Michael said:
This was a really great post.
Thanks.
Thank you.
Would you suppose that the best way to over come this tribal tendency is to integrate into the society?
The tribal tendency probably can't be overcome, but only managed. But to almost overcome tribalism people should integrate. Also people should be tolerant of diversity.
Maybe most important is just for us all to be aware that we have tribal instincts so that we can consciously choose when to give in to our tribal instincts and when to resist our tribal instincts rather than just being unconsciously led by our instincts. I am drawn to go over and touch the pretty woman but I don't have to do it and being able to choose not to touch keeps me out of trouble. People from Victorian/Islamic or otherwise sexually repressed cultures seem to have a harder time behaving responsibly with their sexual urges. They can't seem to find the middle ground between being aware of and involved with sex and being unaware of and uninvolved with sex. I think tribalism might be the same way. The diversity repressed (if that is what the intolerant are) seem to go back and forth from being overly aware of differences and wanting to do something about them, to being unaware of differences and wanting to pretend the differences don't exist.
If so, is it possible to integrate into a primarily Christian society and remain Muslim? Hindu? Shinto? Buddhist?
Yes. I don't know if Satanists could integrate but all of the mainstream religions share a basic sense of morality. The mysticism of the various religions also connects them. The pride of being the people with the only true religion devides the religions.
Jews, Jains, Parsees, and Roma have been minority religions /ethnicitys for thousands of years. Maybe you can't fully integrate if you are to survive as a subculture.
The attitudes of the majority religion also matters. If the majority does not want to tolerate diversity, then the minority will be forced to choose between trying to pass as part majority which means hiding or giving up any differences between them and the majority, or trying to survive as a disliked minority in which case they will probably retreat to ghettos so that they can relax at times by not being surrounded by people who are against them and so that they can support each others beliefs that they are the good guys and the majority are the bad guys.
Why is it that the Chinese that have migrated here have been successful for the most part while the Lebanese have not?
When did they come? How were they first recieved? How big are their populations in the metro areas that they live in? Bigger populations may be slower to melt. Who did they move in next to? If you move into gang land your kids are going to be gangsters. I don't know much about Australia.
Sometimes it seems the Chinese response to pressure is to get quiet and work harder. Becomming rich is validation enough and there is no need to shout "fuck you" when somebody says, will you "fucking learn to speak english". For a more passionate person getting quiet and working harder might not work. Based on the few Australians and Lebanese that I have known, they shared the trait of not believing that it is not OK to take crap from anybody. Taking a joke is one thing, but taking actual crap is a challenge to ones manhood. The problem between Australians and Lebanese might be that they are too similar.
Is it that the quality of person migrating is different? I mean most Chinese migrants are Cantonese and potentially were educated or at the least business orientated. (Isn’t’ Prosperity is one of three wishes at Chinese new year?) Or is it that Chinese and Aussie beliefs are quite similar? I know a lot of Cantonese Xians here.
Should Australia, a country with a small population, take a large number of war ravaged refuges? Can we? What does that say to the Geneva convention?
The Autralian people need to decide what they are comfortable with. Then they have to make ther politicians obey them. In the USA the majority of Americans clearly don't want as much immigration as we are getting. But the employers desiring cheaper labor have shown that they have more political clout than the majority of the people wanting less immigration do. It sounds to me like the same political dynamic controls immigration in Europe and the UK. Is this also what is going on in Australia?
Lets suppose:
I wonder how the Japanese, whom are sometimes bitched about anyway, were here worshipping their Emperor as a God, wearing traditional warrior hairstyles, blacked teeth, shaved eyebrows kimono and all. Women shuffling by in kimonos, blacked teeth, shaved eyebrows and outlandish makeup. What would Aussies think if they were ? What would people think if they were 6% of the population and growing. Lets say they also gave praise to their Emperor-God, some of who wishing destruction on Australia for WWII, all the while instructing their fellow Aussie-Japanese that they are much more superior to the lazy fat Aussie. That their women are pristine and virtuous while Aussie girls slutty and nutty.
Then one day a nutty Japanese knifes an Aussie .... Samurai style.
I can tell you. People’d poop their pants!
In any country, that would definitely call for pants pooping, and then maybe some head smashing would also be in order.
Incidentally, a number of Greek and Muslim buddies have expressed their worry that there are too many Asians here! Kind of funny huh? Except the one Muslim buddy dating a Catholic Philippian (and hidding it from his mom and dad – he's 28) well he’s fine with Asians
Normal chaos of the melting pot, but funny. Would be funnier, but not unbelievable if the unwelcome proud Muslim Australian thought there were to many East Asians and disliked Asians and then married a Catholic Asian.
What happens when countries like France or The Netherlands begin to have populations with 40 or 50 or even 60% more migrants with a different culture than their own? Will all Hell Break Lose?
Hell could break loose followed by a blending or followed by an expulsion or genocide. Or a peaceful blending of peoples and cultures could happen. Or the minority culture could be lost as the majority culture is taken on by the minority. It is like trying to predict the weather.
Historic France is a Celtic, Germanic, Latin Blend. Hell did break loose but blending and peace also happened. The culture and race that is French, of which the French are so proud, could not have come into existence if hell did not break loose and if the Celtic and Germanic and Latin had not blended.
Is Sydney just a micro-version of what lies ahead when large (>30%) populations of migrants with very different beliefs refuse to integrate?
Give it four generations. The third generation rarely learns their grand parents language. Most of the fourth generation will marry people of other ethnicities. That is how it has been in the USA.
American Jewish Parents may not like seing their kids marry gentiles but absent antisemitism they can't stop the mixed marriages. There were always mixed marriages which is how European Jews ended up looking like Europeans. Those Jews that Hitler killed were more German than they were Jewish. A few hundred years from now Australia might have a minority people 75% descended from anglo-Australians who think they are Lebanese Muslim Australians. Anything can happen as the weird circumstances of future history unfolds.
These Lebanese Australian kids who refuse to assimilate are probably already very Australian culturally. Different peoples melt at different temperatures in the melting pot. If Australians really want the Lebanese Muslims to integrate, then the very best thing Australians could do would be to stop worrying about it. The integration will happen.
Don't tell them to hurry though, because "what, are you saying there is something wrong with being a Lebanese Muslim? Those are fighting words."
"When in Roman, do as the Romans."
I'm sure back then, in a society where punishment was the norm, they figuredout in a hurry that worshipping a different religion, wearing weird clothing and being poor was a quick means to a trip to the coliseum. Sure if you were “rich” and of such a minority that your “uniqueness” becomes “exotic” then Romans would have loved you. But be poor and of a large minority and … … … … "Is that a gladius in your pocket or are you just happy to see me”
And yet Rome became a Christian Nation. You never know how persecution will turn out. The Romans wanted to scare people out of being Christians and instead gave Christians the opportunity to gather converts by impressing people with the depth of their faith in the face of persecution.
