Among the many irrational ideas about racial and ethnic groups
that have polarized societies over the centuries and around the
world, few have been more irrational and counterproductive than the
current dogmas of multiculturalism.
Intellectuals who imagine that they are helping racial or ethnic
groups that lag behind by redefining their lags out of existence
with multicultural rhetoric are in fact leading them into a blind
alley.
Multiculturalism is a tempting quick fix for groups that lag by
simply pronouncing their cultures to be equal, or “equally valid,”
in some vague and lofty sense. Cultural features are just
different, not better or worse, according to this dogma.
Yet the borrowing of particular features from other cultures —
such as Arabic numerals that replaced Roman numerals, even in
Western cultures that derived from Rome — implies that some
features are not simply different but better, including numbers.
Some of the most advanced cultures in history have borrowed from
other cultures, because no given collection of human beings has
created the best answers to all the questions of life.
Nevertheless, since multiculturalists see all cultures as equal
or “equally valid,” they see no justification for schools to insist
that black children learn standard English, for example. Instead,
each group is encouraged to cling to its own culture and to take
pride in its own past glories, real or imaginary.
In other words, members of minority groups that lag
educationally, economically, or otherwise are to continue to behave
in the future as they have in the past — and, if they do not get
the same outcomes as others, it is society’s fault. That is the
bottom line message of multiculturalism.
George Orwell once said that some ideas are so foolish that only
an intellectual could believe them. Multiculturalism is one of
those ideas. The intelligentsia burst into indignation or outrage
at “gaps” or “disparities” in educational, economic, or other
outcomes — and denounce any cultural explanation of these group
differences as “blaming the victim.”
There is no question that some races or whole nations have been
victimized by others, any more than there is any question that
cancers can cause death. But that is very different from saying
that deaths can automatically be blamed on cancer. You might think
that intellectuals could make that distinction. But many do
not.
Yet intellectuals see themselves as friends, allies, and
defenders of racial minorities, even as they paint them into a
corner of cultural stagnation. This allows the intelligentsia to
flatter themselves that they are on the side of the angels against
the forces of evil that are conspiring to keep minorities down.
When they cannot come up with hard evidence in any particular
case to support this theory today, that just proves to the
intelligentsia how fiendishly clever and covert these pervasive
efforts to hold down minorities are.
Why people with high levels of mental skills and rhetorical
talents would tie themselves into knots with such reasoning is a
mystery. Perhaps it is just that they cannot give up a social
vision that is so flattering to themselves, despite how detrimental
it may be to the people they claim to be helping.
Multiculturalism, like the caste system, paints people into the
corner where they happened to have been born. But at least the
caste system does not claim to benefit those at the bottom.
Multiculturalism not only serves the ego interests of
intellectuals, it serves the political interests of elected
officials, who have every incentive to promote a sense of
victimhood, and even paranoia, among groups whose votes they want,
in exchange for both material and psychic support.
The multicultural vision of the world also serves the interests
of those in the media, who thrive on moral melodramas. So do whole
departments of ethnic “studies” in academia and a whole industry of
“diversity” consultants, community organizers, and miscellaneous
other race hustlers.
The biggest losers in all this are those members of racial
minorities who allow themselves to be led into the blind alley of
resentment and rage, even when there are broad avenues of
opportunity available. And we all lose when society is
polarized.
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