A Free Society Tolerates and Encourages Multiculturalism
In the past I have advocated a monocultural development of society in which the freedoms of the individual to align themselves with set ideas, beliefs and practices is sacrificed to the concept of nationhood where all individuals work towards the common good of the State by modifying their own religious and cultural practices (see http://shantanup.wordpress.com/2012/12/28/multiculturalism-and-coherent-government/). Today I am not so sure that such an idea can be considered reasonable. It is fascistic. In a Free Society that one can be proud of living, the individual must retain the right to pursue his or her biological and psychological imperatives that define the person. The Nation should only outline the broad framework of what laws constitute crimes and which misdemeanours of the individual will be punishable because they infringe on the rights of other members of society. So long these limits on personal conduct are not crossed, one needs to be tolerant of the practices and beliefs of people, and allow these to change over time in a peaceful evolutionary fashion. This means that we must not aim to develop a specific type of Nation that can only be accomplished by coercing or worse forcing people to adopt particular values and beliefs. We must not promote any religion or philosophy as a Nation. Indeed, where there is demand to cater for the specific needs of groups in terms of facilities, be it the building of temples, mosques and churches, or parents wishes for the educational needs of their children, the society must enable these to be established. This is the tolerance of multiculturalism that I believe in as a pluralistic person.
Why have I changed my views? What I advocated in the past related purely to the idea of evolutionary biology setting up ethnicities, races and nations as a purely natural phenomenon. I no longer believe that we humans are just like all other animals struggling in the jungle of life through DNA mutations and adaptation to the environment. I believe that we are special animals with a conscience. That conscience dictates our values which is different from one person to another. We cannot say which values are better and which are to be denigrated. It is for the individual to decide that. As a nation we need to create a society that accommodates its diversity to as far as it can stretch until the individual or the group adversely affects other members of society. It requires a pluralistic attitude to appreciate that diversity. That diversity is the truth and reality of our circumstances. That is because the entire process of evolution is in the hands of God, who we should leave our futures in the hands of as we live peacefully with each other, sorting out our daily problems and charting a good future for the improvement of society from all that we do.
We need to live in a free society in which the basic freedoms are guaranteed. That cannot be accomplished by setting limits on the expression of freedoms of any particular group, whether the nature of the diversity is a racial one, due to some other biological feature, or as a result of geographical/national origin, or in the way of religious and philosophical convictions. A free society is achieved by a very high degree of tolerance towards those who are different from one, yet are still within the human fold.
United Kingdom Independence Party
It remains to be seen whether the political party that I am a member of, namely the United Kingdom Independence Party (UKIP), will subscribe to this view and chart its future accordingly. It has stated that the Party is against multiculturalism, yet it has to face the reality that the United Kingdom is currently a highly multicultural state. So what is it advocating? If it advocates against multiculturalism it must have a strategy that works towards the transition of the United Kingdom towards a monocultural state. If the transition is evolutionary that guarantees individual freedoms as time marches on I will associate with the Party. If on the other hand it imposes a culture, for example the Judeao-christian culture that has been mentioned by Nigel Farage then I cannot remain a member of the Party regardless of its views on European Union. The indicators of how UKIP views nationhood developing from its present state towards a monocultural state will be in the details of the policies advocated by the Party. If minority groups are persecuted or their cultural needs are gradually done away with through laws then clearly I cannot agree to such a process of transition.
How does that leave me in relation to the debate on whether the United Kingdom should be part of the European Union? There is nothing enticing about forcing diverse peoples with different standards of living, languages and values into a large superstate. We simply will not be able to relate to people living on the other side of Europe. Small nation states serve the individual better because our individual voices are more likely to be heard and taken note of. This means that we should construct states that are viable at the smallest level geographically and population wise because these are more manageable, people feel that they know each other as a community and these facilitate greater local democracy. For this reason I have always supported the right of the Scottish people to determine through a referendum if they should remain within the United Kingdom. The idea of independence has value at the personal as well as the state level in that it encourages self sufficiency, makes people stronger and promotes unity. So all we need to do is to question whether the United Kingdom is economically viable. If it is, we should remain outside the European Union. The only question that we need to consider in light of this is whether we contribute more financially to the European Union than we get back from the EU? There is no sense in funding a bureaucracy in Brussels or subsidising the lifestyles of people in other parts of Europe. There is environmental and economic harm in encouraging immigration from Europe into the United Kingdom. We must make do with our own resources that should be developed and utilised for our own people. UKIP will give us the referendum to help us decide our own future. Other parties are dragging their heels. So I remain a member of UKIP to see if it will adopt my other ideas on how to better the lives of UK residents. UKIP is a political vehicle for me to try and improve society.
30 July 2014 Update:
God created a consciousness mechanism by which divine, semi-divine and evil religions come about: multiculturalism is divine.
22 August 2014 (16.50 hrs UK time) Editing and Update:
Being divine is not the same as being ‘dharmic’. Divine is the manifestation of sattvic (saintly) characteristics; semi-divine is rajasic (performing ones material duties); and evil is tamasic (being destructive and wayward). Being Dharmic on the other hand means taking one’s way of living from sanatana dharma, or the eternal or timeless law established by God. When we are on a mode to fight for and perform dharma we are trying to establish truth and justice with ahimsa (non-violence) being the most important of our do’s and don’ts but which too may need to be fought for by killing if necessary. Fostering multiculturalism is divine but performing one’s dharma means that one does not allow any one of the cultures to infringe on the privacy of any of the other cultures and prevent them from leading their own lives of contentment. Thus dharma will come into conflict with the idea of fostering multiculturalism because the question of truth and justice is involved on any issue.
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First Published in Blog https://shantanup.wordpress.com January 21, 2014 - Posted by shantanup | Uncategorized | Edit
2 Comments »
1. You are a deranged loony.
Comment by GetDead,loony | January 23, 2014 | Edit | Reply
2. What makes you say that? Do you take a position on monoculturalism versus multiculturalism; on secularism versus pluralism; on immigration; on small states versus large superstates?
Comment by shantanup | January 23, 2014 | Edit | Reply
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