It's a strange thing to find yourself in agreement with the far-Right on any subject, and certainly for some people on the Left, this passing proximity is enough to render my opinions and arguments suspect - even de facto wrong. Multi-culturalism can appear to be a soft target because it is so often attacked from the Right. For those of us on the Left, defending it can be an almost knee-jerk response, on the purely oppositional grounds that anything that annoys fascists and conservatives has to be a good thing. In my view, this lazy and thoughtless attitude has crippled the Left and allowed the Right in general, and the far-Right in particular to seize the political initiative and the intellectual high ground.
Naturally, the reasons for my scepticism about multi-culturalism are somewhat different from the usual conservative arguments. I have no particular attachment to "British" culture - I'd argue anyway that what you mean by British culture is highly dependant on your class background. There is a world of difference between the culture of the middle-class and the working-class in Britain. We have very different attitudes and expectations on a whole range of subjects, from education and work, to sex, food and leisure. As for culture in the sense of art, that scarcely registers among the proles at all. The world of galleries, exhibitions and theatres is quite alien to most working-class people - it's the preserve of the educated, and while it's true that university has become more accessible to the working class in the last few decades, it's also true that with the recent trebling of tuition fees, that opportunity and the social mobility it allowed is closing down. The result can only be a sharpening of class identity - a return to us and them. Clearly, we can't talk about British culture without specifying which social class we're talking about.
It follows from this that I have no interest in preserving the "purity" of British culture - it's a nonsensical notion anyway that bears no relation to historical reality. It's a cliché that the British (or at least, the English) are cultural magpies and genetic mongrels that have always readily absorbed foreign ideas, language, habits and so on. I don't subscribe to the idea that immigrant cultures represent any sort of threat to the existence of a distinctive British culture - the real threat there comes not from immigration but from commodification: the application of commercial market values to everything that we do, with the less popular and more peculiar past-times being put out of business by those pursuits with mass appeal, just as supermarkets squeeze out small specialist stores. I'm all for hybrid cultural mixtures: the regular flow of new ideas into our cultural pool keeps it fresh and prevents stagnation.
I must admit, however, a certain sympathy for the joys of intolerance.
Is that too provocative a way of putting it?
I am an anarchist and I see anarchism as part of the rationalist, Enlightenment tradition. I have little time for the post-modern liberal nonsense about all cultures being equal and truth being relative. The scientific method is demonstrably an effective means of discerning the truth. On the basis of this method, we routinely do incredible things which other alleged truth-seeking methods have never and can never achieve. The day prayers manage to safely hurl hundreds of people thousands of miles through the air to the other side of the planet will be, well... the day I start wailing and gnashing my teeth in lamentation.
There are, to get back to the point, some things which should not be tolerated: fascism, misogyny, bullying, oppression... this isn't an arbitrary list. I believe that human beings have an inherent sense of morality and justice and that this is firmly rooted in our biological evolution. There is, moreover, good scientific evidence to support the claim that morals are rooted in patterns of behaviour which evolved as the most effective way of ensuring our survival as a species. The predisposition to empathy, altruism, co-operation and mutual aid between individuals forms the bedrock of our existence as a social species. It is the basis of a universal moral code, one found in all human societies, which seeks to prevent violence and theft inside the community. It's notable that people who lack these qualities are seen as evil, selfish, psychopathic bastards. They are, in a profound sense, anti-social and communities invariably take steps to contain them. (Attitudes regarding violence towards people seen as outside of the community are, however, more variable - as are other issues, like sexual propriety, which form a secondary layer of morality which varies enormously from one culture to another.)
These social attributes may stem from our genes and have evolved in a situation in which society was composed almost entirely of close genetic relatives, but the strength of nationalist sentiment shows that it can be extended outwards to include in our communities people we haven't met and who aren't closely related to us. Our sense of who is one of us is also shaped by our consciousness of commonality, of having shared interests. In view of scientific findings showing that we are all genetically related and in view of improved communications and travel and the increasingly integrated and globalised economy and interlinked ecological issues, there seems no reason in principle why our sense of community can't expand to take in the entire species.
Human beings have an inherent moral sense which has evolved to regulate the behaviour of individuals in a social context - to allow society to exist. It can be expressed quite simply as the Golden Rule - treat others as you'd like them to treat you in the same circumstances. Bearing in mind that this internal sense of moral justice depends on who you accept as part of your in-group, then surely the role of anarchists - and anyone else who cares about progress and social harmony - is to demolish the barriers between people and encourage a more inclusive definition of us.
This isn't an argument for homogeneity. It's not a question of stifling diversity but of recognising common humanity beneath all the accretions of culture. There is much about the kaleidoscope of cultures that I enjoy and appreciate. If by multi-culturalism we mean a variety of food, drink, music, language, art, architecture, different philosophies and historical perspectives, then fine! The more the merrier. But if it means having to tolerate sexism and homophobia, for example, then we have problems. Much of the difference between cultures is fairly superficial. Providing there is common agreement on fundamental questions about who is a part of our society, there is no reason why they can't co-exist peacefully.
It would appear then that I'm not opposed to multi-culturalism in principle. In practice though? Well I have already described multi-culturalism as a middle-class con. To explain why, we need to consider the matter from a class perspective.
There is a very marked difference in the attitudes of the working-class and the bourgeoisie, by which I mean the liberal middle-class - the conservatives obviously have their own objections which have already been discussed. Too often, working-class hostility to multi-culturalism is dismissed as ignorance and latent racism. But there are genuine problems with multi-culturalism and class is the prism that brings them into focus.
How do the working-class experience multi-culturalism?
When the idea of multi-culturalism first became established in the 1980s, local councils began pouring money into community projects, and in trying to identify the outlines of these communities, they naturally found themselves talking to the most conservative - and therefore visible - elements in them. The more progressive people, being more integrated, were easily overlooked. Consequently, it was the clerics and the conservative businessmen who had experience of organisation and of handling large sums of money who came to be regarded as "community leaders". (It's interesting to reflect that if the same approach were taken to provide funding to white working-class communities, we'd have vicars and Masons being appointed to speak on our behalf - and how many people would consider them to be representative of us?)
This clearly skews the dynamic within communities, giving power and influence to conservatives that they might not otherwise have. It props up the influence of religion when in the wider context, urban society is becoming increasingly secularised - reversing a process which had already begun in immigrant communities in the 1970s.
The further problem with beginning to differentiate between individual immigrant communities was that it served to sharpen ethnic and religious differences. Groups which had been rubbing along together comfortably now began to differentiate themselves, competing for funding for their own particular communities. The result has been to resurrect sectarian divisions and old rivalries along much the same lines as existed during British colonial control of their home countries. Divide and rule rides again.
Outside of immigrant communities, it has served to effectively block integration into the wider working-class by putting the emphasis on ethnicity and religion and obscuring the shared experiences of class. This has been disastrous, effectively dividing the working-class against itself by conjuring up the perception of special treatment for the minority. The rolling back of secularisation, for example, keeping Muslims out of pubs and consequently closing down a possible avenue of integration, has only reinforced this. As have faith-based schools. Even in mixed schools, the special dispensation that allows religious minorities to be excused from RE lessons can only serve to divide kids.
The result of all this is a patchwork of self-contained ghettos, where immigrants, huddling together for mutual support and security, have no need to integrate. And yet, integration is the best and most effective way of fighting racism. The empathy that grows from shared experiences is a far surer cure for prejudice than well-meaning pleas for tolerance of differences.
Now, how do the liberal middle-class experience multi-culturalism?
Well for a start, it needs to be recognised that the bourgeoisie relate to society in a very different way to the working-class. Their relative affluence gives them options in life and comparative security from the social problems associated with poverty. They have less need for the support of a tight-knit community. Their social networks are more geographically scattered and tend to be based more on personal interests than mere proximity. They have a degree of mobility which is denied to the working-class, who are more tied down by their need for support to particular communities, and when they move away from those support networks, they are liable to struggle alone. Yet it has to be said that for the working-class, communities can be restrictive, even oppressive. The lack of physical mobility means you are stuck with a quite arbitrary social network, based on geography, and including people you don't get on with. It is this friction which causes all the drama: the constant feuding and fighting, fuelled by frustration, that is constantly erupting on the estates.
For the middle-class, community is looser, less restrictive and more of a voluntary concern. Theirs is a more individualistic and independent existence. Freed from the constraints of being rooted in a specific geographic community, and physically remote from the poor districts where immigrants invariably wash up, they can cherry-pick the aspects of different cultures without having to commit to them, or even deal with them except on their own terms. They don't have to live in a community in which wife-beating is seen as acceptable.
Where immigration and multi-culturalism does actually enter their lives, it is generally through the field of education, by which immigrants can themselves become bourgeois. Yet this is actually a form of mediation, which smooths off the more difficult aspects of the immigrant's culture. University has the effect of making the middle-class more culturally homogeneous, instilling if not British, then at least Western European cultural values. Partly this is due to the nature of academia, promoting critical analysis and the scientific method. Partly it's down to the fact that going to university generally means moving to another part of the country, physically distancing you from family, friends and your cultural background, while surrounding you with people from many different backgrounds, prompting a more cosmopolitan outlook and giving you the space and freedom to experiment with different habits, ideas and identities. Finally, it should also be noted that there are well-established links between education and secularisation - ie, the more educated you are, the less religiously inclined you become. For immigrants, becoming bourgeois means escaping their cultural background and becoming integrated into mainstream British society.
All of this means that the effects and experiences of multi-culturalism are very different depending on your social class. The middle-class get to enjoy all the benefits of cosmopolitan diversity, remote from the repression and competition of the ghettos, while the working-class are vertically divided and weakened, and subjected to a liberal political ethos which seems to favour the needs of immigrant minorities over the needs of the indigenous working-class. Needless to say, these conditions also make the working-class more susceptible to fascist propaganda. Thanks to these obvious demarcations, we're divided and ruled.
By buying into multi-culturalism, the Left has made itself unable to overcome these divisions in our class. It has, in fact, utterly crippled us by making it impossible for us to assert our own values. Multi-culturalism is actually the death of socialism. If we are socialists, then we stand for Liberty, Equality and Solidarity. When we back away from criticising and opposing the misogynistic strands in Islam because Muslims in general are being persecuted, we abandon all our own principles, without which we are precisely nothing.
And where does the logic of multi-culturalism lead us? It means we can't attack capitalism because the exploitation of labour is just part of the culture of the bourgeoisie; it's an integral part of their identity, and everyone has a right to assert their own identity and values, right? No matter how toxic those values may be to the rest of us...?
Enough! Multi-culturalism is a middle-class con. If we are socialists, we must stand by our principles and not bend-over backwards to tolerate and accommodate reactionary values. Without integration, we as a class, will remain divided and defeated.