Today, the new religion of multiculturalism represents a serious danger. It removes some disincentives for not assimilating, even discouraging it. It provides an ideology of group identities, complete with a “grievances” and demands.
Welfare and other social benefits only add to the problem, allowing migrants (or far more likely, their children) to avoid the forced assimilation that a requirement to work presents.
To be an American is to share the spirit and inherited cultural values of America. Even too many native “Americans” these days have lost this in their multiculturalist and transnational confusion.
I grew up in 1950′s New Mexico, a consciously multicultural American society. Spanish was required to be taught in grade school (as a secondary language) We celebrated the contributions to our culture of the Native Americans, Spanish and Mexicans; but, we were all Americans. We shared the dreams and the culture, even as we swung at pinatas or watched the luminarias on Christmas eve.
This is what we need today. I have met many immigrants from Mexico who want to be Americans – who share the desire, who work hard, and want their children to share the American dream. I also work with some Europeans who don’t even understand the concept of national identity – so brainwashed by transnational idealism that they cannot understand that America has something of value to be preserved beyond our economy.
The danger is not so much immigration as the lack of a strong ideology of assimilation; the lack of expectations for migrants to become true Americans; the divisive lures of multiculturalism; and, the lack of confidence in Americanism by too many native born Americans.
