Controversies over Race - Part 2

A number of dilemmas and controversies that arise in relation to how society addresses issues of racial and cultural grouping will be discussed.

Questions and dilemmas to discuss

Is it ethically unacceptable for a country to refuse refugees that come from a culture whose prescriptions are not compatible with the country's values?

Different reasons are given by people that are opposed to accepting asylum seekers and who want harsh anti-refugee policies such as those of the Abbott government. Some are clearly silly and just counter-factual, such as 'they are clogging up the roads and causing traffic jams in Western Sydney' and 'They are taking away our jobs'. In other cases concerns are expressed specifically about Muslim refugees, in relation to fears that an increasing proportion of Muslims in the electorate could eventually lead to Islamic laws or cultural expectations being imposed on the descendants of current citizens. In Australia that seems a very remote prospect, with Muslims making up only 2.2% of the population at last census. In Western European countries the proportions are higher at around 4-5%, and it is 8% in France. There has been considerably more social unrest about Muslim immigration in those countries. France continues to have controversy over issues such as girls wearing Muslim head scarves to school, given a 2004 French law that forbids the wearing of conspicuous religious symbols in state institutions.

Here's an article by Christian Tsiolkas in which he gives his views about the reasons for where Australian attitudes to asylum seekers: 'Why Australia hates asylum seekers' (mid-length article: 6,000 words)

https://www.themonthly.com.au/

Could concern about the long-term influence of a growing Muslim population on social policy, law and culture ever be a valid reason to seek to minimise acceptance of Muslim refugees?

Should countries have entirely open borders?

PJ O'Rourke, an acerbic humorist and novelist, is generally regarded as 'right-wing' although he is really a Libertarian. He demonstrated that being 'right-wing' doesn't necessarily mean being anti-immigration a few years back in a Q&A discussion of immigration in which he memorably said, when asked what his policy would be 'Let them in. Let them all in, the more the merrier'. His explanation of why he thought that was longer and I only remember bits. The general impression was that he thought they would be a stimulus to productivity.

Most left-leaning Australians abhor the government's treatment of asylum seekers. But it's not easy to come up with an obviously acceptable policy to deal with the tragedy of displaced refugees and fugitives from tyranny. Perhaps in Australia it would be manageable if we had completely open borders, since we have no land borders with any countries that are sources. It is quite different in Europe and the US, which has direct land connections to countries that are far less well off.

What do you think? Should we have any constraints at all on immigration? If so, what should they be?

Can it ever be acceptable for a country to try to maintain a monoculture?

There are plenty of countries that try to aim for this, that are roundly condemned, such as many African countries, Fiji (suppression of Indians) and Malaysia (suppression of Chinese), China. Nearly all examples are of poor countries though. Westerners tend to be reluctantly accepting (though critical) of the racism of such policies on the grounds that (arguably) one cannot expect a struggling developing country to be as open and tolerant as an affluent developed one.

The stark exception to this is Japan, which is reported to have 98.5% of its population being ethnically Japanese, with almost all the remainder being temporarily resident foreign nationals. While the Japanese government officially has policies against racial discrimination, it accepts almost no refugees and makes immigration very difficult.

Japan's ostensible reasons for not accepting refugees avoid mentioning race (see here, here and here). But it is hard to imagine that either race or culture is not behind the policy when one looks at the centuries-old tradition of xenophobia in Japan, reaching its highest point in the policy of Sakoku that forbade any foreigner entering Japan between 1639 and 1853, under penalty of death.

If such a policy were expressed as an aim for cultural harmony and avoiding inter-ethnic tensions, could it ever be defensible?

Can the booing of Adam Goodes be reasonably interpreted as anything other than racial prejudice? Even if it can, does it remain unacceptable?

Most of those that have tried to explain the booing as something other than racial prejudice have been the usual cardboard cutout right-wing bigots, like Andrew Bolt or Alan Jones. There are some exceptions though. I was very surprised to see an ABC sports commentator suggest to the newsreader in one of those on-camera 'informal' discussions that the booing was 'not about race'. From what I recall of the newsreader's perplexed expression, she was as surprised as me.

Waleed Aly thinks the booing is a racist reaction to an Aborigine not 'knowing his place'. That is, he thinks we're only happy to be nice to minorities as long as they are deferential and don't make waves.

Stan Grant is less judgemental. He doesn't claim to know why the booing occurs. He just explains what it feels like as an indigenous person being on the receiving end of that sort of treatment.

The 'genocide' label

There is a good deal of academic debate over whether the massacre of indigenous peoples in the colonisation of Australia, North and South America should be called 'genocide', which is a word first invented in 1944 with respect to the Nazi treatment of Jews. Some people think that it should only be applied to very specific, narrowly-defined sets of circumstances, and that the killing of indigenous people by colonialists generally does not qualify. Others disagree.

Do you think it matters whether the word is applied to those events? Does the use of a word matter? If it does matter, should it be applied to them or not?

Is cultural appropriation bad?

White, blonde, Australian rapper Iggy Azalea generated some controversy with her use of a very 'black' sound to reach the top of the rap charts in the US. This article roundly criticises her for that. While all cultures appropriate styles from other cultures, there seems to be a point at which that becomes unacceptable if the imitation is too close and the imitated culture is a disadvantaged one.

An earlier example of this is Elvis Presley, who some see as achieving such stardom because he was the acceptable white imitator of the musical style of Chuck Berry.

What do you think about cultural appropriation? When is it acceptable?

Is it OK to buy golliwogs?

Someone told me she had heard that golliwogs were 'coming back', because they had been out for so long that they had lost the racist associations they used to have. However, many people are still concerned about those associations, as shown in this article.

What do you think, is it OK to buy a golliwog doll? Does it depend on who owns it and how it is used?

Affirmative Action

Under what circumstances is affirmative action appropriate? Is it racist because it makes preferences based on race, or is it anti-racist because it aims to achieve more equal outcomes across races?