and not use it very much on the thread. I'm just not sure what to replace it with. "Excessive sensitivity to possible accusations of insensitivity?" ("ESPAS"?)
Also, why do we let the right control the terms of the debate?
I rather like ESPAS ![[Razz]](tongue.gif)
I think the problem is that when you use the term, your point is always going to fall into the chasm between those who hear multiculturalism as 'a free pass for foriegners to kill my cat' and those of us who hear criticism of multiculturalism as code for 'Pakis Go Home'.
Then whatever it is you're trying to debate gets lost in a revival of the same argument.
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It's a matter of food and available blood. If motherhood is sacred, put your money where your mouth is. Only then can you expect the coming down to the wrecked & shimmering earth of that miracle you sing about. [Margaret Atwood]
Posts: 5285 | From: A dour region for dour folk | Registered: Oct 2002
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mdijon
Shipmate
# 8520
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Laura:
Mdijon -- I think I suggested ages back on this thread that we were not apparently talking the same language when we used the word "multiculturalism". Can we not let the word go and try to focus on the issue? I've been trying to do that, but every single time you come back and post, "yes, but you can't blame this on multiculturalism (your definition of it)". If you redefine multiculturalism in such a way that it cannot be responsible for or even inform something that doesn't work in a positive way every time, the debate is pointless. In this country, multiculturalism (understood as a general warm and fuzzy feeling toward a society in which many cultures are embraced and tolerated, which is, generally, imho a Good Thing) has also sometimes supported a balkanization that is not helpful to democratic values. ......I'm genuinely at a loss at how to proceed here.
Well, I must say I missed that.... but either way, if a thread entitled "Failing...in the name of Multiculturalism" starts up again with a story about one of the most sickening 'honour' killings, the knee jerk response is quite difficult to stop.
I'll admit to finding it difficult to refocus under the same OP, but I'll deny redefining Multiculturalism in a way that only permits positive things coming from it.
Either way, on your definition of something "not helpful to democratic values" I'm still completely unclear as to whether this aspect of multiculturalism is actually responsible for any of the human rights denials we're discussing on the thread. That is happens in an immigrant community is clearly part of the problem, but what aspect of whatever is called multiculturalism that contributes to this still isn't clear to me.... maybe it's been spelt out and I've missed it.... humour me and let's try again.
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mdijon nojidm uoɿıqɯ ɯqıɿou
ɯqıɿou uoɿıqɯ nojidm mdijon
Posts: 12277 | From: UK | Registered: Sep 2004
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Honest Ron Bacardi
Shipmate
# 38
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Posted
It would be a shame if this interesting thread got bogged down because of definitional problems. I don't know if the following might help clear that, or sink it without trace, but anyway here goes -
Ken writes:
quote:
Also the attempted redefinition of the word "multiculturalism" is itself part of a right-wing strategy to control the language of politics. A successful one so far in the USA, and partly so after here, with their complete destruction of the once useful word "liberal", the demonisation of the word "socialism" (which we simply can;t use when taling to Americans any more) and the absurd currency of their pathetic whinges around the phrase "politically correct" (Actually we lefties never said "politically correct" in the first place - when we made those jokes we would have said "ideologically sound" - but they landed their punches well)
. Some of us don't want to lose yet another once useful word to them.
Whilst I share your distaste for the British press, Ken, and mourn the passing of the once-useful word "liberal" - now seemingly little more than a tribal identifier - frankly I can't go along with the rest of it. For a start, it looks suspiciously like a conspiracy theory, and they have an unerring track record of being usually wrong. But more importantly, the facts just don't support it. Yes, of course there are right-wing opponents, but in fact the matter of definition is being purued primarily by academia in sociology studies, not the press. And the most recent criticisms of multiculturalism have come from the centre-left, such as in Goodhart's critique. But in saying that, it's perhaps important to look at what is being criticised and what isn't.
What isn't being criticised is the desire of any nation to develop a working strategy whereby a resident majority population can interact productively with any number of incoming ones, or resident minority ones.
Those who categorise these things tend to use 3 analytical categories:
1) A dominant culture paradigm, whereby minorities are expected to conform themselves to the dominant paradigm. France would be an example here.
2) A "melting pot" paradigm, whereby minorities are expected to interact with the majority in order to develop a new culture that would then become predominant, albeit constantly evolving. The USA is usually held up as an example of this one. Finally,
3) A multicultural paradigm. This rejects the concept of a predominant culture altogether. You can probably subdivide this into weak multiculturalism, which would agree that statistically one culture may predominate, and strong multiculturalism, which would take steps to ensure that no single culture could predominate. Because it is a negative definition, very different national approaches could be classified as being multicultural. Canada and the UK are usually put in here.
These are just social-science type categorizations, so it would be a mistake to get hung up on precision and possible ideas of underlying drivers. But to understand why why one would come up with an idea like multiculturalism, I think you need to look at the history of Canada, where it was first articulated.
So much for what people are talking about, in the UK discussion at least (and these definitions or something like them seem to be used equally in North America). The centre-left critique, (which has subsequently been taken up by figures such as Trevor Phillips and John Sentamu), seems to have been kicked off by an article in Prospect Magazine by David Goodhart back in Feb 2004. Unfortunately only the first few lines seem to be available without a paying subscription.
In brief, though, he points out that there is an inherent tension in multiculturalism that any broadly left-wing sympathiser needs to come to grips with - that is that solidarity and diversity are here in opposition. Traditionally the left has been interested in both, but here you run the risk of pursuing one at the expense of the other. Pursue diversity to an extreme and you risk losing cohesion altogether. The article is long and covers numerous bases besides this, but you do need to read it if you want to understand the sort of arguments currently being deployed.
In fact, Goodhart recommends a change from multiculturalism towards the "melting-pot" ideal, where at least there is a positive ideal to aim at, but in doing so he does mention some critiques of the US melting-pot approach, so it may be well worth non-UK members pursuing this too.
I also think - going beyond Goodhart now - that it is relevant that the Iraqi war also falls into this timeframe, and questions of a multicultural nature present themselves rather obviously here too. Will a supervening sense of common purpose win out, perhaps making it look more like category 2)? - if not it will look more like category 3) and continuing hostilities.
And it is also sobering to consider that the original history of apartheid has some disturbing parallels, and some lessons need to be learned from that before unqualified support is given to multiculturalism. That at least demonstrated that in the absence of moderate socio-economic equity, things are liable to go from bad to worse.
Untrammelled multiculturalism is potentially very dangerous to minorities, and I think Laura's OP, highlighting a tangible example, is timely.
Ian
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Anglo-Cthulhic
Posts: 4857 | From: the corridors of Pah! | Registered: May 2001
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mdijon
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# 8520
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Posted
I've really dragged this one out, and for that I'm sorry. I've been back to re-read the OP again a few times during the thread, and after IanB's post I've been back yet again.
And I think I'm going to have to admit there really is a point here that I've not properly digested until now.
But firstly, I've been talking as if I somehow represent the minority people's take on multiculturalism. That clearly isn't so. IanB quotes both Trevor Phillips (who I don't have so much time for) and Sentamu (who I have great respect for) who disagree with me.
If one finds oneself swimming against one's learned betters it is very rarely correct to persist. In this case, however, I think I still disagree... although I feel myself crumbling a bit.
Secondly, I do now see that if Islamic schools are operating in Berlin, with teaching in Turkish, without proper inspection and supervision, then students are getting a sub-standard education. If the state is failing to intervene, it is likely that concerns about "tolerance" and "multi-culturalism" are likely to be partly to blame.
However, I think the link between that and honour killings is very weak. The article refers to these schools as "fuelling honour killings" and I think that's unlikely, although I accept that a girl in such a school is not going to report sexual abuse, for instance, to her teacher.
So I accept there are sins to lay at the door of multi-culturalism.
What I don't accept is that the worst excesses (killings, child abuse, FGM) in islamic society can be counted among these.
There are other factors; if one funds RC and C of E schools, it's hard to refuse islamic schools.
I would also blame years of dreadful race relations - abuses, riots, discrimination; and eye for eye between the communities - that now results in authority finding it very difficult to constructively engage communities.
Multiculturalism is part of the expression of these difficult relationship - and as such can get blamed for many ills that go much deeper.
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mdijon nojidm uoɿıqɯ ɯqıɿou
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Laura
General nuisance
# 10
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Posted
Hrmph. He listens to ++Sentamu but not me. I guess that's what the mitre and a life of struggle gets one.
mdijon: I think you've got ahold of what I think is the central problem, and I'm certainly not going to disagree with you. I will go so far as to allow that the link with honor killings may not be as strong as the link with tolerating other more pervasive but less extreme forms of oppression of women. Though, upon reflection, I'm not sure that the lesser but more pervasive erosion of women's rights in that context is not the more sinister in terms of impact, when purveyed by gov't funded foreign-language schools.
And I'll say again that I think the shift against FGM even in some countries where it has been widely practiced, is one of the world's growing success stories of cooperation between medical folks, activists and religious leaders, in terms of women's rights. I'd like to see honor killings go the same way.
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Love is the only sane and satisfactory answer to the problem of human existence. - Erich Fromm
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mdijon
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# 8520
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Posted
Well, thank you for your patience Laura.
It's perhaps worth thinking about why FGM has been dealt with in such a different atmosphere. There are few cries of "foul" or "intolerance" from representatives of any community regarding the intervention of the UN and other Western based agencies. It's not as if gains here have been made as a result of a radically different approach, or particular cultural sensitivity. Why the difference?
On the other hand, maybe it's not a good time to kick start the thread or start another multiculturalism/immigrants/prime directive type thread just yet. Perhaps I'll cogitate a bit first.
BTW, it's not just his hat, though. And I might not listen to him that much more than I listen to you.
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mdijon nojidm uoɿıqɯ ɯqıɿou
ɯqıɿou uoɿıqɯ nojidm mdijon
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