Is communitarianism the panacea?

[Ganbare!]

Do you think ethnic/religious enclaves or generally communautarist behaviors benefit anyone, please justify your answer?

www.nytimes.com/2007/11/18/realestate/18nati.html?_r=1&pagewanted=2

Because of its impact on everyday life particularly social harmony, I believe communitarianism cons eclipse its pros.

These people don't affiliate with their host country, they live segregated and sometimes foster anger towards its government or people nevertheless I understand its a convenient way to defend one's culture and identity in a foreign land. But then why leave? Political or civil liberties, economic opportunities? All these are privileges and their counterpart should at least be integration if not assimilation.

[Ganbare!]

Just to clarify, my goal is not to point fingers at a particular community but to debate about the general trend so that applies to Little Havanas, Chinatowns or other ethnic neighboorhoods and related social practices around the globe for that matter.

[bulaklak]

I think enclaves benefit the ethnic minority by providing a support network and community that is familiar and welcoming. What do you suggest they do? Move directly into white suburbs... lol. It's just not economically feasible.

[Ganbare!]

Not necessarily, they could still remain inside the city but spread around, networks don't have to be centralized in a particular location. I'm not only refering to housing, behavior and interactions should be included as well. Don't you think race relations in the US would be less tensed if this phenomenon was less prominent?

I experienced living in an ethnic ghetto, witnessed political and real life linguistic or nationalistic tension in Eastern Canada, I did not like it in the slightest. A lot of people don't even learn local language(s) anymore, is that the society you want? I got in the situation I had to use Spanish several times to ask for directions to get out of sticky situations in Miami barrios.

Don't you want to feel you and every individuals living in the same country to be part of the same nation and not an sub-ethnic/national group?

[bulaklak]

Well it is hard to feel like part of the majority when you are visibly a minority and treated as such. Why do you think Miami is heavily populated by Cubans? White flight. Middle class white non-Hispanics didn't feel comfortable living there and didn't like how the community was changing. If both groups met half way then maybe we'd be getting somewhere.

Also, its not so much that people don't bother to learn English/local languages, its that they choose not to speak it amongst themselves.

[palavore]

Mar 18, 2010 13:03:03 GMT -5 Ganbare! said:

These people don't affiliate with their host country, they live segregated and sometimes foster anger towards its government or people nevertheless I understand its a convenient way to defend one's culture and identity in a foreign land. But then why leave? Political or civil liberties, economic opportunities? All these are privileges and their counterpart should at least be integration if not assimilation.

Actions do not disturb people, but opinions about actions. So when we are hindered or disturbed or grieved, let us never accuse another, but ourselves, that is, our own opinions. -- Epictetus from The Enchiridion

The concern regarding "homogeneity of communities" only arises with minorities/emigrants. Assimilation is a way of preaching fear, xenophobia, and disturbed opinions--an excuse for the majority to feel wronged and to followup with repressive measures.

Welcome people as they are and they will share a roof with you. Human beings are social creatures. They do not isolate themselves without good cause.

[Ganbare!]

Mar 20, 2010 22:57:57 GMT -5 bulaklak said:

Well it is hard to feel like part of the majority when you are visibly a minority and treated as such. Why do you think Miami is heavily populated by Cubans? White flight. Middle class white non-Hispanics didn't feel comfortable living there and didn't like how the community was changing. If both groups met half way then maybe we'd be getting somewhere.

Also, its not so much that people don't bother to learn English/local languages, its that they choose not to speak it amongst themselves.

You are implying WASP are responsible for communitarianism, please elaborate.

palavore: You win a prize for calling me a xenophobe...That's the very thing I wanted to avoid political correctness. I'm not preaching assimilation but I'm sick of seeing large contingent of people never integrating, fearing the rest of society and not bothering to learn the fundamentals of the host culture.

I was an immigrant at one point in my life, I am also a second-generation European citizen, spent moderate time in 2 other countries and I always did the maximum not to stick out like a sore thumb..

Remember Los Angeles race riots? A fringe of society refuses to live with the rest of the population. I find it alarming that most Americans are used to gangs violence or racial segregation, like they are desirable or irremediable.

[palavore]

^What did the Los Angeles riots have with assimilation? African Americans aren't "unassimilated" or ignorant to the "fundamentals of the host culture". At some point, after facing down slavery, discrimination, poverty, and police brutality, you have say that the "host culture" is racist and unfair.

Mar 21, 2010 13:12:42 GMT -5 Ganbare! said:

palavore: You win a prize for calling me a xenophobe...That's the very thing I wanted to avoid political correctness. I'm not preaching assimilation but I'm sick of seeing large contingent of people never integrating, fearing the rest of society and not bothering to learn the fundamentals of the host culture.

"Never integrating". That's not a fact. That's impatience. There are three views on cultural "integration":

Assimilation -- one culture eats all the other cultures (or takes away their children, like Australia)
Melting pot -- one culture mates with all the other cultures (like having mixed race babies)
Separate but equal -- your culture is different, that is a good thing; would you like your own history month?

Remember, people can assimilate into minority cultures. It's not as unidirectional as certain prejudices. Your "sickness" arises from the fact that you don't understand why people make those choices.

I understand why people can choose assimilate, melt, or remain separate as equals. They are motivated by different fears. There is loss of opportunity and economic mobility. Then there is loss of identity. It's the fear that outsiders have of them that I don't understand. That is pure ignorance and it can be corrected.

[Ganbare!]

Don't worry I know what their reasons are, putting a country's social harmony in peril just to protect particular groups economic or identitarian interests is a dangerous idea. Then, why not suppress taxes for the richest strata of the population? It clearly goes against their economic opportunities. Who cares about the majority population tax-funded welfare?

You can't deny that racial animosity exist between communities. Like you stated separate but equal, how can such a policy pacify society if groups barely ever interact? Difference feeds violence that's why the mondialist elite are pushing racial uniformity via intermarriages so hard.

[palavore]

Ganbare: "Communitarianism is futile."

If you don't get this cultural reference, then you're an insult to your host country.

[Ganbare!]

Hmm, I don't have much interest in Star Trek. You're turning the debate into assimilation, there is a middle ground that is integration which anyone can reasonably achieve. It doesn't require abandoning one's identity plus integration helps to succeed in the local mainstream society. The American melting pot ideology failed because of the resistance of many communities, now it's a salad bowl, what's next New Mexico/Florida/Texas secession?

[palavore]

^ Erm, now I have no idea what you're talking about. The dispersal of "ethnic/religious enclaves" into the larger "host enclave" sounds like assimilation to me. In fact, you're agreeing with the idea of "communitarianism" (which isn't really the right word for it). The community that you want to see preserved, expanded, and unbroken (with the wagons circled) is the larger more dominant community of the "host nation". That's why I threw the Borg reference at you.

Mind you, I have no horse in this race. There is no middle ground in any of the options. No one has to meet me half way on the issue. Any arrangement is workable. What would bother me is for people and communities to be coerced down one path. That sends me into revolution mode. I get upset enough as it is when I read about what is happening to the Uygurs in China.

[betahat]

Do you think ethnic/religious enclaves or generally communautarist behaviors benefit anyone, please justify your answer?

Yes. Have you ever gone to an ethnic restaurant in an ethnic ghetto, compared to an ethnic restaurant in a white suburb or small town? It's all about competition.

I rest my case.

I see where you're coming from Ganbare!, I think Europeans worry more about this than North Americans though. We're not so sure or confident in our "own" culture which was always a bit of a hodge-podge. It's easy to see the benefits of ethnic ghettos for people who live in them - proximity to family, familiar food, language, culture, etc. Not to mention employment networks through chain migration.

The question is, if you don't like this - and there are reasons to not like it, especially since it can reinforce socio-economic disparities (which I'm more worried about than the typical American who is worried that he'll have to learn Spanish) - what can we do about it?
I'm sure a lot of us agree that any policies to help immigrants move up and have the opportunity to move to white suburbs is the good thing (though it remains their choice) but there might be some debate about what those policies are? To be concrete, are you opposed to dual-language schooling and do you think the dominant native language is imposed?
Bans on tv stations not in the native language? Bus kids from ethnic ghettos to schools in the suburbs?

It seems like language is the place to begin, as it makes the possibility of integration easier. I wonder whether the fear or concern native speakers have for immigrants is really justified though - wouldn't they just learn the language if there was enough of an incentive for them?
Why is it so important to us that they speak our language? After all, that's why they made menus with pictures on them.

[Ganbare!]

I agree with your food opinion however it is a little weak when you take into account the immensity of its repercussions. I consider sharing fundamental things as the only real basis of peace in a society, immigrants or minorities just there to make money do not represent a danger right now but what about in a couple of decades when they'll have particular religious or cultural policies voted and imposed to everyone (their demographic weight plays in favor). They don't serve pork meals in many French school cafeterias anymore! (the land where cold cuts and sausages are kings).

Playing the devil's advocate is no fun but the ashes of conflict are here. Look at the UK, they're tolerant and all but what did it bring them? Homegrown terrorism. Look at what happened to Yugoslavia and to other multiethnic states, you can't deny human beings have this urge to live with their owns. It's either you share common core values, be imposed to learn the local language (for their own good and everyone else's) while still have the freedom to practice your own culture, religion and language in the private sphere, that or you stay in your own country. I refuse the idea of living in a country where communities are like a state within a state.

About Canadian affairs, I think Quebec citizens and politicans should stop waste taxpayers money and either decide they are Canadians or they're not and then secede (but leave Montreal behind them, we'll trade Ottawa or something), nationalism and communautarism are unbearable for its citizen.

Palavore, I find it ironic that you defend this cause so valiently when this board is all about intermixing, racial understanding which are things communautarianism clearly goes against.

It'd be great if members located elsewhere than NA could share their experience about their own country.

[Ganbare!]

I realize I didn't answer you Betahat, public schools should be diverse, no matter if its through quotas, dual-language is fine as long as there's no minority language school system.