h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

I've just read a little book by Michael Adams (the President of Environics, a polling company Canadians will recognize) which I found very reassuring, not least because it echoes, with hard numbers as backing, many of the things I've been suggesting about why multiculturalism pretty much works in Canada while it doesn't seem to do so well in Europe.

The book is called 'Unlikely Utopia: the Surprising Triumph of Canadian Pluralism' http://www.chapters.indigo.ca/books/Unlikely-Utopia-Michael-Adams/9780670063680-item.html

(I should have bought it online and saved about ten bucks)

I recommend it highly to all. It's a quick read: I got my copy yesterday afternoon and finished it this morning.

Here's a taste:

'Want to be a Canadian? Check out our laws, and especially our Charter. If you can handle those, then live here, in a neighbourhood as diverse or as homogeneous as you choose, be it Herouxville in Quebec, Kensington Market in downtown Toronto, a block of Richmond, B.C., that might as well be Hong Kong, a gay village, whatever -- just get along.

As it turns out, almost everyone does.'


I'm going to post this recommendation a few other Canadian places on h2g2, so some may get a repeat.

Hi anhaga. Good to see you back on h2g2. Where I live in London multiculturalism seems to work quite well. From my own personal perspective anyhow, and based on my relationships with my neighbours and community. Though you wouldn't think it if you read the tabloids or listened to the news because they only ever report the negatives.

Here's a nice short link.

http://www.books-by-isbn.com/0-670-06368-1.

TRiG.

Thanks Anhaga, I'm just going to Chapters to get some Christmas reading, you couldn't be more timely.

Just a thought as well, do you think the question *What is multiculturalism in the West mean?* might be interesting in the Forum. Or even *What's the difference between multiculturalism in NA and Europe?*

Yes that might be interesting zoomer. Though Europe is a hugely varied place. I live in the London UK, but when I visited Amsterdam, Holland, the atmosphere seemed very different. Also its quite different in France. People say this has a lot to do with previous imperialist attitudes to colonies from European powers.

Effers:

I'm only back for the purposes of this thread, my journal, other Canada related threads and any Guide related things which may come up. Thanks for noticing my absence.

The impression one would get from most posters to threads on hootoo is that multiculturalism is insane, unworkable and horribly harmful and always has been wherever the word has been uttered. As I have pointed out many times many ways and as Mr. Adams points out in the book, the only culture common to all Canadians is multiculturalism and everyone is part of a minority group.

Trig:

I refuse to deal with Amazon.ca: it is a company which pretends to be Canadian, receives postal benefits reserved for Canadian companies, and yet somehow manages to have no employees within the borders of Canada. My first choice is always independent booksellers. My second choice is Chapters/Indigo, which is, at least, Canadian.

cl zoomer:

I have to go out and get another copy tomorrow: my parents are traveling for two months in the new year and seem intent on bringing my copy with them. There's simply too much great information in the slim little volume for me to be without it after only twenty-four hours' perusal. They'll be getting one more christmas present.

There are a few interesting little charts in the book, including one that compares the countries of origin of foreign national groups larger than I think it's ten thousand in major cities. London comes in with four groups: Irish, Pakistani, something and something (I'm going from memory). Vancouver comes in with something like eighteen groups from all over the globe. Toronto has something like eight. All of the European examples are made up of groups from former colonies. The biggest U.S. example, Miami, has nine groups, all Latin American.


The descendants of the victors on the Plains of Abraham, the British, make up only 15% of the population of Canada. No group is a majority.

I feel very fortunate that my ancestors chose Canada, even though Canada was plural, and quite a different place from today, in the eighteenth century.

It is interesting to contrast the Canadian multicultural experience with the variety condemned by the Objectivists:

"Multiculturalism is a growing force in America’s universities and public life. In brief, multiculturalism is the view that all cultures, from that of a spirits-worshiping tribe to that of an advanced industrial civilization, are equal in value.

Since cultures are obviously not equal in value—not if man’s life is your standard of value—this egalitarian doctrine can have only one purpose: to raze the mountaintops. Multiculturalism seeks to obliterate the value of a free, industrialized civilization (which today exists in the West and elsewhere), by declaring that such a civilization is no better than primitive tribalism. More deeply, it seeks to incapacitate a mind’s ability to distinguish good from evil, to distinguish that which is life promoting from that which is life negating.

We are opposed to this destructive doctrine. We hold that moral judgment is essential to life. The ideas and values that animate a particular culture can and should be judged objectively. A culture that values freedom, progress, reason and science, for instance, is good; one that values oppression, stagnation, mysticism, and ignorance is not."

http://www.aynrand.org/site/PageServer?pagename=media_topic_multiculturalism

>>I'm only back for the purposes of this thread, my journal, other Canada related threads and any Guide related things which may come up.<

I'm only here for the pigs

'A culture that values freedom, progress, reason and science, for instance, is good'

that seems to describe Canada's culture of multiculturalism, doesn't it?


If you add that we value pigs.

Ayn Rand and the Objectivists is to Canada as Woolerton is to Dog River.

I'm not much of a TV watcher, but don't you mean Wullerton ?

And I agree about the Objectivists. What is their problem, anyway?

It should be just a bit obvious that multiculturalism works quite well here.

"And I agree about the Objectivists. What is their problem, anyway?"
Personally I reckon they misunderstood which meaning of 'object' was being used in the term 'objectivist'.

hi, Anhaga, I like your book suggestion. I´ll try to get a copy. In the same page you have linked there´s a comment from publishers about a book also by Adams: Sex in the snow: " (...)values can be even more important than demographic traits when it comes to how people behave as citizens, consumers, employees(...). Rather than being defined by their religion, age, gender and ethic background, Canadians were embracing postmodern values that cut across those categories."

I think interesting a thread about multiculturalism. It doesn´t work in many countries. It would be healthy to read other´s opinions and still more to read a book of Adams to start with.

I think I won´t be able to post until January, I´ve got problems with internet. Im at work now.

I wish you a good time of holydays

Salud y alegría for all of you

Kisitos
Mar

Happy Holidays Mar and everyone.

A thread on multiculturalism might be interesting but I fear, based on previous discussions here that have touched on the subject, that it might descend into various kinds of nastiness.


I don't watch much television either, Tal. But I do have DVDs of the first three seasons of Corner Gas. I find they hold up very well to repeated viewings.
(sorry I misspelled Wullerton<spit&gt

>>... it might descend into various kinds of nastiness.<



And just what do you mean by that snide remark, you sarcastic ?



I might have expected as much from the likes of you!!!


& etc...

From what I understand (not a lot, at this time of night, but I did read your post before), you're saying that the kind of multiculturalism condemned by the Objectivists (whoever they may be) is not the kind experienced in Canada. There are, then, two (at least) types of multiculturalism.

Next questions: (i) Do you agree that the type of multiculturalism condemned by the Objectivists is indeed worthy of condemnation? (ii) Did or does this type of multiculturalism ever actually exist, or was it merely a figment of the imagination of the Objectivists, or a misunderstanding on their part?

TRiG.