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Politics : Politics for Pros- moderated -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: ManyMoose who wrote (150045)	12/7/2005 12:35:26 PM
From: Lane3	Read Replies (3) \| Respond to of 793964

>>"Invent 'multiculturalism' and encourage immigrants to maintain their culture.<< The last office Christmas Party I attended there had banners from Kwanza, Hanukkah, Islam, and what have you. It was all part of an intense effort to install multiculturalism on us. Non-Christian events had no such multi-cultural flavor, but the daily effort to enforce multiculturalism was relentless. Lest there be no misunderstanding about where I stand, I love the richness brought to the American culture by ethnic groups from around the world. Rich American culture, not multiculturalism. It would be very easy to misunderstand where you stand. If you don't think that Kwanza and Hanukkah add to the richness of American culture but rather see them as signs of multicultural isolationism, you and I have different ideas of the meaning of "richness in American culture." Part of the melting pot is the integration of traditions from other cultures. We would not have the Christmas tree if we hadn't adopted it from the Germans. There is a difference between adopting charming tidbits from other cultures and cultural isolationism. Hanukkah lights add richness. Sharia courts are isolationist. There is a difference. My family is from Slovakia. The tradition I grew up with was eating mashed potatoes, buttermilk, and mushrooms on Christmas Eve. It was a little odd and I felt somewhat isolated over it on that day, but it's hard to imagine mushrooms as a national threat. It took a while for Christmas trees to be fully integrated into American culture. While that was going on there were some folks railing against the assault. How quaint that seems now. I agree with you and Lamm that the cultural isolationism variety of multiculturalism is very problematic. But I would caution you not to wall out the incorporation of other traditions out of concern about it. Incorporation is what assimilation and the melting pot are all about. If you wall out innocent traditions, you are contributing to cultural isolationism.