Sunday, April 20, 2008

The Left and Multiculturalism

Below is a new guest-essay from our Russian correspondent Dimitri K.


The Left and Multiculturalism
by Dimitri K.


The barricadesRecently there was an article in The Brussels Journal which blamed British multiculturalism, problems with immigration, and loss of values on the Left, the mentality of 1968, and students. I argued in the comments that a small group of adolescents is unlikely to have had such a huge impact on the country. I would rather blame it on the legacy of the British Empire: its ruling class had ruled barbaric and savage peoples for so long that may have adopted some of their habits.

If so, does the Left have any role, and what is that role?

Conservatives used to think that the Left and the media are the sources of all ills. Vice versa, the Left sees itself as some intellectual body, which diagnoses the ills of the society and offers the treatment. I partially agree and partially disagree with both opinions. I believe, the Left is actually a sensitive gauge, which reacts to the existing problems. Possibly without even understanding what they are exactly doing.
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Sensitive gauges always amplify the input signal. Those who are familiar with physics, or at least with audio amplifiers, know that if amplification is high, one gets much noise. If amplification is too high, you may get a lot of noise even without any input signal. But when the gauge is properly tuned, it helps to detect the signal, which you can’t detect without it.

Of course, we should not ask the Left what to do. You cannot expect, for example, that a fire alarm will give you a good advice. It will make as much noise as possible to force you out of the building. But if you are reasonable, you would try to stay and use a fire extinguisher. However, it is also unreasonable to blame the fire on the fire alarm.

If this is true, why does the Left promote multiculturalism and the feeling of white guilt? I believe those are the disturbing sounds of alarm. I don’t know why they took exactly those forms, maybe because they are unbearable.

But the real problem may lie behind that. The problem is that we became too self-confident and lost the sense of danger.

That we believe we can influence others without being influenced ourselves.

That we think we are so powerful that we can disregard limitations of our nature.

5 comments:

Whiskey said...

I agree that we cannot blame intellectuals for PC and Multiculturalism.

IMHO what we see globally, all over the place (check CIA World Factbook, Iran, Algeria, and Tunisia have below replacement fertility rates, all around 1.7) is a function of the "science fiction world" we live in.

We live in a world that has fundamentally changed since post-WW2. In the most intimate ways. Because of two crucial pieces of technology becoming cheap, reliable, available, and acceptable.

They are the birth control pill, and the condom.

In short they changed all the social rules. Allowing women to control their own fertility and thus assert social control. Most societies are very feminized, and thus PC and Multiculturalist.

Women no longer need to "settle" for a good man and can delay or avoid marriage, having the kid of a the most Alpha man if need be, by IVF at age 40+ with sperm donors. In the meantime, enjoying consumerist desires and demonstrating hipness.

It is no accident that those who benefit from the profound cultural/social changes of the birth control pill and condom, women and the socially dominant/physically dominant men, devalue the sort of traditional values that allow the average man to demonstrate worth, to attract a mate.

It's quite striking really.

ENGLISHMAN said...

We could have changed things for the better in the sixties,we had the government terrified,and real power was so close that all we had to do was reach out and take it,unfortunately peace and love and all that tripe,we neglected our opportunity and got stoned instead,which i regret even today,but such is youth,its the unconquerable hormones,and i suppose that we are responsible for the mess that we are in today.

dienw said...

whiskey_199

I read ,good grief, an article on Robert Downey Jr on the Parade web site; it concludes with this quote from him: "'Maybe the goal really should be a life that values honor, duty, good work, friends and family.'” How ironic: only after winning the prize three times, does a so-called alpha male wise up to become what the three women would have rejected. This only reinforces that "values honor, duty, good work..." are a sucker's values: such are are of value after you have won the prize.

Last_Norwegian said...

It is impossible to overestimate the impact the hippies had. They may have been few, but it is their ideas that prevailed. They are the teachers, the ones who rule our media and write our schoolbooks. *They* are the ones who have shaped our society.

Look at any form of values today, whether it is crime or sexual morals, and morality today has more in common with hippie values than conservative values.

nikolai said...

I think there was a psychological reaction to Hitler and the Nazis. An extreme anti-nationalism formed as a reaction to that extreme nationalism. This was then shaped and moulded by the Left for it's own purposes.

Big business plays along with it for the cheap labour.