Well, the Filipinos, Hungarians, (East) Indians, or Peruvians haven't gotten up to honour killings in Canada, whereas the Pakistanis seem to.

Or maybe they have.

I don't think multiculturalism is a good longterm solution. Old-fashioned equality before the law, traditional Anglo-American fare, does better. It was tainted in olden days by racism; so just remove the racism and keep to the old principles.

It's two questions, then. Related at only a very gross level. Nothing to do with multiculturalism at all. Just crime.

Don't you see? It's only "bad thinking lowers guard to allow evil sect related to cultural group into 30% of planet." Evil sect would have been there anyway. That's what evil sects do. It's the 1880s anarchists and the Nazis, too. In those cases the weakness of democracy was political freedom and a bit of freedom of the press, though one was more external than the other.

The strength, however, is the same thing as the perceived weakness. But the "give ups" don't see resiliency at play. The West is either more interesting than that or has been flawed from the outset. I prefer the former. In either case, multiculturalism is irrelevant to the problem. It's a distraction.

No, no -- multiculturalism is very relevant, because it's a marker of lack of confidence in our own culture/institutions.

The Anglosphere has always been an open society -- the English were a mongrel race, etc.

But we've always had a tension between being an open society and dealing with those who would destroy it.

I tend towards passive-aggression -- would not lift a finger to save Khadr, but once he makes it back to Canadian soil, he gets the protections due him. Same way we acted towards Communist British subjects who travelled to Stalinland to plot against their own governments and ended up in the gulags.

But yes, the 1880s anarchists, the Communists, the others -- that's the apt comparison.

"...a marker of lack of confidence in our own culture/institutions...:

Hooey. What we lack are champions of our own culture and institutions. Frankly, we have too many defeatist conservative voices that should be positive. It is a sign of strength to be the mongrel race and sustain the virtues. Failing to be able to distinguish between criminals and social complexity is missing the point. Why can't Khadr come to Canada on a guilty plea and rot in jail if that is what his plea deserves? I drive by the Kingston Pen every morning going to work quite comfortable knowing who is locked up in there for life. Have conservatives become so weak that they think the prison system has failed, too? What hasn't failed them in their quest to never actually lift a finger to support the country? How is this not the same thing as Harper's gap of a vision for the country?

I think I would argue that there are very few if any ‘monocultures’ in the world. Unless you have a country organised like Mao’s China during the cultural revolution I don’t see how these days you can have anything but ‘multiculturalism’. Any culture that is ‘monoculture’ is essentially moribund. However fundamentalism of any kind is a threat by its nature to any liberal democracy. All government needs to be secular and all societies need to be tolerant. Anything less is bordering on fascism.

Be multicultural. Hell, I am. But don't go yammering on about it. Less monuments to multicult a la the thing in front of Union Station, more stuff about Carleton, Brock, Muir, Sir John A., Sir Wilfrid, Currie, et al.

Be multicultural. Hell, I am. But don't go yammering on about it. Less monuments to multicult a la the thing in front of Union Station, more stuff about Carleton, Brock, Muir, Sir John A., Sir Wilfrid, Currie, et al.

I think there is a difference between an ethnicity (Philipino, is one of your examples) and an ideology (Muslim Fundamentalism, is the thing complained of in your quote). Thus, I would argue that there is no problem with multiculturalism (small-m) but there is a big problem with not recognizing human rights and trying to impose your own view on others through terror (which is my understanding of Muslim Fundamentalism).

Multiculturism is a worthy goal but seems not to work very well when closed societies prosper within open ones. When champions of "our own culture and institutions", that don't restrict themselves to the fluff of Sir John, TDL and hockey, come forward there is a radical element that is lightening quick to interpret it as anti-(insert your cause here) and the media seem jubilant at reporting it as such.

I am very much in agreement with Hans here. The society I live in has an ideological foundation of human rights, tolerance and freedom. Cultures that are based in contrary ideologies may have real difficulty in integrating themselves into Canadian culture without building moats around themselves. That's when things don't work.

"The society I live in has an ideological foundation of human rights, tolerance and freedom..."

But also an ideological foundation of order, duty, sacrifice and the common cause as well, PoK. I think the weepy tears of the conservative give ups (one of whom I do not consider Ben BTW) it's like they have forgotten the balance. I do blame Harper and his inability to enunciate a positive statement about the nature of the culture.

Hans: then it is correct to say that Muslim fundamentalism (or any violent fundamentalism) and multiculturalism are unrelated.

So, for example, I have no problem whatsoever with Khadr being charged with treason... except for the fact that at the time he was a mid-teen under the control of his criminal father. That might go to sentence as much as guilt.

And I think the me in late 2010 is saying the same thing that I was in mid-2005 here and here as well as here.

Here is another good discussion from 2007.

One of the trouble's with Styn is his arguments always suggest that "multicultralism" has somehow made us tolerant of honour killings or prevents him from calling-out Muslims about things like honour killings - which is complete lies and fear mongering.

Nowhere have I see anyone tolerating the idea of honour killings, and from the cases I've seen the justice system has handled them pretty well.

The hypocritical part of Styn, is that he calls out Muslims for violence against women as if they are the only group of people who have that problem - Ben comes close to making the same argument above.

The thing is there are all kinds of nominally Christian white men in this country beating and killing their wives/girlfriends and children, but because they don't use their religion or culture to justify it, and because they were likely born here, Styn leaves them alone.

So if those Muslims would just assimilate and beat their women in fits of rage like normal men without the messy justifications then Canada will be an assimilationist success story.

I was going to say - multiculturalism had nothing to do with the Oklahoma bombings or Russell Williams. Nor the recession, come to think of it.

I would agree that its two separate things.

I have very consistently been in the "Let Khadr rot" camp.

One thing that always amazes me is how we in the west have great ideals about democracy, equality, fairness, human rights, inclusiveness, justice, etc. etc. that we so often fail to adhere to and then wonder why others don’t adopt those ideals or respect them.

I think we fail to adhere to those ideals perfectly and do a crap job of exporting the ideas. I live in a democratic, largely equal, largely fair and inclusive, just society with serious issues related to democracy, equality, fairness, human rights, inclusiveness and justice.

It aint perfect but it is arguably better than a lot.

Up thread "I think I would argue that there are very few if any ‘monocultures’ in the world"

Japan, North and South Korea, Saudi Arabia, Revolutionary Iran are a few which spring to mind.

I suspect the problem with multi kulti is that it works fine with cultures which are not particularly religiously based, or at least capable of keeping religion in the private sphere. Islam's ability to do this is difficult to discern. It may be there but, for example, in Saudi, Yemen, the Gulf States, Iran and such like, religions other than Islam are scarcely tolerated and state sponsored and empowered Committees for the Promotion of Virtue and Suppression of Vice harrass the citizenry in the name of the most backward versions of Islam, suggest otherwise.

Similarly, Islamic fundamentalist immigrants seem convinced that this "separation of Church and State" nonesense is the work of corrupt Western devils. However, suggesting that they might be happier back home leaves you open to accusations of bigotry and racism.

It is not all that terribly clear to me why we need immigrants from the Islamic world and I can think of plenty of reasons to put that world at the bottom of the stack of countries we do want people from. But, of course, to say such a thing in a multi kulti Canada is, if not forbidden, then frowned upon. So our politicians remain silent despite seeing what growing Islamic minorities are doing to the cultures of nations like the UK, France, Sweden, the Netherlands.

Which has indeed, as Mark says, ""utterly shrivelled the limits on public discussion." Not a good thing.

Your last sentence does not connect with the rest, You have described on challenge to the concept by aspects of one culture. Whether that is the case or not - or perhaps better stated that is a matter of degree, that is not a critique or even an analysis of multiculturalism. It isn't even a description of multiculturalism. Because it can be countered, effectively, by the words of the Osmond family: "one bad apple don't spoil the who bunch none..." or something like that.