The whole idea of a "melting pot" is that the people who come here "melt" and adopt our culture as we incorporate some of theirs. Todays "diversity" proponents want to keep different groups isolated and pure and celebrated while denigrating the "culture" of the evil Americans.
Oh, say can you see by the dawn's early light
What so proudly we hailed at the twilight's last gleaming?
Whose broad stripes and bright stars thru the perilous fight,
O'er the ramparts we watched were so gallantly streaming?
And the rocket's red glare, the bombs bursting in air,
Gave proof through the night that our flag was still there.
Oh, say does that star-spangled banner yet wave
O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave?
On the shore, dimly seen through the mists of the deep,
Where the foe's haughty host in dread silence reposes,
What is that which the breeze, o'er the towering steep,
As it fitfully blows, half conceals, half discloses?
Now it catches the gleam of the morning's first beam,
In full glory reflected now shines in the stream:
'Tis the star-spangled banner! Oh long may it wave
O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave!
And where is that band who so vauntingly swore
That the havoc of war and the battle's confusion,
A home and a country should leave us no more!
Their blood has washed out their foul footsteps' pollution.
No refuge could save the hireling and slave
From the terror of flight, or the gloom of the grave:
And the star-spangled banner in triumph doth wave
O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave!
Oh! thus be it ever, when freemen shall stand
Between their loved home and the war's desolation!
Blest with victory and peace, may the heav'n rescued land
Praise the Power that hath made and preserved us a nation.
Then conquer we must, when our cause it is just,
And this be our motto: "In God is our trust."
And the star-spangled banner in triumph shall wave
O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave!
Great poem. Yes, it was originally a poem called The Defence Of Fort McHenry. Until somebody realized the words would go perfectly with an old English drinking song.
Who else would sing their national anthem to the tune of a song from a country they fought their first two wars with?
actually, I have long thought of it as a stir fry, not a melting pot (as do the rightists) or a salad bowl (as do the leftists). In stir fry, you can identify each ingredient and even pick em out as you desire (to consume, or put to the side). They all however add to the goop at the bottom, and every bite has at least some of everything else.
Given that we have 50 states, we caually have 50 different recipies for stir fry. Some are blander, some are spicier. Some are just white meat and soy sauce :)
The problem I have with the "melting pot" metaphor is that, over the years, I've heard it mostly from white, middle and upper class Americans. I've noticed a pattern of using it to justify enforcing conformity, not recognizing diversity. And as I've formed friendships with members of minority communities, I've realized that its appeal isn't universal.
Of course, I still fondly remember the School House Rock short on the U.S., ending in a melting pot shaped like the lower 48 states.
I think it'd be more accurate to describe the U.S. as a stew. All of the ingredients are in the same pot. The longer you cook them, the more they taste like the other ingredients. But, in the end, a potato is still recognizeably a potato.
However, I like Aziz's stir fry analogy, too - particularly the part about having 50 different recepies.
I'm rather startled to see the concept of the melting pot described as either "rightist" or one of white upper class people. Neither seems to match my experience at all.
Dean, I think this is very well said, and hints at the solution to the argument. Some of the leftists I've known do sneer at American because they disdain it; but others really are just defensive of America's rich historical diversity, and want to celebrate it. If I'm any indication, many of my commie friends would agree wholeheartedly with you.
Maybe we shouldn't call it a melting pot anymore. Gumbo, anyone?
i may have overstated there. I suspect that most people interpret "melting pot" in a vaguely stir-fry way anyway. But I usually directly encounter the idea in the context of "you muslims need to assimilate more; why cant you accept that the Koran is just a book?" (in other words, exactly what Irshad Manji keeps lecturing believers like myself to do).
granted Manji is not rightist but she is invoked by them. For perhaps the best examples of what I am talking about, read the tone of Paul J Cella's multiple entries (in Diaries and Front-page stories) at RedState.org (itself the DailyKos analog for the Republicans).
The basic idea is that tolerance for other cultures and diversity undermines the nation, and muslims need to abandon their Islamic values and embrace Christian ones (or at least recognize that America is founded on Christian values, defined in an exclusionary way). The attack on tolerance also extends to non-european ethnicities; see much of teh writing by John Derbyshire at National Review Online (disclaimer: I actually like the Derb, hes an interesting and even charming guy. he's just got a bug up his arse about white culture) and the thinly-veiled-in-science arguments at VDare.org by Steve Sailer.
"....Fifth, conservatives pay attention to the principle of variety. They feel affection for the proliferating intricacy of long-established social institutions and modes of life, as distinguished from the narrowing uniformity and deadening egalitarianism of radical syatems. For the preservation of a healthy diversity in any civilization, there must survive orders and classes, differences in material condition, and many sorts of inequality. The only true forms of equality are equality in the Last Judgment and equality before a just court of law; all other attampts at leveling lead, at best, to social stagnation. Society longs for honest and able leadership; and if natural and institutional differences among people are destroyed, presently some tyrant or host of squalid oligarchs will create new forms of inequality. Similarly, conservatives uphold the institution of private property as productive of human variety: without private property, liberty is reduced and culture is impoverished."
-Russell Kirk, Introduction to The Portable Conservative Reader
Alain de Benoist defined Left and Right similarly, as did Erik von Kuehnelt-Leddihn. The Left is for equality and uniformity. The Right is for hierarchy and diversity. We must not allow the Left to steal our word!
I see what you're saying Aziz. There are also rightists who claim there is a unified American culture, which is something of a stretch; yes there is one but one of its hallmarks is an extaordinary variety.
So long as the hierarchy is based strictly on merit (particularly on the content of a body's character), and no man has to take off his hat and step into the gutter when the squire goes by.
To get away from food analogies, I think of American culture as Rock and Roll. Sure, it's got it's own thing going on, but it's derived from something else (blues/european culture), and it's able to absorb all kinds of diverse things. Depending on the kind of Rock you like, you can hear classical, jazz, indian music, african music, etc. etc.
"The basic idea is that tolerance for other cultures and diversity undermines the nation, and muslims need to abandon their Islamic values and embrace Christian ones (or at least recognize that America is founded on Christian values, defined in an exclusionary way)."
You're going to need to define "Islamic values" because what seems to pass as "Islamic values" in the Islamic world truly is incompatible with the Constitution, religous freedom and freedom for women and men. And, yes, certain things shouldn't be tolerated because they do undermine the nation and the freedom of others: female genital mutilation, violent jihad, honor killings, treating women like a subspecies instead of equals, etc.
The problem with the salad or the stew analogy is that each ingredient remains integrally separate. We get a competition for dominance. The carrot is better than the potato, or the lettuce, or vice versa.
The melting pot analogy is better. Each individual ingredient affects the overall end product, but, and this is huge, each ingredient also loses its structural integrity and identity.
It is vitally important that immigrants forfeit their allegiances to their native lands in favor of allegiance to the USA. In other words, they must voluntarily lose their previous identity and replace it with a new identity.
This doesn't mean that they will not change what America is. Each new immigrant affects the overall composition of what America is and what it stands for. So each person gets to have their say; each person has an impact on our society; each person can be recognized as important to who we are as a people. Every spice changes the flavor of the pot. But those people CANNOT demand to retain their old identity. We CANNOT allow that.
I disagree, Scott. Because once a potato has been placed in the stew, you can't revert it to a plain potato again. It's not integrally separate. It is forever flavored by the experiences of the other "ingredients."
And the conformity you attribute to the melting pot is the exact reason I reject the analogy.
Melting pots make alloys, where you cannot tell one component from the next. Sure, an alloy is often stronger than the original metals. But you'd be hard pressed to say that you cannot tell one American from another.
The only thing that new citizens agree to give up is their allegience to foreign powers. And that is hardly the sum total of an individual's identity.
What so proudly we hailed at the twilight's last gleaming?
Whose broad stripes and bright stars thru the perilous fight,
O'er the ramparts we watched were so gallantly streaming?
And the rocket's red glare, the bombs bursting in air,
Gave proof through the night that our flag was still there.
Oh, say does that star-spangled banner yet wave
O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave?
On the shore, dimly seen through the mists of the deep,
Where the foe's haughty host in dread silence reposes,
What is that which the breeze, o'er the towering steep,
As it fitfully blows, half conceals, half discloses?
Now it catches the gleam of the morning's first beam,
In full glory reflected now shines in the stream:
'Tis the star-spangled banner! Oh long may it wave
O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave!
And where is that band who so vauntingly swore
That the havoc of war and the battle's confusion,
A home and a country should leave us no more!
Their blood has washed out their foul footsteps' pollution.
No refuge could save the hireling and slave
From the terror of flight, or the gloom of the grave:
And the star-spangled banner in triumph doth wave
O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave!
Oh! thus be it ever, when freemen shall stand
Between their loved home and the war's desolation!
Blest with victory and peace, may the heav'n rescued land
Praise the Power that hath made and preserved us a nation.
Then conquer we must, when our cause it is just,
And this be our motto: "In God is our trust."
And the star-spangled banner in triumph shall wave
O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave!
Great poem. Yes, it was originally a poem called The Defence Of Fort McHenry. Until somebody realized the words would go perfectly with an old English drinking song.
Who else would sing their national anthem to the tune of a song from a country they fought their first two wars with?
Given that we have 50 states, we caually have 50 different recipies for stir fry. Some are blander, some are spicier. Some are just white meat and soy sauce :)
Of course, I still fondly remember the School House Rock short on the U.S., ending in a melting pot shaped like the lower 48 states.
I think it'd be more accurate to describe the U.S. as a stew. All of the ingredients are in the same pot. The longer you cook them, the more they taste like the other ingredients. But, in the end, a potato is still recognizeably a potato.
However, I like Aziz's stir fry analogy, too - particularly the part about having 50 different recepies.
Sorry, Aziz, but that's funny. :)
I have a tendency to make food-themed analogies in Ramadan, especially the first week. Subconscious impulses.
mmmm. Sub.
Maybe we shouldn't call it a melting pot anymore. Gumbo, anyone?
granted Manji is not rightist but she is invoked by them. For perhaps the best examples of what I am talking about, read the tone of Paul J Cella's multiple entries (in Diaries and Front-page stories) at RedState.org (itself the DailyKos analog for the Republicans).
The basic idea is that tolerance for other cultures and diversity undermines the nation, and muslims need to abandon their Islamic values and embrace Christian ones (or at least recognize that America is founded on Christian values, defined in an exclusionary way). The attack on tolerance also extends to non-european ethnicities; see much of teh writing by John Derbyshire at National Review Online (disclaimer: I actually like the Derb, hes an interesting and even charming guy. he's just got a bug up his arse about white culture) and the thinly-veiled-in-science arguments at VDare.org by Steve Sailer.
-Russell Kirk, Introduction to The Portable Conservative Reader
Alain de Benoist defined Left and Right similarly, as did Erik von Kuehnelt-Leddihn. The Left is for equality and uniformity. The Right is for hierarchy and diversity. We must not allow the Left to steal our word!
Oh, and etouffee for me.
You're going to need to define "Islamic values" because what seems to pass as "Islamic values" in the Islamic world truly is incompatible with the Constitution, religous freedom and freedom for women and men. And, yes, certain things shouldn't be tolerated because they do undermine the nation and the freedom of others: female genital mutilation, violent jihad, honor killings, treating women like a subspecies instead of equals, etc.
The melting pot analogy is better. Each individual ingredient affects the overall end product, but, and this is huge, each ingredient also loses its structural integrity and identity.
It is vitally important that immigrants forfeit their allegiances to their native lands in favor of allegiance to the USA. In other words, they must voluntarily lose their previous identity and replace it with a new identity.
This doesn't mean that they will not change what America is. Each new immigrant affects the overall composition of what America is and what it stands for. So each person gets to have their say; each person has an impact on our society; each person can be recognized as important to who we are as a people. Every spice changes the flavor of the pot. But those people CANNOT demand to retain their old identity. We CANNOT allow that.
And the conformity you attribute to the melting pot is the exact reason I reject the analogy.
Melting pots make alloys, where you cannot tell one component from the next. Sure, an alloy is often stronger than the original metals. But you'd be hard pressed to say that you cannot tell one American from another.
The only thing that new citizens agree to give up is their allegience to foreign powers. And that is hardly the sum total of an individual's identity.