From the
Butterflies and Wheels[*1] philosophy blog (a possible candidate for a new must-read blog), via
Reason Online[*2] :
The alternatives, the French philosopher Alain Finkielkraut suggests, are simple: ‘Either people have rights or they have uniforms; either they can legitimately free themselves from oppression… or else their culture has the last word.’
A right means nothing if it applies only to the group, not the individual. There is no such thing as a “group right.” No such thing as “civil rights.” Only individual rights are true rights.
Culture is by its nature oppressive. Culture requires conformity–any culture. The words “black culture,” “white culture,” “American culture,” “Chinese culture,” and “Islamic culture” all bring to mind different things. Call them stereotypes if you want, but what is a culture but a collection of behaviors that are unique and distinctive to a particular group? Within any particular culture, certain behaviors are encouraged, others are discouraged, and some are taboo.
The problem, of course, is that things that one culture encourages, another culture discourages, or even declares taboo. Eating dog meat. Chopping off the heads of your enemies. That kind of thing.
So, then, how can an individual be “multicultural?” (Unless, of course, that individual belongs to the “multicultural culture.” Left as a thought exercise to the reader are the contradictions inherent in a “multicultural culture.”)
Can a person hold two cultures to be equally “valid” without, at some point, choosing between the cultural dictates of one or the other? If you kind of like pork chops, but don’t eat pork because you’re respecting Islam, are you being multicultural, or are you submitting to one culture’s taboos over another culture’s permissions?
Snookums claims that I sometimes have “intellectual” tendencies. I guess she’s right.
