Posted on 06/27/2007 6:56:14 AM PDT by rattrap
Are you into the multicultural agenda? Is the drive to diversity a big deal with you? Perhaps not. Maybe you're one of those people who actually like to judge people based on their individual personality and integrity.
A Harvard political scientist, Robert Putnam, did a little study that might interest you. His topic ... immigration and ethnic diversity. The results are shocking, not at all what he expected. In fact, the study results that this liberal, academia bed-wetter wanted to wait until after the immigration debate to publish it. Why? Because it is damaging to the pro-illegal immigration debate. Not only that, but he was scrambling to find ways to compensate for the negative effects of diversity. Are you getting this? He was afraid what right-wingers would do with the news. He had something that went against his liberal, academia beliefs and withheld the study until he could figure out a way to spin the results so as not to offend his and his liberal colleague's tender sensibilities.
OK ... gotcha. Now you're curious. You want to know what the study said, right? Putnam's study reveals that immigration and diversity not only reduce social capital between ethnic groups, but also within the groups themselves. He uses the analogy of a turtle, saying that people who live in ethnically diverse setting "hunker down." They don't assimilate. They don't embrace each other and share tortilla dinners together. They sit in front of the television and waste away .. they pull into their shells.
Putnam found that the more diverse the neighborhood, the less residents trust neighbors. In ethnically diverse cities like LA and San Francisco, 30% of people say that they trust their neighbors. In ethnically homogeneous cities, the figure is as high as 80%. Putnam says that people in diverse communities tend "to withdraw even from close friends, to expect the worst from their community and its leaders, to volunteer less, give less to charity and work on community projects less often, to register to vote less, to agitate for social reform more, but have less faith that they can actually make a difference, and to huddle unhappily in front of the television." Sounds like a neighborhood you we would all really love to live in, doesn't it? This magic ethnically diverse community that we've been hearing so much about doesn't sound like a community that is going to be all that active in government. Perhaps they don't even care about who is representing them and what issues are facing the communities in which they live.
And it doesn't matter whether they are poor communities or safe communities ... the findings are all the same. In general, Putnam found that the more people are brought into contact with another race or culture, the more they stick to their own, and the less they trust others.
This is the America that our Senate have just promoted with their amnesty bill. We're not speaking racism here. We're speaking culturalism. People tend to gravitate toward a culture they understand and are comfortable with.
Here is a study that we're probably not going to hear much about.
In a way, you’ve got to respect this guy. Although he couldn’t see what was in front of him unless he saw it through his research, he didn’t shade or flush the results.
Hail Diversity!
I think it’s a bit more complicated than that. There was a book that came out, long time ago, that layed out all the various nations located within America, using the standard of nation as applies to the rest of the world. As it turned out, I think it ended up being that there were 10 nations located within America.
Most thinking people, (most of those are freepers), can see the sham of multiculturalism and diversity. When I was going to grade school, there were 2 German girls in my grade. They were strongly, very strongly encouraged to assimilate. Our human nature is very evident in kids, they haven’t learned to hide true feelings, like adults do.
When the German girls would get together, and speak German, the rest of us felt left out, and put off by their “secret code”.
If we assimilate, we all share common reference points. This makes us stronger, because then, your neighbor is also someone who is an identifiable countryman. Diversity results in a collection of unconnected individuals. Perserve your culture, practice what you wish at home, but be an American first.
We’re constantly told, “Celebrate diversity!” You don’t have to nag people to celebrate something that is good. People just naturally celebrate it.
If this thing goes through, we can look for the final BALKANIZATION of America with all the internal unrest between the various SEPARATE and UNASSIMILATED factions that entails.
I have this sneaking suspicion that this is PRECISELY what these New World Order cretins in Washington want. The ensuing civil unrest and turmoil would most likely lead to closing the net around the rest of us, declaring a “National Emergency,” suspending posse comitatus, collecting the firearms and...
If you’re having trouble filling in the rest, study the course of virtually EVERY tyranny throughout history. Also look up “Hegelian Dialectic.”
And if some of you folks are not big readers, perhaps these short videos will help:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9CyxOlL9zKg
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j73SsNFgBO4
Birds of a feather . . . . That said, it is only natural and instinctive to draw closer to those with whom you have shared interests. Race will be a factor in those interests but maybe not the dominant one. If I go to a church camp and our shared interests are a closer relationship with our Creator, race would have little impact if any with the interaction. If I am in a poor neighborhood where violence is prone to happen it would be a little more in my thoughts unless I had made friends with the different ethnic groups and even then mob mentality may overrule what friendships were formed. Crowded cities are a poor melting pot.
Yup. Everytime someone asks if I speak Spanish, I say no (I do.), besides, why should I be forced to speak a foriegn language in my country?
Divide and conquer.
Not exactly new knowledge, been around a couple thousand years or so.
A tyrannical government fears most a united, po’d citizenry.
I’ve often challenged leftists to show me ONE study that demonstrates the “strength in diversity”, or ANY benefits from “diversity”.
And here we go, some leftist decided to do a study, and came up with the opposite results.
Multiculturalism, as we conservatives have always instinctively known, WEAKENS society, and assimilation strengthens it.
But, then again, every agenda of the left has the result of weakening the foundations of society. Not saying that this is their intent (though, for some, it is), but this is the result.
If you want to call a preference for your own kind “racism”, fine. The fact is, all these idiot intellectuals ignore what makes (made?) America great; the unifying factor, the “own kind” above all the ethnicities and races: being an American. The notion that one “loses” culture by assimilating is nonsense.
The liberals turned off the stove and the “melting pot” is full of oil and water instead of a nice tasty stew.
“Yup. Everytime someone asks if I speak Spanish, I say no (I do.), besides, why should I be forced to speak a foriegn language in my country?”
There’s always a backlash. I like Spanish culture. When I was in the Navy in San Diego, one of my best friends was Alex Viera. We had a great time. Spanish, being a Latin language didn’t seem so odd to me. I took French in school, (proximity to Canada, seemed wise at the time).
28 years later, I’m starting to chaffe at the Spanish being forced on us. Multi lingual signs, ballots, phone trees. Bah! Spanish language tv and radio, ESPN Desports! Grrrrr. You know, I’m not big on conspiracies, but if you divide the working class by language, they aren’t likely to unite to oppose the elite on key issues, are they?
I have no problem with Spanish people, notice they try to categorize them as “brown” people to further polarize us. I just want this to be America. Perserve OUR borders, language, and culture. If you want to be an American, and you want to assimilate, come here legally, and I’ll fight for your right to do so.
What idiocy.
I got news for you, if they ever announced “gun confiscation” it’s going to be such a cultural affront in the South that not only will people not turn over their guns, and this is people of both races, but, you’ll see alot of violence break out.
I’ve never held to the idea that the South is permanently in the United States, and when you consider that, if you take out the Southern states, the country is predominantly blue, at some point there will be a cultural flashpoint. And just look at our experience in Iraq and Vietnam, the Soviets in Afghanistan, etc. When a country reacts to your presence as if it were an armed camp under hostile occupation, general, the occupying power retreats. Hell, the Union states actually made a deal with the South to pull out troops because they were tired of having to deal with our resistance
The rest of the country may fall, but the rest of the South will survive because we’ve always had our identity as being somewhat seperate, and I got news for you, no black in the South is going to turn guns over in a national gun confiscation order because well, it’s a common belief in the black community that the only thing that keeps them from re-enslavement is the ability to defend themselves. The story of the black man in the 1920’s, who used his shotgun to scare off the Klan, still has reverence in that community.
The rest of the nation may fall, but the South never will.
In our history, many nationalities have emigrated to the USA, and since our revolution, most did not speak English. Italians, Germans, Poles, Russians, Chinese, Japanese, even Latinos from south of the border learned English, and adopted our “American” culture, which is an off shoot of the British/Celtic cultures and Western civilization.
The big problem today is that multiculturalism has downgraded the value of our American (Western) culture and its strengths. The left actually argues that all cultures are equal and perhaps that American culture is imperialistic and evil. All cultures are not evil, and America need to foster its culture, not proliferate every third world culture.
Race is not necessarily a factor in culture, but every time I hear a rap music tune, I am reminded that there is an African-American subculture, and part of it is distasteful to me. However, in general Black Americans have adopted American culture.
The concern that I have for illegal immigration is that with the massive influx of Hispanics our country will not be able to assimilate these people, thereby creating situations like what Victor Davis Hansen called “Mexifornia” in his book. We don’t need the Canadian model where whole regions of the culture are adversarial to each other because of language and culture.
We may have 10 nations, but I have lived in six states in different parts of the country and find Americans from NY are more like Americans from Texas, Georgia, Virginia or Arizona than for example an Englishman is like a Scot, or a Castilian is like a Catalonian. If illegal immigration doesn’t change, we may be looking at Southern California as another Quebec (Hispanic style).
I feel the same way. Living in L.A., however, I can’t escape it. It’s crazy here.
So how did the "melting pot" concept come to be? That was real and historically unquestioned.
What is the essential factor missing from this summary? Perhaps there are two factors. Or three.
Where does being "in the shadows" factor into the whole enterprise? How about the nature of the "move" of cultures? How about the vetting for suitability before being allowed to emmigrate?
How about a willingness to assimilate? The conscious effort to not only move but to embrace the culture which is the destination, for whatever reason?
Legal status may be a factor. You think?
Meeting some minimum standard, or any standard at all before being allowed to join might be another.
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