A well-put statement of the problem, Jaguar. The hard part is finding a, or the, solution.

On our side of the pond, we invoke what we call Severeid's Law, after the late television editorialist: "The chief cause of problems is solutions."

How on earth is tolerating intolerance in the name of multiculturalism & diversity going to create a cohesive society?

To me this is the crux of the question. If you decide you're not going to tolerate intolerance, then you're in effect being intolerant yourself. This of course leads to the point that when you become what you dislike, you're no better than the thing you dislike.

Everyone on the planet is intolerant. If they were not, there would be no conflict. People fighting for 'democracy' are intolerant because they believe the way one nation lives is better than another. They choose not to tolerate a lifestyle they disagree with.

Intolerance makes the world go round. It fuels the global economy. It drives human rights activists. It gives the religious right something to work on and gives the liberals something to work out.

If you've got the power, you can be as intolerant as you like.

Alithana - that is the point of cultural relativism but the way I see it, it's closer to nihilism. If you cannot say that any culture is better or worse than any other, there can, by definition, be no progress. You cannot say that female genital mutilation is bad, that child labour is bad, that stoning gays to death is bad because it's another culture you do not belong to. Thus my saying it's intellectual poison. I don't see 'progress' as a linear thing but I do believe there is better and worse which leads me to by next point:

The answer, from what I can see ties in to questions of the role of the nation state and culture in the 21st century - is some kind of explicit declaration of values, a kind of bill of rights of some sort, a baseline.

This way I think you deal with Aliantha's problem you may say as you wish, but if you cross this line, I'm going to give you both barrels, this is where we stand and we will not move or, in practice This country stands for human rights, equality in race, gender, sexual orientation etc, free speech and a few more, if you disagree with these things, you're welcome to kindly fuck off.

Of course that doesn't sit too comfortably with free speech. Problem, dat.

Over the last few days a debate has erupted here about the incredible number of Eastern European immigrants that have come via EU freedom of movement, never know, might spark something larger.

Some differences are deserving of tolerance, being matters of faith and opinion. Other differences are not. Often those differences have to do with an unwillingness to recognize proper boundaries and domains...a desire to impose by force (of government, or of arms) one's values on others.

Militant Islam is an example of this. So are the more extreme forms of fundamentalist Christianity. So is the form of socialist collectivism currently styling itself "progressive". All three of these examples are desirous of using political and legal power to impose their values on others, claiming that the proper purpose of law is to enforce one brand of morality (their own), rather than being a mutual agreed formal system to make it posible for differing value systems to operate with minimum interference and conflict in the same social space. Usually the justification for this is both circular and memetic: "My value system says imposing it on others this is the right and moral thing to do".

You posed about the hardest question possible. My values are an amalgalm of culture, religion, and philosophy chosen consciously and unconsciously over a life-time with shifting barriers about what is acceptable behavior. If we don't allow people this flexibility as a society we are no longer Western. If we allow people to exercise primitive tribal values we are no longer Western. Law should be where the line is drawn but too much law leads to an unfree anti-Western society because an over-lawyered society is essentially lawless.

It isn't solvable with immigration controls that choose only the educated, as those are the very people whose values shifted back to the tribal after living among us. If we halt all immigration we die as a society. We're better off in the US since Mexican culture is not as far from the norm as Arab culture is from Europes norm. Europes troubles are much more intense, I'm watching them as a Romanized German watched Rome fall. The question is how far will they fall and will some cultural force pick up the pieces?

Don't leave the neo-con movement out of this.

How can we apply the end of my nose rule to folks who treat "their" women as chattel?

I would go with that. That said, what someone believes in their own hearts and in the privacy of their homes is up to them. How they act upon it within our society is a different matter. I do not believe it is right to barr entry to an applicant merely because they are moslem. I do believe it acceptable to insist that certain practices not be translated to life in the UK.

There are ways of doing things which can be deemed purely 'cultural'. There are also ways of doing things which can be argued as being against the internationally accepted code of Human Rights. Wearing the Hijab versus Female infanticide.

Attempts to impose western style values on to another culture can have the counterproductive effect of pushing the very people we want to help into even greater acceptance of the treatment we see as vile (such as female genital mutilation.) Making sure we're willing to help those who want to fight these things from below is probably more effective. (Alice Walker wrote a stunning book about this issue. Can't recall the title, but I'll dig it out. It follows the fate of one of the minor characters from Color Purple, as she reclaims her tribal heritage by voluntarily undergoing mutilation.)

In our own country however, we have an absolute right and duty to draw the lines where we see fit. As I said, this is an argument about tolerance not ethnicity or faith. I am tolerant of people of all faiths up to the point they espouse intolerance and at that point I am happy to have a row with them. I am not going to assume their intolerance just because they subscribe to a particular faith. Be they Islamic, Catholic, Jewish, Sikh or whatever.

We used to assume a level of tolerance of the Sikh faith which has been blown out of the water by th attitude of some hardliners to recent theatre productions. We also assume a level of intolerance of Moslems. But Moslems come in all shapes and sizes. We are equally likely to be surprised by them.

We shouldn't be afraid to advocate secular values in a secular country. Nor should we be afraid to argue vehemently against intolerance where it rears its head. I do think we need to be careful and not allow ourselves to turn a fight against intolerance into an anti-Moslem crusade.

Sure thing...I write one up over the weekend and the World can start following it on Monday. Oh, you want input? OK, show of hands, who wants input? Back to square one.
But I'm just as wise as Solomon, why can't I write the rules? Oh that's right, he had an army, it's good to be the King.
Why bother making policy/rules/suggestions, you can't enforce?

We have a Bill of Rights, Constitution and a Legal Code. If Abdul or Maood, or Ming, want to emigrate, then they'll have to alter their Cultural Heritage to conform to our laws.
You want Sharia Law?... go home.
You object to queers?...don't marry one and it won't concern you.
You want us to change to accommodate you?...not here, dude.
You want to mutilate your women?...get the fuck out.

We need a slogan to rally our militant secularists..... how about, "Cultural Diversity - that's what the french do"


I'm inundated with "Embrace Cultural Diversity", every damn day. It's replaced, ISO-9001, ethics, 5-S, even Employee Involvement as the corporate holy grail.

The fastest way to get fired, neck and neck with surfing porn sites, is to tell an Indian you think feeding cows and letting people starve isn't right. Or tell an Asian you think whaling is wrong. Don't even think about the Koran or you'll be history.

I see two choices;

A ~ World War until we are all green mutants. UT said we need "actual understanding of the true differences in different cultures", but without accepting them and their practices, we only know why we're fighting.

B ~ Chargoggagoggmanchauggagoggchabunagungamaugg (lake Webster) in Massachusetts. Local lore holds it's Indian for, "You fish on your side, I'll fish on my side, nobody fish in the middle." Yes, that dirty word....Isolationism. When you have two or more cultures that are diametrically opposed in philosophy, you might come to a meeting of the minds eventually. But when the diametrically opposed forces are Dogma, forget it. The only way to not have friction is prevent rubbing. :fuse: