Multicultural Malcontents

Recent polls show there's been a backlash to the London bombings, at least a backlash of opinion among the British, Muslim and non-Muslim alike. And some scholars are once again chiming in with at least anecdotal evidence (such as there terrorist acts) that cultural harmony heavily depends not just on tolerance but on conformity as well.

In the wake of the 9/11 airliner attacks, there was a backlash in America, too. As the frontier of terrorism encroaches closer to our homes and those of our "allies," some wonder about that great experiment of multiculturalism, the so-called "melting pot." From the working class to the ivory towers, many wonder if we can "all just get along." Everywhere cultures class within societies or nations, out comes a heretofor smouldering resentment, which then, for some, turns into angry resistence to racial, ethnic and religious minorities and cult groups wherever they are around the world.

The "melting pot" idea seems inevitable in the long run, even globally, but in the short term, multiculturalism causes such strife for a nation or culture. It does seem that for the "melting pot" idea to work, we need more melting, meaning more educated, more cosmopolitan, more secular assimilation. It seems we will have to be more alike and more cooperative to make multicultural nations and globalization work optimally and, above all, peacefully.

Ideally yes, we'd all get along (and even want to share the responsibilities and rewards of universal goals for the long term good of life on the planet). But it doesn't seem too difficult to trigger people's urges to not get along.

Tribalism - especially the tribalism of various religions, downright dangerous for millennia and disastrous for multiculturalism - tribalism seems so engrained that we shouldn't expect nationality to trump religion, at least not yet in the course of human events. (Of course I think ridding ourselves of religion and religious animosities and competitions is the answer - but how?)

We need the religious freedom to ween ourselves of religion - more, much more than we need religion itself. We need freedom FROM religion a LOT more than we need religious freedom. That's what religious freedom ought to stand for, ideally - the freedom from religion. (But of course, we must discover that for ourselves, through improved education, and this is an issue of global education. Secular wisdom, facts and realism/pragmatism are the greatest tools we've got to eradicate fundamentalism and tribalism, much more so than fascism or other means of force. We've got to be free to let go of the old tools that cause such bitter divisions.)

But for now, it seems we're still too primitive (and dependent on superstitions and faith) to make enough progress to get along optimally and peacefully.

The spread of education, equality and human rights all around the world seems surely much of the answer, but that seems more difficult than we imagine. And every act of resistence, especially violent, is a setback. Or is progress still on the march?

I may be speaking from an idealistic and paroachial perspective here, not having considered or studied this as much as others. I'd be curious to learn of others' perspectives.