None So Blind

Consider how many “truths” we accept because they seem “right.” I remember a TV ad during those exciting days of the unpleasantness in Southeast Asia. A young, wholesome maiden in pigtails, granny dress and fashionable pastel tint sunglasses offered a tiny fistful of wildflowers to the viewer and intoned solemnly, “Peace. It’s the natural order of things.” Why, of course it isn’t! The natural order of things is the Hobbesian reality of survival of the fittest; a life in the jungle. The natural order of things is a violent and remorseless food chain. It isn’t peace.

Or take Global Climate Change (previously known as Warming.) If you sweated last summer it is because man, we puny humans, have become so powerful that we can control the long established cycles of warming and cooling of the planet. It is because we are inherently profligate and wasteful of our resources without concern for our environment—particularly we Americans who have such riches to squander. If only we drive a battery-powered roller-skate to work, don a hemp sweater and adjust our thermostat and simply go to bed when the sun goes down, we can save the planet and all of humanity. Flagellation is our only recourse. Guilt is the solution. Sorry, I’m not buying it.

But, today’s rant is about diversity. Who could possibly argue against the benefits of diversity? How about this giant who passed into that dark night recently:

Speaking Truth

The complimentary terms are legion: diversity, multiculturalism, celebration of our differences, and on and on. The pejoratives outnumber the compliments: nationalist, fascist, supremacist, jingoist. We’ve built a whole educational system that exalts the acceptance of differences. Suggest that we have a single dominant language for the nation to conduct business and you are decried as a thug and unwelcoming of our Spanish visitors. Demand that it be English and I’ll give you an argument on free market principles, however. Our earlier colonists and immigrants didn’t diversify our society, they assimilated and integrated. That’s the critical difference.

Examine the most successful democracies, then take a look at the most violent, unpleasant areas of the world. Consider where former peace is deteriorating and society is eroding. What can you conclude? If you can make any sort of case for diversity over homogeneity in culture, heritage, morality, ethnicity or language, I’ll be surprised.

Possibly the most successful and long-lived democracy has been Great Britain—an island nation with a Caucasian population, a long established parliamentary monarchy, a protestant religion common to the people, a single language (more or less), and a shared culture. Problems today? Yep. Cause? Diversification! The long-standing and heretofore fairly limited in practice policy of British citizenship to all former colonials and residents of the dominion who immigrate is now leading to huge enclaves of south Asians and Middle Easterners who simply refuse to assimilate. British common law versus Sharia?

Notice the riots in France the last couple of summers? Are these French people simply lashing out at society? Hardly. More fundamentalist transplants who don’t embrace the basic principles of French culture. How about the “former Yugoslavia”? That’s a veritable Petri dish for study of the diversity vs homogeneity question. Israel/Palestine? Recent Mumbai events?

I’d like to buy into the diversity-is-better thing, but the evidence doesn’t support the thesis. Melting pots should melt, not curdle the components. There is nothing to be lost by understanding others. Isolationism isn’t the answer. But kneeling at the idol of diversity at the expense of the very basics of our society is a grave error. Samuel Huntington noted that, and he wasn’t ashamed to write it, publish it, and defend it. He Got It Right