Angela Merkel declares death of German multiculturalism

[Penn]

Well, this comes as a surprise on the heels of the AH show in Berlin.


http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010...alism-failures

[rdret1]

We were hearing a lot of the same grumblings when were there in the early to mid 90's. A Turkish housing area was set on fire by some neo-nazis and a couple of people died. It seems like there was a big Turkish riot in Frankfurt because they believed the arsonists weren't really being pursued. They were saying then that their social security system was being bankrupted because of their own immigration problems. Some in Germany believed immigration and the drain on the economy were a contributing factor in the perceived rise in neo-nazi youth gangs.

[Thomas Paine]

October 19, 2010
The Multicultural Cult
By Thomas Sowell

Somebody eventually had to say it -- and German chancellor Angela Merkel deserves credit for being the one who had the courage to say it out loud. Multiculturalism has "utterly failed."

Multiculturalism is not just a recognition that different groups have different cultures. We all knew that, long before multiculturalism became a cult that has spawned mindless rhapsodies about "diversity," without a speck of evidence to substantiate its supposed benefits.

In Germany, as in other countries in Europe, welcoming millions of foreign workers who insist on remaining foreign has created problems so obvious that only the intelligentsia could fail to see them. It takes a high IQ to evade the obvious.

"We kidded ourselves for a while," Chancellor Merkel said, but now it was clear that the attempt to build a society where people of very different languages and cultures could "live side-by-side" and "enjoy each other" has "failed, utterly failed."

This is not a lesson for Germany alone. In countries around the world, and over the centuries, peoples with jarring differences in language, cultures and values have been a major problem and, too often, sources of major disasters for the societies in which they co-exist.

Even the tragedies and atrocities associated with racial differences in racist countries have been exceeded by the tragedies and atrocities among people with clashing cultures who are physically indistinguishable from one another, as in the Balkans or Rwanda.

Among the ways that people with different cultures have managed to minimize frictions have been (1) mutual cultural accommodations, even while not amalgamating completely, and (2) living separately in their own enclaves. Both of these approaches are anathema to the multicultural cultists.

Expecting any group to adapt their lifestyles to the cultural values of the larger society around them is "cultural imperialism" according to the multicultural cult. And living in separate neighborhoods is considered to be so terrible that there are government-financed programs to take people from high-crime slums and put them in subsidized housing in middle-class neighborhoods.

Multiculturalists condemn people's objections to transplanting hoodlums, criminals and dysfunctional families into the midst of people who may have sacrificed for years to be able to escape from living among hoodlums, criminals and dysfunctional families.

The actual direct experience of the people who complain about the consequences of these social experiments is often dismissed as mere biased "perceptions" or "stereotypes," if not outright "racism." But some of the strongest complaints have come from middle-class blacks who have fled ghetto life, only to have the government transplant ghetto life back into their midst.

The absorption of millions of immigrants from Europe into American society may be cited as an example of the success of multiculturalism. But, in fact, they were absorbed in ways that were the direct opposite of what the multicultural cult is recommending today.

Before these immigrants were culturally assimilated to the norms of American society, they were by no means scattered at random among the population at large. On New York's lower east side, Hungarian Jews lived clustered together in different neighborhoods from Romanian Jews or Polish Jews -- and German Jews lived away from the lower east side.

When someone suggested relieving the overcrowding in the lower east side schools by transferring some of the children to a school in an Irish neighborhood that had space, both the Irish and the Jews objected.

None of this was peculiar to America. When immigrants from southern Italy to Australia moved into neighborhoods where people from northern Italy lived, the northern Italians moved out. Such scenarios could be found in countries around the world.

It was in later generations, after the children and grandchildren of the immigrants to America were speaking English and living lives more like the lives of other Americans, that they spread out to live and work where other Americans lived and worked. This wasn't multiculturalism. It was common sense.

LINK:
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/art...lt_107634.html

[SF-TX]

It takes a high IQ to evade the obvious.

A good read on this very subject is Intellectual Morons: How Ideology Makes Smart People Fall for Stupid Ideas.

[mojaveman]

Having spent five years of my life there I can say that the relationship between the Germans and the Turks has always been poor but with the Arabs it's been even worse. I believe they're in for some serious social problems in the not so distant future.

[mark46th]

I was wondering how long it would take the Germans to say enough.

My favorite story about Germany was from a friend of mine living in Cologne. He said the worst feeling in the world is to be going 100MPH on the Autobahn with a Turk in a Fiat doing 35 MPH in front of you and a Mercedes coming up behind you at 160MPH...

[Penn]

Is multiculturalism dead here too? Democrat party ask Black Voters to come out and support our President

in an effort to drive up turnout for the midterm elections in Chicago and other cities, Democrats are aiming a less-than-subtle message at African-American voters: "Our President Needs You."

http://www.suntimes.com/news/sweet/2...weet20.article

[The Reaper]

Originally Posted by Penn

Is multiculturalism dead here too? Democrat party ask Black Voters to come out and support our President

http://www.suntimes.com/news/sweet/2...weet20.article

If it would be wrong (and racist) to vote AGAINST a political candidate because of the color of his skin, is it not equally wrong (and racist) to vote FOR him for the same reason?

I thought we were supposed to evaluate people on their positions, their records, and the content of their characters?

If I disagree with the POTUS on all of the above, am I a wrong or racist for voting against him?

TR

[Richard]

Complicated it is - and so it goes...

Richard

German Integration Debate
DerSpiegel, 12 Oct 2010

The debate over integration in Germany won't die down. Bavarian Governor Horst Seehofer fanned the flames by telling newsweekly Focus that immigrants from Turkey and Arabic countries didn't integrate as well and that Germany didn't need any additional immigration from "other cultures."

He said Germany should not offset its shortage of skilled labor through immigration from other cultures. "We must first exhaust the potential we have here. I don't agree with the demand for increased immigration from foreign cultures," he told Focus.

Opposition parties have slammed Seehofer, calling him a right-wing populist and accusing him of whipping up hostility towards immigrants in a bid to shore up flagging voter support for his party, the Christian Social Union, the Bavarian sister party to Chancellor Angela Merkel's Christian Democratic Union (CDU).

Merkel defended Seehofer on Monday. "It was a comment focused on skilled workers. We remain a homeland for many people and hope they feel comfortable in Germany," she told reporters during a trip to Bulgaria. "Germany is and remains a cosmopolitan country."

Next year temporary restrictions on people from Eastern European EU member states working in another EU country will expire. Merkel said that means there will be no repeat of the situation Germany faced in the 1960s when it invited large numbers of Turkish "guest workers" to make up for a shortage of labor.

German media commentators say Seehofer's comments are incendiary and divisive and fail utterly to address Germany's key demographic problem: the fact that it will need to attract hundreds of thousands of skilled workers from all "cultures" if it wants to avoid economic decline in the coming decades.

The center-left Süddeutsche Zeitung writes:

"Seehofer has portrayed himself as a slightly xenophobic, friendly conman. He has overlooked the fact that his tricks no longer work with Bavarians. After hearing such sentences, many Bavarians will see even less reason to vote for the CSU."

The conservative Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung writes:

"Germany will erode without skilled immigrants. Even the most optimistic predictions of 100,000 skilled immigrants per year and small numbers of people emigrating show that the net inflow won't be enough."

"Seehofer doesn't have a remotely serious answer to the problem of demographic change. His comment came against the backdrop of a psycho-social disturbance that erupted as a result of the sensationalist treatment of the unread book by Thilo Sarrazin. Seehofer ... got it wrong just like President (Christian) Wulff whose speech (on Oct. 3, German Unity Day when he said "Islam is part of Germany") in parts seemed to refer to Islam as a persecuted minority in Germany. The population isn't worried about whether Islam belongs to Germany but about the reverse, whether Germany will one day be part of Islam to a greater extent than it wants to be. Those who don't understand that aren't just misjudging the public mood, they are failing to appreciate the momentum of an almost irreversible demographic development."

The left-wing Die Tageszeitung writes:

"This statement is the sad continuation of a rapidly accelerating debate that started some time before Thilo Sarrazin's bestseller (a book published by the former German central bank board member in late August saying Germany was in decline because of a growing underclass of Muslim immigrants) and whose next twist we should be anticipating with trepidation. It is basically about establishing an ever stronger dividing line between 'them' and 'us.'"

"The debate is a prime example of how to deepen divisions in society and deliberately stigmatize certain groups. A foundation of our society is at risk of being sacrificed on the altar of opinion polls -- diversity. It took decades for Germany to reach the stage of development where different life plans, sexual orientation, ethnic and religious backgrounds were regarded as an enrichment and not as a threat. It evidently takes only a few months to undo all this progress."

The conservative Die Welt writes:

"The CSU and the CDU are trying to send two messages at the same time. One is directed at core voters and says: 'We've always been opposed to a multicultural society!' The other message goes to left-wing liberals and says: 'We're better at handling multiculturalism than the center-left parties.' But it's impossible to do both."

"The contradiction has become embarrassing because the conservatives are simplifying both positions to the point of becoming vulgar: While Seehofer is unthinkingly cribbing Sarrazin, Prresident Wulff is copying romantic visions that even the Social Democrats and Green Party wouldn't back these days. It's no accident. The conservatives are increasingly letting the prevailing zeitgeist dictate their positions. But the Zeitgeist changes from day to day. Sometimes, like in the current stormy integration debate now raging, it turns into a whirlwind. Those who don't have their own standpoint then start wobbling."

The business daily Financial Times Deutschland writes:

"What we urgently need is a debate about how we can attract skilled immigrants. But that again doesn't seem to happening. If Seehofer defends himself by saying he must be allowed to raise questions and openly address problems, he's right -- but he has missed his vocation. People who just ask questions should host quiz shows. The job of politicians is to offer concrete solutions."

"The economy lacks skilled workers and the shortage can only be covered through immigration in the long term. Even the best efforts to provide training for our long-term unemployed won't change this demographic problem."

"There is no shortage of practical proposals: making it easier to obtain work visas, acknowledging foreign professional qualificiations and radically shortening the months-long checks conducted by the Federal Labor Agency into whether there are domestic takers for particular jobs that prospective immigrants are applying for. In addition, we need a systematic immigration policy which could consist of annual quotas for various professions with points systems like in Canada and Australia which promote the immigration of highly qualified people. That would help out country a lot more than the eternal repetition of outraged debates."

http://www.spiegel.de/international/...722656,00.html

[incarcerated]

http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20110205...20110205202342

British PM calls multiculturalism a failure

Sat Feb 5, 3:23 pm ET
MUNICH, Germany (AFP) – British Prime Minister David Cameron condemned his country's long-standing policy of multiculturalism as a failure Saturday, saying it was partly to blame for fostering Islamist extremism.

In a speech to the Munich Security Conference, Cameron said many young British Muslims were drawn to violent ideology because they found no strong collective identity in Britain....

Cameron, who took power in May 2010, argued that "under the doctrine of state multiculturalism, we have encouraged different cultures to live separate lives, apart from each other and the mainstream".

"All this leaves some young Muslims feeling rootless. And the search for something to belong to and believe in can lead them to this extremist ideology," he said.

The response, he argued, should be "a lot less of the passive tolerance of recent years and much more active, muscular liberalism".

"A passively tolerant society says to its citizens: as long as you obey the law, we will leave you alone. It stands neutral between different values," he said.

"A genuinely liberal country does much more. It believes in certain values and actively promotes them."

Cameron was careful to distinguish between Islam the religion and the political ideology of Islamist extremism, saying they "are not the same thing."

But Muslim groups in Britain reacted with a mixture of disappointment and outrage....

[nmap]

Dare I hope that I'll see the demise of the multicultural ideal? I certainly hope so!

[mojaveman]

Anyone want to guess what the options are going to be when multiculturalism fails? I ran a few through my mind and they weren't good...

[akv]

Originally Posted by Mohaveman

Anyone want to guess what the options are going to be when multiculturalism fails? I ran a few through my mind and they weren't good...

There is a carriage with bullet holes in it at the military museum in Vienna, it's owner the Archduke Ferdinand had it worse than Anderson Cooper. It's a good thing the Europeans are "too sophisticated and interdependent" to repeat the mistakes of 1914, otherwise the economic woes, rise of nationalism, ethnic tensions and resurgence of Russia might result in interesting times. No need to worry unless they roll that carriage out again...

[mojaveman]

Originally Posted by akv

There is a carriage with bullet holes in it at the military museum in Vienna, it's owner the Archduke Ferdinand had it worse than Anderson Cooper. It's a good thing the Europeans are "too sophisticated and interdependent" to repeat the mistakes of 1914, otherwise the economic woes, rise of nationalism, ethnic tensions and resurgence of Russia might result in interesting times. No need to worry unless they roll that carriage out again...

I had visions of terrible riots going on in the streets, something like what's going on in Egypt right now. That would preclude the small civil wars, and eventual larger war again in Europe. Of course that's still down the road aways...

[mojaveman]

Originally Posted by Chip.B

I can't see those things coming to fruitation as long as there is a American military presence in Europe.

You kind of wonder how strong our presence will be there in another 20 to 30 years. That's the time frame I was thinking of. We might be having some pretty serious issues going on here.