...In the case of Reality v. The Guy Who's Too Stupid To Know How Stupid He Is:
There is an implication bandied about by many on the right that multiculturalism is some sort of coherent socioeconomic policy, the proponents of which (one imagines a shadowy cabal of college professors, Stonewall activists and Black Panthers huddled over a war map, passing a bong -- always to the left! -- in the dusty basement of MoveOn.org's headquarters) are engaged in a continual and often successful struggle to impose it on everyone. But until this definition is supported by facts, posts like this one by our favorite JismSmoothie will continue to fall apart in your fingers like so much goo that used to to be your best friend's face.
Multiculturalism -- as an "ism," a stupid construction as it implies it has its own supporters and think tanks and exegeses and gibbering Beltway hairdos -- exists only insofar as it is a tacit acknowledgement of the reality that this world allows for many different ways of being human. Some of those ways are ours (Americans'), some of these ways are enviable, and some of them are repugnant.
We live in a country where the "tenets of multiculturalism" manifest themselves thusly: The citizens of the city of San Francisco may empower their government agencies to publish election ballots in Chinese, Tagalog, and Spanish; a militia goon who takes it upon himself to firebomb a synagogue or a mosque or a Planned Parenthood office will probably be tried for arson, attempted murder, and maybe a hate crime (a subset, btw, of terrorism); the ACLU will defend Rush Limbaugh's right to make racist bloviations on public airwaves; the man who performs a clitoridectomy on his daughter will get busted for assault, child abuse and endangerment, and maybe even (laughably, but oh well...) for attempting to practice medicine without a license, among other charges; a woman whose ancestors hailed from Harbin Province may by virtue of her qualifications rise to become the fire chief of her hometown; a white man denied housing because of his race may sue his prospective landlord; a public library in Dearborn may very well offer a variety of Arabic reading materials and videos; a major corporation may freely choose to offer benefits to the de facto spouses of their gay employees; and a private university that receives no federal money may proscribe interracial dating among its students.
All of these cases have exactly one commonality, no more: each happens or exists in accordance with the rights of individuals and duties of government enumerated in the founding documents of this country -- documents that tend towards tolerance for the former and take a dim view of unfettered power held by the latter.
In other words, there are no "tenets of multiculturalism," no "principles of a multicultural worldview." There is no there in Goldstein's "there!" There is just a country, a society constantly in flux, mucking through as best it can -- and where that mucking-through involves the law, we tend to defer to our time-honored, tried-and-usually-true legal system, predicated as it is on Roman jurisprudence and English Common Law.
To be sure, there are things with which we Americans tend to be happy (empanadas, porn, curries and Margaret Cho's commentary on being a chubby Asian woman in American entertainment), things some or all of us are squidgy about (eminent domain, the travails of Paris Hilton and Flava Flav and Missing White Women as infotainment, Parker and Stone's "Team America," and Bible study), and things the majority of us despise (theocracy, misogyny, Sharia Law, and long lines at the multiplex.) And much, much more. Moreover, these things change through time in the push and pull and uplift and tramplings underfoot that flavor our particular, sometimes unappetizing stew of humanity -- many more of us are comfortable with gay marriage than we were ten years ago, and the same can be said of Dominionism.
In short: I have no idea what the fuck he's yammering on about. And I'm not sure if it's comforting that he doesn't, either.
PS Oh, okay, maybe this is an explanation...
[ back home ]
Comments for Exhibit H...
JG is really, really filed in the "post, dumb as" category. I wish he would come over here and slap you with his balls. He can't even do that right. I can't stand him. Everytime I wan't to post super-half-assedly I think to myslef- this is so goldsteinesque, better to let the bloggo die.
- Posted at 5:19 PM | By
Alas, peepee, I don't do honeyroasted cashews. OOH BURN!!111!!1!!
Seriously, though, he is kinda hot. You know, for a chemically addicted, jobless, snide, whiny fascist with a bewildering array of mental illnesses...
Seriously, though, he is kinda hot. You know, for a chemically addicted, jobless, snide, whiny fascist with a bewildering array of mental illnesses...
Teh,
You better check out my Weekend Music Video. I feel like a VJ on old MTV.
You better check out my Weekend Music Video. I feel like a VJ on old MTV.
I loved your examples of multiculturalism and the description of the transitory nature of society's priorities. Keep callin' em out!
Teh! Really one of the better essays on MC and the point of the Constitution I've read in the last 3 years.
Well said!
Well said!
- Posted at 2:10 AM | By
Michael Bains
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