I think Ron's right. He said, "multiculturalism is a more dynamic position than
adhereing to old mono cultural ethics and prejudices". We can use the MOQ's
terms to make a case for its superiority but I think it can just as well be
justified in terms of common sense. The world has become too small for
tribalism. Shedding one's provincial attitudes has become a matter of decency
and self-respect, no? The acceptance of multiculturalism demonstrates a certain
intellectual capacity to compare and analyze the values of others, especially
with those who are unlike ourselves. It indicates the ability to look at things
from a broader perspective, in the context of history and geography and
cultural evolution. And isn't it simply a demographic fact that the opposition
to multiculturalism is strongly correlated to the least educated, narrowest,
most provincial minds? Here this attitude finds expression in the Republican's
aggressive patriotism and religiosity. These are the "real" Amer
icans that Sarah Palin loves so well.As if that weren't enough, when
multiculturalism is understood in the context of our own history it can easily
be seen as part of centuries-long effort to overcome a particularly lethal
evil. Western history is totally saturated with religious intolerance.
Virtually every war for the last 1000 years was essentially the assertion of
one set of social level values over another. Christianity over Islam and
Paganism, Catholicism over Protestantism, etc., etc.. To this you can add
colonialism, slavery, two thousand years of anti-semitism, Hitler's genocide,
the American genocide against the Indians, the "white man's burden" and the Ku
Klux Klan. That's the historical context in which multiculturalism should be
understood. It goes hand in hand with democracy and the equality of human
rights. This is not just some Rockwellian sentiment about human dignity, its
about keeping the body-count down. Yes, the intellectually guided society is
more mora
l because it is more dynamic and open and free but its also more moral because
bigotry has been a cruel, cruel bitch for long, long time. One can see how
tribalism served an evolutionary purpose and I'm sure that various levels of
cohesion are still necessary but we can also see how it gets out of hand,
usually in the form of reactionary movements like fascism and fundamentalism.
These are essentially anti-intellectual movements. They are muscular
re-assertions of social level values, a push back against modernity, against
things like multiculturalism. The "free market" conservatives like to imagine
that their internationalism is only about trade and commerce and that it is
culturally neutral. The "undeveloped" nations will just naturally want to be
more Western, at least economically, and that Kentucky Fried Chicken on the
corner represents culturally neutral "progress", right? No, modernity has
changed the values a bit, but we're still exporting Western values at gun point
. Same as it ever was. Capitalism is the new Crusade. Probably goes back to
stone knives but the world is too small and crowded now. Tribalism makes even
less sense than pretended neutrality. Classical Liberalism is based on
enlightenment economics, Lockean and Hobbsian contract theorists who calculate
economic activity in terms of self-interested, rational, amoral individuals. It
is a version of that amoral scientific objectivity that desiccates science and
technology. That's what were exporting with pretended neutrality, so they're
all getting a side dish of dis-Qualified rationality with their seven herbs and
spices.
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