a two-way street

Reading about the British-born terrorists which plot was discovered recently, and remembering how in Toronto 17 youngsters, Canadian born and raised, were planning to behead Stephen Harper, the question of multiculturalism acquires new relevance. We can define multiculturalism as how well a society will receive the different cultures that form the threads of its fabric. The other definition is how well people from different cultures can adapt to the new environment they chose to live in.

Reading Pewglobal you can discover that some groups still have more ties to their original culture than to the adopted one. Muslims in the Western world, born and raised here, still think that they are first Muslims, then British or Canadians. Other example from my own experience is that Italian-Canadian in Woodbridge, Ontario, who have never been to Italy, speak Italian or have any knowledge of Italian history, call themselves Italians and in some cases will cheer Italian teams over Canadian‚Äôs. Chinese diaspora in Markham, On. don‚Äôt bother with learning English and they live all their existence in the safe surrounding of their own. Read “No place like home” from Neil Bissoondath in the New Internationalist for more on the disfunctional relationship between immigrants and the current multicultural policy.

I am guilty of prefering Mexican-raised friends over others. We may keep a strong tie to our original culture, but we have to remember that nobody forced us to migrate (even refugees have options where to go, in some cases) and that we should adapt to our new home.

In our western societies people from all over the world can live with certain degree of respect for each other. The minority groups are accepted or at least tolerated. The same liberty is sometimes missed in our countries of origin. In the Muslim, Latin American and other regions, tolerance to other cultures is less lenient. Being non-Muslim in Middle East is very uncomfortable at best. In Montreal, Radio Maghreb à Montréal (CPAM Radio Union 1610 AM) conducted a poll asking if Algeria should pursue a policy of accepting people from different religion than theirs. The results were that the majority of the callers declared that Algeria should remain a pure Muslim country, denying to the prospect immigrant to Algeria the same liberty that they enjoy in Canada. This may be a red alert that cultural assimilation is not taking place. Reaction against our chosen home culture is what may produce these western-born terrorist.

We can see how two different cultures react: When Sikh men refused to wear the Stetson hat that characterizes the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, they were granted permit to not use it, demonstrating how adaptive the Canadian culture is by accepting that Sikh join the RCMP using turbans. This is an example of foreigns not accepting local traditions but locals accepting foreigners.

Why people come to a country if they cannot accept the local customs? Multiculturalism should be a two-way street. The hosts to foreign cultures have to accept the contribution from abroad, but people coming to a new environment have to realize that they are vowing to change their life style and they need to embrace, at least to some degree, the ways of their new home. Every time that I cross the border, the customs official greets me with a ‚ÄòWelcome Home‚Äô. It’s about time we all feel at home.

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