Multiculturalism, necessary or a failed and flawed policy?

OfficePants

OfficePants

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These 2 Dutch politicians have their views, what does everyone think?

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Flawed and failed at least from Canada's experience. Creating a cultural mosaic rather than a melting pot results in citizens who are only citizens for the benefits they receive from the State but who continue to wave the flag of where they came from instead of proudly calling themselves Canadian
 
Thruth said:
Flawed and failed at least from Canada's experience. Creating a cultural mosaic rather than a melting pot results in citizens who are only citizens for the benefits they receive from the State but who continue to wave the flag of where they came from instead of proudly calling themselves Canadian
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Is that really that wide-spread, though, or is it more a small minority that is well-known because of media attention?

Australia is a very multicultural society and, since WWII, there have been waves of migration from southern Europe (Italy and Greece), eastern Europe (Slavic countries), SE Asia (primarily Vietnam), China and now the Middle East and Africa.

All of those groups have, to a greater or lesser extent, settled in certain areas when they first arrived in Australia. This is natural - if you're in a strange country, it's comforting to be around people who speak the same language, who share the same culture, who eat the same food and so on. However, after one or two generations, those communities have largely spread out through the wider community and whilst there might still be some remnants of the original locations (see the "Chinatowns" that exist in so many cities around the globe), the later generations are spread out around the place and have frequently inter-married with people from other backgrounds.

I suppose - and this is merely a supposition - that the fairly recent rise of the welfare state may have, in a way, assisted people to remain sequestered in relatively closed communities as the fact that they're getting welfare means that they don't need to go out and find work to as great an extent as they once did.

As an example, one of the great, post-WWII infrastructure projects in Australia was the Snowy Mountains hydro-electric scheme. A lot of migrants from southern and eastern Europe worked on the project and so, out of necessity, they mixed together, so people from British, Greek, Italian, Lithuanian, Polish, Dutch and many other backgrounds were pushed together for some years, so they didn't settle in their own communities. Nowadays, though, with migrants being able to access welfare *in certain circumstances*, if they are happy to exist on a relatively small amount of money from the government, they don't need to go out and find work and thus they don't need to move outside their communities.

However, I work with one of the Australian government departments that deals with migrants, and in my experience, it's a definite minority who prefer to stay in their own communities in the long term. Most want to learn English, most want to find work, most want to be self-sufficient and be able to survive in the wider community.
 
it is pretty flawed all across europe. not that mr wilders' suggestions will solve the problems though
 
Europe, of course, is mostly a different case from Australia.

Australia is a young country and whilst the vast majority of the population was Anglo-Saxon for the first 150 years or so of modern Australia's history, Australia didn't really have time the forge a strong national identity that was separate to that of the UK prior to large waves of migrants from other European countries.

Hence, while a lot of Australian in the first half of the 20th century still identified as British to some extent, there wasn't a strong "British", "French", "Dutch" etc national culture that opponents of migration could point out and say, "Our identity is at risk from outsiders".

Of course, Europe has had waves of invaders over the centuries but the various countries still, by and large, have managed to forge distinct cultural identities and people strongly identify with those cultures, so I can understand why outsiders, especially those who look distinctively different, could be regarded as a threat.
 
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Many of us were not Anglo- Saxon but Celtic/Irish.

My background is Irish/Italian/Austrian/Jewish. No much Anglo - Saxon there.

Anyway to use a portmanteau term like Multiculturalism is meaningless internationally.

It means something entirely different in policy, aims, execution and outcomes in Australia than other places.

Here by any criteria it has broadly been a huge success.
Not to say there aren't issues around the fuzzy edges. But then they are more like a Venn diagram anyway. But then thats true of most policies.
 
Journeyman said:
so I can understand why outsiders, especially those who look distinctively different, could be regarded as a threat.
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although there were certainly some issues around the edges the integration of people from surinam and indonesia in tge second half if the 20th century didn't raise the issues we face today. and they surely look different from the ethnic dutch.

two issues that make integration of many of the muslim immigrants more difficult today are the high number of muslim immigrants vs total population (approx 1 mio on 16 mio inhabitants) making it easy for them to live and stay amongst 'their own', and the big cultural differences between the muslims and ethnic dutch, generally not the most liberal and forward types felt the need to leave their country (or were actively brought over by dutch labour intensive industries in the 60s and 70s).
 
Allen Smithee said:
If multiculturalism is so great, what are Asia, Africa, and South America doing to support it? Or Israel?
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Have you been to Israel? It's a very multicultural country, as people of Jewish faith come from so many different countries and cultures. Certainly, they all have the same religion, but just as with Christianity, there are different ways of practicing Judaism. There are Jews from North America, from Russia and eastern Europe, from Western Europe, from other areas of the Middle East, from Africa, from South America, Australia and probably from other places, too. Israel is a melting pot of many different cultures. The only constant amongst migrants over the past 70 years has been Judaism but, as I noted, there are different strands of Judaism and the way that Judaism is practiced in parts of Africa, for example, is very different to the way that it is practiced in, for example, eastern Europe.

South America is also pretty multicultural, particularly certain countries/areas - as well as the Spanish and Portuguese influence, there were a lot of Italians and Germans that migrated to Italy in the first half of the 20th century and there are also a lot of 2nd/3rd/4th generation and more people of Chinese and Japanese heritage. Both Peru and Brazil have significant Japanese-heritage communities.

A lot of Africa was pretty multicultural but megalomaniacs like Idi Amin and Robert Mugabe have pushed out a lot of people from their countries, which has done a huge amount of harm to countries like Uganda and Zimbabwe.
 
Thruth said:
Flawed and failed at least from Canada's experience. Creating a cultural mosaic rather than a melting pot results in citizens who are only citizens for the benefits they receive from the State but who continue to wave the flag of where they came from instead of proudly calling themselves Canadian
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I think the main reason this stuff is becoming difficult to tolerate is because these coming in, to a significant extent, don't want to work. They just want to suck up benefits. Regarding fxh's comments from above, you are talking about a different brand of migrant now. The migrant of today is informed about where the getting is good, and they go after it. My views really started to change a couple of years ago: I went to a local mall in the middle of the day during a work day. It was all Muslims, men and women, entire families even, I was with another person and they mentioned it before I said anything. How is it possible that a minority population like this makes up 80% of the daytime traffic in a mall?

Immigrants are generally coming from failed states, and there is a reason they are that way, and you are, to some extent, adopting the belief systems that led those states to fail. You used to get the ones that wanted to escape and work for a better life, now you are getting the asylum seeking free shit crowd.

To a large extent, I believe this is the reason for the frustration.
 
It is the particular political/policy structure that that defines multiculturalism in Canada that is the failure. the "cultural mosaic" as opposed to the "melting pot"'concept really made considering oneself Canadian above one's cultural background an option.

I realize that immigrants seek communities where they feel comfortable with others from their their own culture but it is clear that a strong national identity has suffered because of this policy.

It has become magnified of late a newer wave of immigrants seek to take advantage of the political structure but we have always had an identity crisis.
 
Thruth said:
It is the particular political/policy structure that that defines multiculturalism in Canada that is the failure. the "cultural mosaic" as opposed to the "melting pot"'concept really made considering oneself Canadian above one's cultural background an option.

I realize that immigrants seek communities where they feel comfortable with others from their their own culture but it is clear that a strong national identity has suffered because of this policy.

It has become magnified of late a newer wave of immigrants seek to take advantage of the political structure but we have always had an identity crisis.
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Fundamentally I question the notions of nationalism, national identity, and whether you have a melting pot or a mosaic. It seems more of a conversation about contribution than whether people are integrating.

I'd rather see pockets of isolated communities that move their ass rather than a melting pot of benefits barnacles, and the same in reverse.
 
OfficePants said:
Fundamentally I question the notions of nationalism, national identity, and whether you have a melting pot or a mosaic. It seems more of a conversation about contribution than whether people are integrating.

I'd rather see pockets of isolated communities that move their ass rather than a melting pot of benefits barnacles, and the same in reverse.
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Couldn't agree more. Just thought I would forward a view about structure. I don't care if people want to live in self-created ghettos or fully integrate as long as they are productive members of society. By and large immigrants to Canada have integrated and become successful. Our benefit-suckers have always been primarily home grown Caucasians along with First Nations which is a whole different fucked up story.

So it has always been why has out multi-culturalism resulted in integrated, successful people who don't necessarily feel it important to consider themselves Canadians.

With America next door, this always struck me as strange because of your fervent national pride.

Now we all are beginning to see the shift in immigrants taking advantage of the welfare state as has happened in Europe. This is far worse than worrying about national identity.
 
Thruth said:
Couldn't agree more. Just thought I would forward a view about structure. I don't care if people want to live in self-created ghettos or fully integrate as long as they are productive members of society. By and large immigrants to Canada have integrated and become successful. Our benefit-suckers have always been primarily home grown Caucasians along with First Nations which is a whole different fucked up story.

So it has always been why has out multi-culturalism resulted in integrated, successful people who don't necessarily feel it important to consider themselves Canadians.

With America next door, this always struck me as strange because of your fervent national pride.

Now we all are beginning to see the shift in immigrants taking advantage of the welfare state as has happened in Europe. This is far worse than worrying about national identity.
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I posted this video in another thread, and it strikes to the heart of this point. Your last sentence particularly, about the shift taking place to game the system. I think it's mostly Muslims behind this. It's a common attitude among muslims that you should go to western countries and steal their wealth thru cheating the system. You just don't see this level of abuse with latino immigrants, and tends to explain the reason why it's most acute in Europe.





Meh... American national pride? It reminds me of pious people in church... you do it because it makes you look good among your congregation. America is full of phony displays of national pride like all the national anthem crap and the NFL in bed with the military. I wouldn't be fooled by it. American's are run by self interest above all else.
 
Interesting thread, i an like many ofvyou exept from down south the border, literally. Both sides from my family got to their respectives countries (colombia and venezuela) in different eras. My mom side in the late 1900 as farmers from sicily and rioja. While my dad side have been there for long as the first conquistadores, french basque stock and austrian stock. The austrian side has been largely forgotten. We are only of european heritage by last name, everything else is either full blown colombian or venezuelan. One thing though that remains is how we call our grandma which is nonna, other than that for the most part we have nothing to do with europe, except a couple of family members that have moved back to spain or italy for economic reasons, but have made those countries their homes ans feel proud of being from there. Interestig thing about venezuelans is that some of us we may have an icelandic mother and an italian father yet they never say they are from those countries, but think of themselves as full blooded venezuelans. Something very different to my colombian cousins born in the us that say that they are born in colombia when in reality they are from here and dont know anything about colombia.
 
Germany has the same problems like the Netherlands. Lots of foreign workers came (and were welcomed) after the second world war.
Usually men looking for work to support their families back home. The early ones integrated in the way that they learned the language at least to a point to understand the basics. There were and are little to no problems with immigrants from direct neighbouring or southern European countries. But there is a large number of Turkish people who still haven't integrated and have often taken over large areas of major cities, creating their own environment with bars, shops, churches and so on. Many of them do not speak fluent German (especially the older women and younger kids) and there is basically no need to do so. They often despise the German (and Western culture in general), yet largely exploit the system.
Germans have mostly moved away from those areas when they became the minority.
Trouble is that German (and nowadays EU legislation) aided this process. German communities hand out low interest loans to immigrants to start a business, yet they don't do the same for Germans. Once an old German shop closes you can be sure it's taken over and turned into phone shops, groceries or Döner shops. With more people working in them than customers showing up during the day.

There is also the other side of the medal, where many local companies benefit from the immigrants and the money the government pays for their accommodation and food. A lot of old hotels or close to condemnation buildings have become housings for immigrants and the living circumstances are miserable.
I think the Western countries need to do more to actually tell the truth and show the reality about what is going on, that not everyone can afford to buy a new car and that you need some skills to get a good job to pay for everything.

Migration and benefit fraud has been a major topic during the UK elections, and it still is. Though it's mostly a smoke screen to cover other problems in this country. It hands out massive benefits for almost each and everything to everyone who wants to exploit it.
When I contacted my local Job Centre to get a National Insurance number all I got as a reply to my email was a link to their website showing me how to apply for benefits. And once you cross the border (which is a touch more risky and difficult compared to the continent) you are entitled to benefits, they even provide a translator. Problem with the legislation is that you get them also for your family back home, and I'm sure that the total number of kids in Eastern Europe is astronomical.

National pride has been and still is abused for so many things, although loosing the second world war has taken that away from Germany. Which is why winning at big sport events means so much to us. It is pretty much the only thing left to use our flag. Heck, we don't even have a royal family to cheer for. Although technically, all European royal families are more or less German.
 
It is sad what has happened to germany, it can be said that ia similar albeit different to most white people that can't be proud of being white for fear of being labelled as racist, nazis, and so on. Fuck that! Europe's own demise will be because of its politicians and leaders, not because of its people. The people will eventually get tired of it.
 
This white supremacy bullshit is a thing of the past. A lot of proud Aryans™ are often lazy ass idiots that use this old legend to feel better.
Still it has become a cliche that only white people can be racists.
The problem is that over the years certain groups feel entitled to get benefits and there are no appropriate jobs left for those numb-nuts to be a part of the working community There aren't a lot of specialized, high skill jobs either, so there is no need for high level education and job training. Many of those who earn big money exclude themselves from the main community and it's made easy for them. Above a certain income they have the option to choose their national insurance and pension schemes, while those below that level have to pay into the system. With more and more people earning less and paying less taxes the welfare system will eventually collapse. If it hasn't already.
In Germany the folks who never worked are better off than those who get fired because they have become too old (55 and above), but have worked up to 40 years in their lives. They are actually forced by the new system to use up their savings or even sell their house up to the point where they have left so little that they can apply for benefits. And in Germany that is hardly enough to cover rent, energy costs and so on.
 
OfficePants said:
I posted this video in another thread, and it strikes to the heart of this point. Your last sentence particularly, about the shift taking place to game the system. I think it's mostly Muslims behind this. It's a common attitude among muslims that you should go to western countries and steal their wealth thru cheating the system. You just don't see this level of abuse with latino immigrants, and tends to explain the reason why it's most acute in Europe.





Meh... American national pride? It reminds me of pious people in church... you do it because it makes you look good among your congregation. America is full of phony displays of national pride like all the national anthem crap and the NFL in bed with the military. I wouldn't be fooled by it. American's are run by self interest above all else.
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While I realize national pride is a bit of an illusion often given the influence of self interest groups it would still be nice to see more of it outside of international hockey and curling championships.
 
Scherensammler said:
This white supremacy bullshit is a thing of the past. A lot of proud Aryans™ are often lazy ass idiots that use this old legend to feel better.
Still it has become a cliche that only white people can be racists.
The problem is that over the years certain groups feel entitled to get benefits and there are no appropriate jobs left for those numb-nuts to be a part of the working community There aren't a lot of specialized, high skill jobs either, so there is no need for high level education and job training. Many of those who earn big money exclude themselves from the main community and it's made easy for them. Above a certain income they have the option to choose their national insurance and pension schemes, while those below that level have to pay into the system. With more and more people earning less and paying less taxes the welfare system will eventually collapse. If it hasn't already.
In Germany the folks who never worked are better off than those who get fired because they have become too old (55 and above), but have worked up to 40 years in their lives. They are actually forced by the new system to use up their savings or even sell their house up to the point where they have left so little that they can apply for benefits. And in Germany that is hardly enough to cover rent, energy costs and so on.
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There is something wrong with any nation that makes welfare a viable alternative to working. Generations of welfarenicks is disgusting.
 
They have tried to reverse it, but did it half-hearted.
There is a lot of legislation involved. In the olden days you got "Arbeitslosengeld" over a period of time based on the years you have worked.
The longer you've worked the longer you'd get support. Which was fair because you paid into the system.
Nowadays you get support for one year only, after that you move into the benefit system.
Your "ALG" is roughly 65% of your last nett income, so there isn't really a lot left after rent and so on. It gets really silly if you have to pay off a loan or you need one. When your flat exceeds a certain size and/or the rent is too high you are forced to move or no support at all after 6 months. So even if your rent is way under that limit, if your flat is too big you have to find a new one. And flats that fit that special category have become very rare in recent years.
A lot of folks work under the radar while cashing in benefits, often full time. Very good for their employers as well, but bad for the system, because nobody pays in.
The only "positive" side effect of the new system is that benefit seekers just pass through and try to get into the UK. At any cost. They must really love the wheather over here.

Calais migrants: 'Get to England or die trying' – video | UK news | The Guardian
 
Leitmotif said:
It is sad what has happened to germany, it can be said that ia similar albeit different to most white people that can't be proud of being white for fear of being labelled as racist, nazis, and so on. Fuck that! Europe's own demise will be because of its politicians and leaders, not because of its people. The people will eventually get tired of it.
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Yeah, and the PC police does this no favors. The level or racism among other races towards whites is shocking. Unfortunately, the white supremacy crowd fills the void and makes the kind of normalcy that every other race gets when addressing racism impossible.
 
Back in the first days of the Third Reich they lowered the average income and arranged full employment. The latter not without ulterior motives though, like the Autobahn and of course weaponising Germany.
In return there was a program called "Kraft durch Freude", which enabled low income families to have state organized vacations like cruises on the Baltic Sea.
I'm sure that if you offered families living on benefits a similar vacation they would have demands regarding the locations or time period.
 
Scherensammler said:
Back in the first days of the Third Reich they lowered the average income and arranged full employment. The latter not without ulterior motives though, like the Autobahn and of course weaponising Germany.
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No ulterior motives? Come on. No government does anything for the good of the people. Whenever you hear any politician say (fill in your country) "the ________ people", run.
 
Scherensammler said:
Back in the first days of the Third Reich they lowered the average income and arranged full employment. The latter not without ulterior motives though, like the Autobahn and of course weaponising Germany.
In return there was a program called "Kraft durch Freude", which enabled low income families to have state organized vacations like cruises on the Baltic Sea.
I'm sure that if you offered families living on benefits a similar vacation they would have demands regarding the locations or time period.
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They gave some of my relatives a free camp holiday in Auschwitz - one way ticket though.
 
I use the old school definition of a nation, which is a people united by language, beliefs, culture, history. The modern definition is whoever the heck is within the legal landmass border, and that entails no unity or coherence whatsoever. Secondly, there is the old quip about democracy working until the populace realizes they can vote themselves money from the treasury. Make that worse by adding politicians willing to import people for the sole reason of boosting their voter base and nothing good can come of such selfish recklessness.

A nation is the family on a grand scale. The metaphor of national borders and a family home is sound. You have perfect control to pick and choose who enters and what they can do. The open border nuts are quite insane.
http://p.im9.eu/mapporn-percentage-of-eu-population-positive-to-non-eu-immigration-834x642.jpg
 
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Office do i qualify as an american yet? Its all about fatness and yea thats two eggs on the top!
 
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