Doors slam shut across Europe as immigration controls tightened

[Timber Loftis]

I'm sorry but in America, culture does equal country. It has to be that way in a melting pot. People will always keep part of their heritage with them, of course, but there is a discernible "American" culture and if people want to come here, they should adapt to it.

And if you are right and culture does not equal country, then I especially want to keep THEM out.

And, yes, you are right, getting down to the FACTS and sorting out who wants what is the best thing to do right now.

[Memnoch]

My position on this is pretty simple. I don't have a problem with immigration as I think that it adds to a country. The US, as well as Australia, was built on immigration.

BUT I think it's only fair enough that when people immigrate, they make an effort to integrate into the society they're moving into. This doesn't mean you drop your own customs, but rather that you find a way to practice your own custom while acknowledging existing customs and practices.

A good example is that whole honour killing thing which happens in places like Pakistan, Turkey and so on. It may be part of someone's culture to kill their spouse, daughter or whatever if they've been unfaithful, but they certainly shouldn't take this to a place like the US or Australia as it's certainly not part of our own culture.

Multiculturalism can be a beautiful thing, if done properly. It enriches a society by allowing all to experience a different culture, rather than siloing it and segregating it among a few groups. That's where distrust and xenophobia come in.

[johnny]

We HAVE the immigrants to do the jobs the locals are not interested in, only problem is....the immigrants aren't interested in em either, because our welfare system is interesting enough to sit back and relax and see what happens next.

[Bungleau]

Originally posted by Memnoch: A good example is that whole honour killing thing which happens in places like Pakistan, Turkey and so on. It may be part of someone's culture to kill their spouse, daughter or whatever if they've been unfaithful, but they certainly shouldn't take this to a place like the US or Australia as it's certainly not part of our own culture.

The issue in my mind is where cultures collide. Someone from such a country comes here, honour killings are not tolerated. You go there... do you play by those rules? Are you up to having your wife/daughter/cousin/niece killed because of honour? Or honor?

And if someone comes "here", wherever honour killings are not tolerated, and something takes place that would justify one back home... conflict. Saying that my years of tradition don't matter over "here" doesn't make one's actions acceptible back "there". Imagine coming home for a holiday visit and being told you need four tickets there, three back... what wins?

Therein lies the challenge. And while I don't pretend to have the answer, I do understand why it's such a difficult question. The "they should know better" approach just doesn't cut it.

[johnny]

I have the answer however...it doesn't work.

[Timber Loftis]

I have another answer. Honor killings are wrong, period. Full stop. Cultures that believe they aren't should be forced to change. It's like cannabalism, once it may have been considered acceptable in some cultures, but we came to realize that those cultures were just stupid and wrong.

[Memnoch]

Originally posted by Bungleau: quote: Originally posted by Memnoch: A good example is that whole honour killing thing which happens in places like Pakistan, Turkey and so on. It may be part of someone's culture to kill their spouse, daughter or whatever if they've been unfaithful, but they certainly shouldn't take this to a place like the US or Australia as it's certainly not part of our own culture.

The issue in my mind is where cultures collide. Someone from such a country comes here, honour killings are not tolerated. You go there... do you play by those rules? Are you up to having your wife/daughter/cousin/niece killed because of honour? Or honor?

And if someone comes "here", wherever honour killings are not tolerated, and something takes place that would justify one back home... conflict. Saying that my years of tradition don't matter over "here" doesn't make one's actions acceptible back "there". Imagine coming home for a holiday visit and being told you need four tickets there, three back... what wins?

Therein lies the challenge. And while I don't pretend to have the answer, I do understand why it's such a difficult question. The "they should know better" approach just doesn't cut it. [/QUOTE]This issue comes down to what kind of ethical approach you use - cultural relativism or ethical imperialism? Cultural relativism holds that "when in Rome you do as the Romans do" - in other words, each culture has its own values when viewed in the context of that culture. If we go to west Papua New Guinea (one of the few places in the world where cannibalism still exists) and someone offers us a leg of human, we are not required to eat it if we don't approve of cannibalism, but at the same time we would respect their right to do it within the context of their culture.

On the other hand, you could subscribe to another ethical theory, that of ethical imperialism, which can also be expressed as "when in Rome, do as the Americans do". In other words, YOUR culture is superior and to hell with other people's cultures as they're backward and unenlightened. It's our job as members of the enlightened culture to evangelize all the backward primates who stick to their old, incorrect ways.

I'm exaggerating here, and honour killings is an extreme example which involves gender inequality and murder, but you see the point. There's a middle ground that needs to be achieved, and where that middle ground will be for an individual will be will depend on their own specific values and levels of tolerance.

[Lanesra]

Originally posted by Memnoch: Right, let's get some bloody debate happening here, to try and avert Z from shutting down this forum.

If I didn't know you better I would think you're taking the piss! Debate is only welcome here if you agree with what Z thinks.

If that wasn't the case there might be a moderator based in Europe.

[Lucern]

The easiest answer is that honor killings and cannibalism in most countries are illegal, and if one's not going to follow customs (whatever that entails) they should know the law.

As with honor killings, culture is actually a common defense of the indefensible, because there isn't an easy answer against it. You have to say "Well your culture is wrong", which makes your voice irrelevant in their eyes. However, it's actually most frequently cited in cases where it wasn't part of one's culture, at least historically speaking. An excellent case of this is the application and use of fundamentalist Islam. The discourse around it in such countries is that they're going back to the way things were in the era of Caliphates, but its application and expectation that it actually becomes the primary focus of government has its roots at the end of the 19th century. Sharia law was something that could only be implemented if several prerequisites were met, which actually made the whole thing more tolerable than how it is implemented now. None of these are ever mentioned by people trying to implement it now, conveniently. They need you, and everyone else to believe it's part of their culture, but they didn't count on the definition of culture changing, and their arguments fall apart outside of an early-mid 20th century anthropological understanding of culture.

Then: Cultures begin and end at naturally discernable social and physical geographies. A person is born into a culture, which gives them their sense of identity, their norms, etc. Cultures only change from the outside, and such change can be devastating, erupting social ties and rendering the culture vulnerable to being subsumed by the invading culture. In a sense, cultures are whole entities, bounded to place and people. In this conception, cultural representatives have every right to tell you to shove off with your culturally embedded concept of morality.

Now: there isn't one definition that holds the most weight really, but it's generally agreed upon that whatever culture happens to be, one certainly doesn't begin and end in identifiable places and people. It adapts to and rejects others according to its own cultural logic. This logic isn't necessarily consistent across all members of any given society, big or small. This is why there will never be a cultural map that holds any weight. Under this conception, it's possible to say that those who are advocating honor killings are generally gaining in ways that the rest of society are not through the subjugation of various members (particularly women), which is a statement that is free of cultural judgement. Note that this conception is probably alien to just about everyone here, because it's the former one that gets bandied around - and that's about 100% the fault of my particular discipline. Kicked ourselves right in the butt

Human diversity as well as the deliberate construction of nation states themselves is why I say culture doesn't equal country. I agree with you in spirit TL - there are discernable, distict elements across American society (whether they're due to culture, similarities of law, shared media, and education, etc, is up for debate), but I'll assert my skepticism that we could come up with a widely agreed upon set of characteristics that make us American in a cultural sense. Even if we can, well and good, but my point is that it's a bad assumption to go in with. I see it employed most by people who benefit from painting America that way, such as evangelicals who confidently speak of the silent majority, politicians who win by statistically insignificant margins, or as a handy dandy reason to not let cultural outsiders in (which actually used to include communists and atheists in our own policy).

And for those shaking your heads, maybe the happy middle ground is to just be skeptical about a more blatant example. Is there one Russian culture? Start thinking of the Kremlin, big hats or whatever, but the sheer size and diversity should render one incredulous of the applicability of a common set of cultural norms and beliefs.

And perhaps theoretically speaking, if at any point culture is a unified ideology across a political landscape (a country) - the governing bodies were REALLY good at social engineering.

[ 05-25-2006, 12:16 PM: Message edited by: Lucern ]

[johnny]

Originally posted by Lanesra: quote: Originally posted by Memnoch: Right, let's get some bloody debate happening here, to try and avert Z from shutting down this forum.

If I didn't know you better I would think you're taking the piss! Debate is only welcome here if you agree with what Z thinks.

If that wasn't the case there might be a moderator based in Europe. [/QUOTE]Mouse is no longer with us then ?