Multiculturalism = Multiconformism
by Andrew Bates
If you are a white guy like me you do not need to read this article. You already think exactly as I do, feel as I do, act as I do and have the same tastes as I do. There is nothing to be gained by your reading this article. There is nothing I could add to your reality because, as white guys, we see everything the same way, through the same paradigm.
Yeah right. Leave aside the fact that everything I write is gold and should therefore be read, digested and memorised by all. The number of guilt-induced liberal white guys out there who will have experienced moral outrage upon reading this article’s title plainly refutes this. That there are differences of political opinion within individuals having the same race and gender characteristics and, further, that there are differences of policy opinion, aesthetic opinion and sporting opinion within those sharing the same race, gender and political characteristics, clearly shows how wrong such thinking is.
Yet this is the perverted logic, the abandoning of the facts of reality, that justifies positions like Women’s Rights Officer, Maori Students’ Officer and Pacific Island Students’ Officer and such impositions as Womenspace, Hineahuone (‘Maorispace’) and Cultural Space.
I used to get annoyed about having to fund such policies. "Why should I?" I would think. "I haven’t violated anybody’s rights." Taking my money by force (under compulsory student membership) and spending it in such a way treated me as a means to someone else’s ends, rather than with the respect every individual is owed. The inability of my peers to speak up publicly and name it as racism and the ability of others to defend it unreservedly only served to further fuel my fire.
Yet there is more to this issue. White guys are not the only ones being discriminated against. The mentality outlined above holds that I am an oppressor by virtue of my gender and race and that my sexual and racial victims need a spokesman (oops! spokesperson) to represent them all and a space to get away from people like me to express their same views. The view also holds that all women, all Maori and Pacific Islanders have the same fundamental beliefs about reality, the same values and anxieties and this is discrimination, plain and simple.
This discrimination is held to be a move in the right direction, a move away from the misanthropy of racism, sexism and other bigotry yet it serves only to further entrench bigoted views. It is poison, offered as cure. Aside from the resentment that develops in those who are characterised as oppressors and pay the price of special treatment for their ‘victims’, aside from the individuals of the ‘victim’ groups whose qualifications are treated with suspicion because they may have been set a lower standard or received some advantage, this argument further contributes to ill-feeling.
The nature of the oppression of women and racial minorities is the rejection of individualism. In failing to identify and treat a woman, a Maori or a Pacific Islander as an individual and to evaluate that person based on the content of his character, the real bigots engage in collectivism. Similarly, the irrational classing of individuals as alleged oppressors because of their gender and racial characteristics is bigoted. Man or woman, Maori or Pakeha, gay, straight or whatever, each and every single one of us is an individual.
As individuals we have different tastes, opinions and ideas. We may share some ideas with those like us and this may be because we shared similar experiences growing up and have been influenced by similar ideas. We each, however, have free will and can accept or reject the ideas we are presented with. We can also develop new ideas and theories, regardless of our gender or race.
Just because an individual is white does not mean he likes classical music or punk music or heavy metal. Just because an individual is Maori does not mean he likes rap. Yet theories advocating such things as "culture spaces" evade such facts and treat individuals as fungible parts of an amorphous whole – their race.
Just because an individual is male does not mean he thinks women are brainless, incapable of great things on a level playing field and only worthy of making the coffee, cooking and doing housework. Just because an individual is female does not mean she thinks of men as oppressors and as bigoted misogynists who cannot think outside the subjects of rugby, cars and sex.
This may seem obvious but the justification for things like cultural space, racial quotas and double standards in hiring, enrolment or welfare spending and for theories on Cultural Relativism, Feminist Logic and Aryan Instinct rely on the evasion of such truths.
If we want a world free from discrimination it is reality and, as a corollary, individualism we must embrace. Such a cultural sea change would lead us to political (i.e. real) freedom and then we would really see some diversity worth celebrating.
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