What are your views on Multiculturalism in Ireland? - Threadbanned User List in OP

One eyed Jack

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117817495#Comment_117817495

I didn’t dodge the question anyway, I answered it directly -

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117807472#Comment_117807472

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117817495#Comment_117817495

Open borders and mass migration are government policy are they?

where exactly is this policy?

I was born abroad, I am 100% Irish.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117817840#Comment_117817840

Did Sand say that you weren't Irish? Dunno why there's a need for a % here. Either someone is Irish or they're not.

Mass immigration was a key part of the pro-multiculturalism movement over the last few decades, and if you weren't trying to be argumentative you would admit the truth of that. Consider the demographic shift in Ireland in a relatively short period of time... THAT doesn't happen naturally for an Island on the edge of Europe.

Sand

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117817840#Comment_117817840

This is an interesting example of how the logic changes as it needs to. Were we discussing people born in Ireland to migrant parents, the argument is that they were born in Ireland, so they are ethnically Irish. Whereas when it is tactically useful, people born outside Ireland are not members of the ethnic nation whose country or state they were born in. They are Irish by virtue of Irish descent. Birthright citizenship vs. citizenship by ethnic descent, shuffle as needed.

I don't support birth right citizenship (and neither do the Irish people) so where you were born is irrelevant to me. 1 in 5 Irish residents being born abroad is a strong indicator of mass migration into Ireland over the past 30 years. A level likely not seen since the 16th-17th century plantations. Sure, some fraction of that are Irish people born abroad like yourself. But it is a small fraction. Ireland is undergoing massive migration and it has and will continue to have significant negative outcomes for the indigenous Irish people.

Anne_Widdecombe

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117810864#Comment_117810864

Multiculturalism is the enemy of culture.

Mass immigration nullifies the possibility of assimilation into the home culture. For instance, if 700,000 Pakistanis settled in Ireland over the next year, that would have a detrimental effect on the home culture. In several generations, the original home culture would be gone. Ireland would become Pakistan Mark II.

Mass immigration also means that different cultures coalesce around each other, living separately from one another. Take the Brazilian population in Ireland, or even the Nigerian population. What you find is that they all stick to each other, with comparatively limited interaction with the home culture.

If you believe that the Irish culture is valueless and should be replaced by anything approximating any of the above, that's your right. Most people do value indigenous culture and are perfectly happy to have migrants enter the country - but at a rate that allows for assimilation, rather than separation of separate migrant cultures.

One eyed Jack

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117818254#Comment_117818254

Multiculturalism, as the term implies, is the idea of multiple cultures, far from your idea of one homogeneous culture based it appears upon nothing more than national identity alone. Culture itself are sets of shared values, beliefs, ideals, traditions, language, and so on, and can be distinguished from national identity.

To demonstrate the point, in order for your argument to have any validity, I would have to assume as you’re doing, that all people from Pakistan think the same, and I know that’s not even true of Irish people, and therefore have no basis upon which to assume that based solely upon their national identity, all people from Pakistan think the same. As much as I’d like to distance you from your moniker as I don’t think it’s fair to assume you share Anne Widdecombes values, I’ll take 700,000 Pakistani nationals over one Anne Widdecombe any day of the week 😂

I don’t have to though, I don’t even have to entertain your limited thought experiment, because I know from statistics available from the CSO that the majority of immigrants themselves are actually Irish, followed by the UK, and it would be unfair and unreasonable to assume that all immigrants from the UK share Anne Widdecombes values -

https://www.cso.ie/en/releasesandpublications/er/pme/populationandmigrationestimatesapril2019/

Clearly, mass immigration if it were happening, is wholly unlikely to result in 700k immigrants in any given year from a single country, let alone Pakistan, even assuming for the purposes of your thought experiment that all Pakistani immigrants share the same values, which I can say based upon my experience, they most assuredly do not, they share far more in common with Irish people than the regime which they sought to extricate themselves from in the first place. And I’m not just talking about the current regime, but rather our shared history of gaining independence from British rule -

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Pakistan

But let’s take your example of the idea of people with shared identities and values and so on coalescing around each other, as I’m never keen on simply throwing the baby out with the bath water. Certainly people with shared values and identities and interests in common do coalesce around each other, and the same is true of Irish people, that they coalesce around other people who share their values and beliefs and traditions and so on. And the same is true of anyone really that they will coalesce around people they identify as having traits or characteristics in common with, with comparatively little interaction with those people who they identify as not having at least something in common with. It’s the whole idea of community and indeed multiculturalism!

To give you just one example, immigrants from other cultures similar to our own coming to Ireland prefer the values of a Conservative Catholic education for their children, over the values espoused by other organisations such as Educate Together with their gender neutral bathroom facilities and their surface level token nodding to multiculturalism which is absolutely more akin to assimilation into their particular beliefs, values and ideals for Irish society. ET have been established in Irish society for the last 40 odd years or so and have yet to make so much as a dint in Irish Education. Their more liberal leanings are more appealing to more Irish people than immigrants who are forced by virtue of being blow-ins to the area to enrol their children in schools which are inconsistent with their world views, etc, and it is a very fortunate few who manage to enrol their children in schools which are more in keeping with their world views and values and culture and so on. Their choices with regards to the education of their children are rather limited in an attempt to assimilate rather than appreciate that they do not share the values of the schools in which they have little choice but to enrol their children, and so many choose to set up schools among themselves which are not recognised by the State and therefore receiving no funding from the State. It doesn’t appear to bother them, nor should it, as they are educating their children as they see fit, maintaining their own cultures and traditions and values and so on.

To give you another example - Brazilians, Filipino, Middle and Far Eastern, African cultures share values in common with Irish people coalescing around religious traditions and values and so on, many practices in common in practice, and some indeed more likely to induce culture shock, albeit not a fatal affliction. If you’ve ever been to a Pentecostal service for example, you’ll know exactly what I mean, they like to raise the roof off the building with their enthusiasm for their faith 😂 Muslims are just a tad more reserved (in public at least 😁), rather like an Irish Catholic mass, which I do wish were a bit more similar to Brazilian culture at times. Our celebration of mass is an oxymoron with it’s rather sombre overtones.

However, not for a minute do I believe or would I ever suggest that Irish culture is valueless, and while I don’t mind in the least sharing the cúpla focal with my Indian co-worker who has a rather sweet deal on a hotel room (it’s only himself though, it wouldn’t be ideal for a family), I really don’t have the inclination to impose upon anyone else the virtues and values of what Irish culture means to me, regardless of what it may or may not mean to anyone else. Only to those people who choose to embrace it am I willing to share, because attempting to force assimilation by means of direct or indirect force, incurs resistance proportional to the degree of force used. Instead I prefer that anyone sees the benefits of Irish culture for themselves and inquires to know more, than my expending any degree of effort to have them comply with my world views which we do not share in common. I would say that of anyone though regardless of their nationality.

I still have no idea what “Indigenous Culture” means specifically to you, but from your post I gather it’s probably nothing like the above, and is rather based upon your lack of interaction with people from other cultures in an attempt to preserve your own standards.

Anne_Widdecombe

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117820077#Comment_117820077

Can you summarise this down to a handful of concise points?

I don't think I can go through that much text and be expected to reply with the same length.

One eyed Jack

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117820269#Comment_117820269

Just one point really if I had to summarise -

Your post is not about multiculturalism, it’s about nationalism. It presents a hypothetical scenario which bears no resemblance to reality whatsoever, but is rather predicated upon the idea that people share your views of other people based solely upon their nationality.

It works of course if one is already given to assuming negative stereotypes of people from other cultures based solely upon their nationality, much like the way negative stereotypes of Irish people persist in spite of being based upon nothing more than a belief which itself is based upon ignorance and a lack of interaction with Irish people, assuming we’re all the same, when in reality we very clearly are not.

You’re attempting the same sort of effort with your 700,000 Pakistani immigrants thought experiment, and the problem with that idea gaining any traction is that it just doesn’t map to reality, it only works if one needs to engender fear, uncertainty and doubt in any given population of other people, in spite of evidence to the contrary such as the fact that immigrants very rarely achieve positions of power within any society in order to influence public policies without assimilating themselves into already existing social structures.

It’s why immigrants do not and simply can not present the threat to any society you wish people to believe they do, even if people never had any experience of their own upon which they rely on with regards to their judgement of people from other cultures. They’re biased far more in favour of their own experiences than they are anyone else’s idealism (whether that idealistic portrayal of people from other cultures is either positive or negative).

That’s why I suggested I would take 700,000 Pakistani nationals over one Anne Widdecombe any day of the week. Because I don’t need to rely on any stereotypes to know Anne Widdecombe is an awful dose, and I’d sooner take my chances with the 700,000 Pakistani nationals knowing that they’re unlikely to share Anne Widdecombes values 😁

Anne_Widdecombe

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117820455#Comment_117820455

If that's a summary, then I'm screwed. 😆

One eyed Jack

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117820550#Comment_117820550

I would never want you to think you’re obligated to respond with a post of similar length (though as it’s a discussion forum, the term does imply some requirement of engagement beyond a snazzy one-liner), but the point is very simple -

Your point is about nationalism, not multiculturalism.

Anne_Widdecombe

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117820558#Comment_117820558

My point was about multiculturalism that has overlap with nationalism to a degree. But that doesn't undermine the argument I made, which is true and valid.

One eyed Jack

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117820565#Comment_117820565

Your point is solely focused on nationalism and assumptions you need people to make about other people based upon their nationality, with no regard whatsoever for the variations in cultures in any other society in the very same way as variations exist between cultures in Irish society.

There’s no need to undermine your argument because you simply don’t have one that relates to multiculturalism, because there’s no truth in your argument, which renders the value or validity of your attempt at a thought experiment useless.

Anne_Widdecombe

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117820612#Comment_117820612

But that's just an outright dismissal, rather than an engagement with my points.

Let's put it this way, do you believe there is even such a thing as "Irish culture" on this island and, if so, what do you believe constitutes it?

The reason I ask is because, unless we know what we mean by Irish culture, we may be talking about very different things.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117817960#Comment_117817960

Sand tried to make a point about 20% of the population being foreign born, and tried to make out that those foreign born people are somehow not Irish. And that is somehow a bad thing.

Neither of which is true.

Fearmongering

Mass immigration happens when the host country is a country that people want to live in. Like Ireland during the Celtic tiger and when the country was doing well. Obviously others will want to move there.

So, totally is normal and natural.

Anne_Widdecombe

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117820958#Comment_117820958

There is a difference between being ethnically Irish and civically Irish.

You can grab a man from the Oman tonight and give him an Irish passport; he may be civically Irish, but he is not ethnically Irish.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117820974#Comment_117820974

I never suggested he was.

The fearmongering argument that 20% of the country is foreign born is brought out all the time, to try and scare people into nationalism.

That somehow Ireland is becoming not Irish. Which is rubbish. More than anything else, foreign born, does not mean not Irish. I personally, and lots of people I know we're not born in Ireland, but are 100% Irish.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117820626#Comment_117820626

The question about Irish culture has been asked many times on this thread.

Turns out everyone has different ideas as to what is Irish culture.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117820958#Comment_117820958

Bubblypop, I'm not going to bother repeating past points about the negatives of either multiculturalism, or immigration, because you've been here for most of it, and have consistently sought to dismiss them, without countering the points made.

Immigration is normal and natural. Mass immigration is not because it is political. It's political due to the pressure (both political and economic) that Merkel and the EU brought to bear to justify their own desire for cheap labor to meet their employment needs.

As for fearmongering, you're doing the extreme opposite, insisting that there is nothing at all that is negative. Nothing at all. Everything is wonderful. But it's not.

Lastly, the 20% of people in this country who are foreign born includes migrants who are not Irish. There are many foreign born people living in this country who are not Irish citizens, and have no interest in becoming such, along with those who are not eligible to become Irish citizens. As for whether it's a bad thing... it's a dramatic shift in the demographics in this country in a relatively short time, and brings a variety of problems that rarely exist when the foreign populations are much smaller in numbers. But I guess you'll be dismissing that so you can keep the sunny and no clouds routine going.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117820994#Comment_117820994

What's wrong with nationalism? Nothing. In fact, it's only within western nations that the term is associated with negative connotations, whereas it's considered a positive and a very natural thing everywhere else. We should be nationalistic, have pride in our nation, and our people.

How do you determine that someone is 100% Irish? This should be interesting.

One eyed Jack

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117821257#Comment_117821257

Well there’s nothing inherently positive or negative about nationalism per se, but it’s fair to suggest that bubblypop was referring to the way in which some people’s idea of nationalism isn’t so much predicated upon being proud of their nation and their national identity, but rather trying to suggest that their nation and their national identity are superior to other nations and national identities.

Similar to the way in which Anne Widdecombe puts forward the idea of 700,000 Pakistani immigrants in one year and the idea that they are somehow a threat to Anne’s ideas of an Irish national identity. My idea of an Irish national identity is not nearly so fragile as to believe it could ever be threatened by immigrants, no matter how many, no matter what country they came from.

I certainly do have a strong sense of national identity and pride in my country and it’s heritage and traditions and values, more along the lines of the land of Saints and Scholars, land of a thousand welcomes, that sort of thing, as opposed to ideas about “indigenous populations” and “natives”, or the idea that I am so insecure in my identity and it hangs by such a thin thread that it could be so easily threatened by being shared, so I must keep it to myself and be wary of all who might try and take it from me, but it’s fine for me to try and force my ideas upon other people.

That’s the sort of nationalism which encourages division and discrimination rather than an appreciation not just of our own cultural identity, but appreciation of other cultures and values and traditions and so on. Because it offers no value to Irish society, it’s just not that popular, either culturally, politically or socially.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117821257#Comment_117821257

Well, it's obvious that 100% Irish is someone that has two Irish parents. I don't see anything too interesting in that, that is law.

that's not to suggest that someone is less Irish if they don't have two Irish parents. You can be Irish and also another nationality, but personally, I am irish, even though wasnt born in this country.

I don't care what nationality someone is, people are people.

And no, we don't have to be nationalistic. People can be whatever they want to be. Some people can be proud of being irish, that can live all Irish culture, whatever that is to people.

some people might not care less bout being irish or their culture, that's allowed too.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117821381#Comment_117821381

And I would agree with you.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117821429#Comment_117821429

All well and good, but that's not what you were referring to previously, though... or am I mistaken?

If I was, then, I'll drop out, in agreement with the above.. but honestly, that wasn't what I got from your previous posts.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117821435#Comment_117821435

No, I honestly don't know what you thought I was referring to?

But, that's what I believe

Strumms

Net inward migration into Ireland according to CSO is around somewhere between 20,000 - 30,000 people per annum.

According to the CSO the population is projected to grow by 1,953,300 (+41.2%) over the 35 year period from 2016 to 2051.

https://www.cso.ie/en/releasesandpublications/ep/p-plfp/populationandlabourforceprojections2017-2051/populationprojectionsresults/

that needs addressing.

conorhal

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117820077#Comment_117820077

To the best of my knowledge, 'one Anne Widdecombe' is, to this day, still a virgin and has raped nobody. Can the same be said of your theoretical 700,000 Pakistani's that you expect to integrate so well? Rotherham and the systemic nature of 'asian' grooming gangs and their all too similar modus operendi nationwide in the UK would suggest that we would be a lot better off with the one 'good old fashioned catholic' Ann Widdecombe instead, despite your distain for her, which amounts to little more than the standard lefty 'if they're for it, I'm agin' it! tendency to cut off your nose to spite someone else’s face, followed by the swift demand that everybody else must have their nose cut off also.

One eyed Jack

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117827690#Comment_117827690

Well, yes, it can, seeing as they’re an entirely hypothetical entity we can make up whatever we like about them to suit our own preferences. Innocent until proven guilty is one of the core principles or values of Western democratic society, so when it comes to an entirely hypothetical scenario, the same standard should apply.

While Anne Widdecombe may be your personal preference, it doesn’t diminish the fact that I would rather take my chances with 700,000 Pakistani immigrants than Anne Widdecombe, notwithstanding the fact that Anne Widdecombe enjoys far higher status in public life in the UK than any Pakistani immigrants who live there. In her position in public life in the UK, she has contributed not much more than “if they’re for it, I’m agin’ it”, under the guise of someone who pretends to be a good old fashioned Catholic, demanding that everyone else must also cut their noses off to spite themselves, which is precisely why the best she can do nowadays is a guest appearance on GB News peddling her oddball cantankery to anyone who cares to be bothered tuning in.

Tell me how

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117827690#Comment_117827690

Are you really using a devout Catholic as a counter point to rapists within a particular community?

Really? I mean really really?

conorhal

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117827830#Comment_117827830

There is nothing hypothetical about the thousands of girls raped across the UK and there's nothing hypothetical about the culture of their abusers that facilitated and contributed to it. You are effectively saying you'd 'theoretically' prefer a few thousand rapes to one person you find disagreeable and you have the nerve to call Widdacombe an oddball cantanterous crank?

Cordell

I would rather take my chances with 700,000 Pakistani immigrants than Anne Widdecombe

TIL that a harmless old crank that just say odd things is more harmful than child grooming gangs, bombers and beheaders.