Multiculturalism - a racism in disguise

[chequita guevara]

Originally posted by germanos
Yet it's only the arabs that are resorting to terrorism.

What about the: Basques, Irish, Germans, Greeks, Italians, etc.? Or are ETA, the IRA, Red Brigade, Gladio, November 17, etc. really Arab cover groups?

[chequita guevara]

Originally posted by Last Conformist
Thus, I don´t think ethnic exclusivity is at the heart of the problem.

Your examples are of "fellow" Europeans. Arabs, Turks, etc. are all considered outsiders.

It's not like France has a lot of trouble right now with Black Africans, and yet there is extensive racism against them. I heard an interesting anecdote about an American Black woman who went to France to live. She said at first people treated her like a celebrity, but as her French got better and better and she lost her American accent, people began to treat her worse and worse, because they though she was an African.

[germanos]

Originally posted by chegitz guevara


What about the: Basques, Irish, Germans, Greeks, Italians, etc.? Or are ETA, the IRA, Red Brigade, Gladio, November 17, etc. really Arab cover groups?

Che: are you discussing exclusion if immigrants or something else?

[Last Conformist]

Originally posted by chegitz guevara


What about the: Basques, Irish, Germans, Greeks, Italians, etc.? Or are ETA, the IRA, Red Brigade, Gladio, November 17, etc. really Arab cover groups?

No, they're South Asians. Don't you even try to keep up?

[Caligastia]

Originally posted by chegitz guevara


Your examples are of "fellow" Europeans. Arabs, Turks, etc. are all considered outsiders.

It's not like France has a lot of trouble right now with Black Africans, and yet there is extensive racism against them. I heard an interesting anecdote about an American Black woman who went to France to live. She said at first people treated her like a celebrity, but as her French got better and better and she lost her American accent, people began to treat her worse and worse, because they though she was an African.

The French, being white, are racist just because they are racist. Non-whites, however, are simply reacting to "oppression". You make me sick.

[chequita guevara]

Cali, the adults are trying to have a discussion. Go play with your white hood someplace else.

[Caligastia]

Originally posted by chegitz guevara
Cali, the adults are trying to have a discussion. Go play with your white hood someplace else.

Funny way to show everyone how 'adult' you are.

[chequita guevara]

Originally posted by germanos
Che: are you discussing exclusion if immigrants or something else?

You said only the Arabs are resorting to terrorism. I just thought I'd point out that there are quite a few international terrorist groups of European origin. I would also note that two 9/11 hijackers were Pakistani and were the London Subway bombers also Pakistani? So it's not only Arabs who are causing a problem with terrorism.

[chequita guevara]

Originally posted by Caligastia


Funny way to show everyone how 'adult' you are.

When you stop putting words in my mouth I'll stop patronizing you.

[Last Conformist]

Originally posted by chegitz guevara


Your examples are of "fellow" Europeans. Arabs, Turks, etc. are all considered outsiders.

Yugoslavs group with Arabs and Turks, not with Greeks and Italians (let alone Finns!) in the minds of most Swedes.

[Imran Siddiqui]

Originally posted by chegitz guevara
I think it has to do with the fact that we are an immigrant society. Everyone here except for a tiny minority has ancestors from abroad. In Europe, even countries with lots of immigrants, you always "know" that this is the country of a specific group of people tied to a particular piece of land, whose ancestors who been tied to that land for generations immemorial. England is the country of the English. Germany is the country of the Germans. Etc. Even if you get citizenship, you'll never be English or German. In an immigrant country like the U.S. or Argentina or Israel, if you get citizenship, you're an American or Argentinian or Israeli. You become part of the group.

There probably is something to that. I mean there is not really any ethnically defined "American nation". The American nation is based on common civics rather than ethnicity (as opposed to say the German nation or the French nation, which is more ethnically based).

[germanos]

Originally posted by chegitz guevara


You said only the Arabs are resorting to terrorism.

Yet this was in answer to your post where you spoke of immigrant exclusion of "arabs, turks and south asians", and how this has a direct correlation to their radicalisation.

Don't clutch at straws now.

[Sandman]

There probably is something to that. I mean there is not really any ethnically defined "American nation". The American nation is based on common civics rather than ethnicity (as opposed to say the German nation or the French nation, which is more ethnically based).

Huh? The French make a big thing of not being ethnically based.

[Cort Haus]

Originally posted by chegitz guevara
Those ideas don't come about for no reason, but are the product of oppression. People feel the need for identity politics because they feel, rightly or wrongly, that they are excluded from society in general. People feel they need a safe space to get away from oppression. Reality precedes ideology.

When I used to go on anti-racist marches 20 years ago with my Trotskyite buddies at the time, the police were allowed to kill black people at will, Asians would get their houses firebombed, and the state and media constantly reinforced negative racial stereotypes. That was real oppression - state driven, divide and rule. There was, however, no Islamic terrorism or demands for Sharia law.

Today, things are very different. The state and sections of the media are more likely to constantly accuse the white working class of intolerance and racism (as perhaps you are here) despite there being virtually no evidence of this at all (as was proved in a recent debate here). Ethnic groups are encouraged to see themselves as different, and always there is the emphasis of what seperates people, rather than what people have in common. We now have a bit of a problem with wannabe terrorists and calls for Sharia law.

This is the divisive model of multiculturalism, rather than one which promotes what people have in common. The state has played a part, but out of a misguided belief that promoting identity politics is a good thing. This mistake is now recognised by bodies such at the Council for Racial Equality (CRE) which has been critical recently of the failure of the identity-driven approach to a multi racial society.

Blaming oppression for today's problems is wrong. The situation has changed from the days when that analysis would have been a legitimate starting point.

England may not be as racist as the continent, but is rather a bit more racist than the U.S.

Remind us again of the role, as you see it, of the Confederate flag which so may in the USA love to fly. Remind us of the Jail statistics by ethnicity. Care to back up your assertion of US superiority in this department with some evidence (other than massacres on tube trains which you seem to think is the fault of oppressor non-muslims and proof of racism)?

[chequita guevara]

There's a government and there's a people.