Another response to Outside the So-Called Ethnic Box:

A correspondent forwarded a typical screed complaining that multiple cultures and languages are "balkanizing" the US. It was written by someone named Lamm. Here's what I said about it:

>> How would you reply to this? Sent to my political group <<

Is this Lamm the semi-racist ex-governor of Colorado Dick Lamm? Or is it someone in your circle?

It looks like an e-mail forwarded several times. Unless the author is available to debate his views, I wouldn't waste much time on it.

>> THE HISTORIES OF BILINGUAL AND BICULTURAL SOCIETIES THAT DO NOT ASSIMILATE ARE HISTORIES OF TURMOIL, TENSION, AND TRAGEDY. CANADA, BELGIUM, MALAYSIA, LEBANON <<

Canada, Belgium, Malaysia, and Lebanon?! These are his examples?? How pathetically weak can you get? Canada and Belgium are modern Western countries with no major problems, so multiculturalism hasn't hurt them. I'm not up on Malaysia, but I believe it's a stable, thriving democracy. Only tiny Lebanon is an example of a country "torn" by factions—and those are religious more than racial factions.

According to the UN's 2005 rankings of the best places to live:

Canada is 14th, Belgium 24th, and Malaysia 36th. In other words, they're in the top 20% of all the world's countries. And they're supposed to be the argument AGAINST multiculturalism? They sound like an argument FOR multiculturalism to me.

Moreover, all the great empires in history were multicultural: Egypt, China, Rome, etc. All lasted far longer than the United States has. And the US has been multicultural from the start too. English, French, Dutch, German, and Spanish settlers combined with American Indians and black slaves to form the basis of our country.

What are Lamm's examples of a "pure" country with only one culture? Saudi Arabia, with its fundamentalist fanaticism? Japan, which became a military dictatorship that tried to conquer the world? I'd love to hear what country he thinks we should emulate—but he sounds too ignorant to come up with a positive example. All he's doing is criticizing our present culture because he's a scared little xenophobic racist. (If he's a member of your group, you can tell him I said so.)

I love these nutcases who think America was once culturally pure but is becoming corrupt now. When was this monocultural paradise, exactly? During the Revolutionary War, when the Americans threw off the old European culture and adopted a native-style democracy with the help of their Indian allies? During the Civil War, when proponents of the North's industrial culture fought against proponents of the South's agricultural culture? During the so-called Gilded Era, when the foreign immigration fueling our factories and sweatshops reached an all-time high?

When, exactly? Let's see Lamm pick a year when America was better than it is now so I can point out the flaws in his thinking.

Related links
They keep coming, and coming, and coming...
Multiculturalism defined

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