Keep The Immigrants

When I saw the title of a particular Wall Street Journal opinion piece by Jason Riley, I knew I had to read it and, once read, pass it on. The title? “Keep the Immigrants, Deport the Multiculturalists.”

What a wonderful sentiment. I can honestly say I like the idea.

It seems to me it's been those pushing multiculturalism the hardest have been the cause of many of the problems with immigrants, trying their darnedest to prevent them from assimilating into American culture. To them American culture is inferior to all the others because of past wrongs committed by those long dead. However, these same multiculturalists are willing to overlook the brutal nature of many of the other cultures they hold in such high regard, cultures many of those immigrants worked so hard to get away from. Who are they to tell these folks they must not join with the millions of immigrants that came before them?

If American culture is under assault today, it's not from immigrants who aren't assimilating but from liberal elites who reject the concept of assimilation. For multiculturalists, and particularly those in the academy, assimilation is a dirty word. A values-neutral belief system is embraced by some to avoid having to judge one culture as superior or inferior to another. Others reject the assimilationist paradigm outright on the grounds that the U.S. hasn't always lived up to its ideals. America slaughtered Indians and enslaved blacks, goes the argument, and this wicked history means we have no right to impose a value system on others.

The problem isn't the immigrants. The problem is the militant multiculturalists who want to turn America into some loose federation of ethnic and racial groups. The political right should continue to push back against bilingual education advocates, anti-American Chicano Studies professors, Spanish-language ballots, ethnically gerrymandered voting districts, La Raza's big-government agenda and all the rest. But these problems weren't created by the women burping our babies and changing linen at our hotels, or by the men picking lettuce in Yuma and building homes in Iowa City.

Keep the immigrants. Deport the Columbia faculty.

While I don't agree with all of Mr. Riley's sentiments or with his ideas, particularly for open borders, I do agree with his take on the multiculturalists. Deport them. Let them live in the cultures they hold in such high regard, live by their laws, their mores, their customs. Let them make a direct comparison between that culture and American culture. I have a feeling that they would gladly return to the decadent American culture and all its flaws rather than live in one of those 'superior' or 'equal' cultures.