Assimilation vs. Multiculturalism

Cultural assimilation. The best society is one where everyone is more-or-less the same. There can be no conflicts if everyone is on the same page.

Multiculturalism The best society is one where people, from a myriad of different backgrounds and beliefs, can live harmoniously despite their differences, and even learn from each other's differences.

Which do you think is better? I'm on the side of multiculturalism.

edited 6th Feb '11 7:55:53 PM by Grain

Anime geemu wo shinasai!

I have this feeling this got spawned due to Ukon but anyway, I subscribe to multiculturalism. The better way to integrate societies. I'm of the opinion that multiculturalism leads to assimilation but assimilation practices lead to a segregated society due to backlash.

Ideally multiculturalism, but practically... I dunno. I think people should be able to choose for themselves and not have to deal with degrading comments that they're "whitewashed" if they choose to assimilate.

Assimilation, all the way.

@ Breadloaf: I think it's more accurate to say that heavy-handed attempts to force assimilation (which usually include a fair deal of plain ol' discrimination under the guise of assimilation) are doomed to causing backlash.

Can I Take a Third Option and say neither, to a degree?

My opposition to Multiculturalism, is that it stresses the differences of people. And is perfectly reconcilable with Separatism of all sorts.

Cultural assimilation implies that people should stop their cultural practices, even if it means that culture itself dies off. The answer to me is voluntary interculturalism, in a world society that all countries and borders are destroyed. That people feel the social responsibility to part in culture and ensure it's survival.

Culture doesn't disappear if people of all cultures make and effort to preserve it all, especially it's most important parts. It's not true that you can't be a part of and help protect a culture you weren't born into. It doesn't matter what origin a person is who speaks and publicizes a dying language, the language is kept spoken and well.

Personally, on the scale, though, I would say that I am more in line with opposition to Multiculturalism and on the side of assimilation. We aren't living on a world without borders, yet. And it's the duty of the immigrant to make peace with the nation they are living among, not the duty of the nation to make peace with the immigrant.

Genkidama for Japan, even if you don't have money, you can help![1]

"The answer to me is voluntary interculturalism, in a world society that all countries and borders are destroyed."

Why?

A flaw that I see in assimilation is that the qualities of minorities would be stamped out. Being stamped out isn't fun.

Anime geemu wo shinasai!

"A flaw that I see in assimilation is that the qualities of minorities would be stamped out. Being stamped out isn't fun."

Only if you are using ham-fisted methods in an attempt to force one-sided assimilation.

@Wander: Talk to him on his Help! thread.

Eh...this is something I'd hate to have an extreme in. Assimilation would make people happier, so in an ideal world, more of that. In practice, multiculturalism except when it's actually harming people.

Except for 4/1/2011. That day lingers in my memory like...metaphor here...I should go.

Well, for the points against multiculturalism is that nobody is promoting difference. Multiculturalism is about government not interfering in the realm of someone's culture. It's up to you how you act and if you wish to continue speaking say Korean, then you do so. Your country still operates with official languages, the government still provides services in English/French, but you can speak Korean, run a Korean grocery store, or do whatever. On the flip side, from the individual, while you may practice anything of your culture, you cannot exclude people in your practices... for instance, running a Korean grocery store and then refusing entry to Japanese people. If there's no encouragement/discouragement, being in a English-speaking country will naturally cause the subsequent generations of the family simply become more and more similar to the majority.

Government can also work on exchange of ideas. If you have sufficient populations of different cultures you can pick up certain ideas from them. You can use them to build better relations with the home country. You have people who will naturally trade better with their home country. And what I mean by exchange of ideas, is that we can improve our country by taking on solutions to problems that other people have already solved.

That's ideal multiculturalism, breadloaf. In practice, what you get is a lot like what we have today.

Edit: Not sure why I wanted that in italics. My mistake.

edited 6th Feb '11 9:28:39 PM by Ultrayellow

Except for 4/1/2011. That day lingers in my memory like...metaphor here...I should go.

Is skin whitening an assimilationist activity?

Anime geemu wo shinasai!

No, it's one of the many ways those with two neurons to rub together can take money from those with one or less.

@Ultrayellow

Could you be more specific? I know a lot of areas are nowhere near as successful as where I live, I just wanted to get a sense of which parts of the world we should be discussing when it comes to multiculturalism's shortcomings.

On a more serious note, skin whitening is multiculturalist, if anything. That's a cultural trait, and depends on what one culture views as attractive.

@breadloaf: Some cultures promote racism. Some cultures promote qualities or mindsets which hold people back. That's unhelpful.

edited 6th Feb '11 9:18:17 PM by Ultrayellow

Except for 4/1/2011. That day lingers in my memory like...metaphor here...I should go.

White skin love! What are we, East Asians? Here everyone wants tanned skin. There, everyone wants white skin.

@Ultrayellow

So my friend tells me to respond with "Your FACE is unhelpful!" but I told him it might not go well with constructive discussion.

Anyway, I'm going to presume you mean that some cultures promote sexism or intolerance, others reject academics, and so on and so forth. Well, the question is similar to even just one culture. If certain families have parents who don't bother to promote academics, or are intolerant, what should the government do about it? I think the best you can do is that as we learn about positive aspects from any culture, or new positive ones arise in our own culture, we promote them in our education system. It's all we can do.

Say there's a culture that rejects academics but promotes strong physical attributes. Ignore it's rejection of academics and take on it's promotion of physical prowess. Put it into your physical education classes, perhaps, because of their focus on building strong bodies, they know how better to do it. Or, if it's a sexist society but on the other hand, it's heavy on say a good work ethic, take that but ignore the sexism. With multiculturalism we have that option.

edited 6th Feb '11 8:37:18 PM by breadloaf

But you don't have that option. Total multiculturalism says you have to let every culture do its thing. Doesn't matter if the culture's promoting racism, or any bad thing, you can't do anything about it. Skin whitening is a part of a culture. You can't even say that's wrong, because it's a part of their culture to value whiter skin.

Except for 4/1/2011. That day lingers in my memory like...metaphor here...I should go.

Promoting racism would be contradictory to inter-cultural harmony. Multiculturalism is tolerant of different things and different people, which is anti-racist. I think that you're describing a different ideology.

edited 6th Feb '11 8:57:20 PM by Grain

Anime geemu wo shinasai!

I don't think that Multiculturalism and Interculturalism are the same thing.

Like I said, Multiculturalism is open to Separatism. Interculturalism is not.

At the risk of sounding racist, I find this kind of alienating. As I personally adore ghostly pale skin. It is impossible for someone to be "too pale", in my opinion, I can just get lost aesthetically in truly white skin. It's just gorgeous. And yet, everyone around here in the United States seems to be more interested in tanning. A bronze look. As they seem to call it.

In fact that's supposed to be, according to the people involved, a big cultural division between the so called "Goths" and "Preps". That "Preps", whatever the heck that is even supposed to mean anymore, like tanning. While "Goths", subvert that "norm" of body building, partying, tanning, and doing whatever is most normal, with "weird" stuff like keeping their skin pasty white.

edited 6th Feb '11 9:03:43 PM by Ukonkivi

Genkidama for Japan, even if you don't have money, you can help![1]

Minorities believe that the majority appearance is most aesthetic, and try to mimic it. That's not multicultural. The multicultural attitude would be that all appearances are valuable, and none should be overridden.

edited 6th Feb '11 9:15:29 PM by Grain

Anime geemu wo shinasai!

Of course, but it would also say that every culture has a right to its own standards of beauty. With assimilation, there's no point to racism. If there are no different cultures, why does race matter?

Helpful note: there are two types of skin whitening/bleaching, from what I see. Not counting the actual main use, of course, which is removing spots, blemishes, etc. You can whiten skin because your cultures aesthetic is whiter, or you can do it so you'll appear whiter (and therefore Western) because of racism.

Assimilation would stop those. Multiculturalism allows even the parts of a culture which we personally find unpleasant.

I'm still not arguing for total Assimilation. I'm just arguing for a compromise. Why not get rid of the parts of some cultures which nobody else likes?

Except for 4/1/2011. That day lingers in my memory like...metaphor here...I should go.

Who are we?

Are you talking about unpleasant things like female circumcision? Okay, you're expanding this thread to consider how moral relativism would work in a multicultural society. Well, I believe that there are certain inalienable human rights that would have to be agreed upon.

edited 6th Feb '11 9:27:18 PM by Grain

Anime geemu wo shinasai!

See, even that's a compromise.

And "we" are at least fluent in English. We probably have a lot of other things in common. It's not hard to find common ground.

edited 6th Feb '11 9:25:32 PM by Ultrayellow

Except for 4/1/2011. That day lingers in my memory like...metaphor here...I should go.

A multicultural society would have to agree on these inalienable rights in order to function harmoniously. That implies a degree of assimilation.

So, there are no absolutes.

edited 6th Feb '11 9:25:49 PM by Grain

Anime geemu wo shinasai!

That was the only point I was really trying to make. Sorry if I was unclear.

Except for 4/1/2011. That day lingers in my memory like...metaphor here...I should go.