Archetypal outriders.
The conflict over Kashmir between Pakistan and India is surging through the veins of young and old Pakistanis and Indians here in this country. The tribal affiliation, which we who are indigenous to this country, people who's parents and grandparents and great grandparents who predate the influx of people into this country and who are constantly asked to forgo their own tribal allegiance and acquiesce to some sort of new world configuration when all around them, the product of tribal thinking is still strong and growing
The sociologists who's project this 'multi cultural experiment' is fail to see the absurdity of asking the majority to lay aside their cultural preference for blood relatives for a wider, multi ethnic collaboration when they see such patriotic fervour exhibited by the newcomers amongst themselves. Can we, at the call of the social anthropologist reinvigorate ourselves to fall in love with all mankind, irrespective of if he or she declines to do so. Scientific experiments especially social ones often fail, even more so if the experiments are politically motivated. The will of the people is hard to subsume even if the financial rewards for the few are high and much of the future trouble the world is storing up for itself is that that the 'winners' in the globalisation of the world are becoming fewer and fewer?
Perhaps the Mad Max Movies capture the future well as the rich withdraw into their gated communities and the rest wild eyed and demented, arm themselves to murder in an attempt to survive.
Of course the current wave of child exploitation by gangs and the rise of knife crime seems to have a predominant racial bias, young men who are confused by their religious teaching whilst living in a society which largely casts aside religion. Alienation between the cultural values of home and the apparent sale of any lingering cultural affinity by the locals. . The arguments about the lack of a male role figures and the self segregation into ethnic ghetto lifestyles which also are determined by racial stereotyping, which only seems to question the benefits of, or lack thereof, of the push to mix.
The prophets of this promised land of ethnic conformity without the inherent tension between the groups have a lot to answer for. No great educational process, just a push to mix as quickly as possible and see how it works out. It's rarely a problem on the one to one individual level, it's only when the crowd of like faces gets together to swap notes that common threads are discovered and prejudice alights it's venomous comparisons.
The people who felt it their duty to concoct this brave new world, the politicians, doing as they always do, paying service to the needs of their paymasters, big business. That moment in time when cheap labour was needed as a substitute for proper investment and training, so why not import the malleable low skill labour from far off countries who made up the Empire. They wouldn't be missed and weren't likely to graduate to the industrial representative bodies such as the Unions and far from home, un-represented were chaff in the hands of exploitive employers.
That was then and now we have a a largely ghettoised, racially aware cohort who feel resentment for their plight, living a life alien to that which still flows through the veins of their relatives in Islamabad or Mumbai, Dhaka, Kingston or Port of Spain. Is it any wonder they draw together like a crowd in the members stand at Lords, to reminisce and find so much in common. Is it any wonder they find in their common affinity the need to reinforce it with a display of arrogance towards the grey uncaring folk around.
Our history is littered with under investment in people. We segregate the rich and the poor in our schooling system, relegating the largest number to failure and struggle whilst the others travel a different road through life. Is any wonder that our folk heroes are Robin Hood, and Dick Turpin, the archetypal outriders who struck at the rich and powerful in desperation.
The sociologists who's project this 'multi cultural experiment' is fail to see the absurdity of asking the majority to lay aside their cultural preference for blood relatives for a wider, multi ethnic collaboration when they see such patriotic fervour exhibited by the newcomers amongst themselves. Can we, at the call of the social anthropologist reinvigorate ourselves to fall in love with all mankind, irrespective of if he or she declines to do so. Scientific experiments especially social ones often fail, even more so if the experiments are politically motivated. The will of the people is hard to subsume even if the financial rewards for the few are high and much of the future trouble the world is storing up for itself is that that the 'winners' in the globalisation of the world are becoming fewer and fewer?
Perhaps the Mad Max Movies capture the future well as the rich withdraw into their gated communities and the rest wild eyed and demented, arm themselves to murder in an attempt to survive.
Of course the current wave of child exploitation by gangs and the rise of knife crime seems to have a predominant racial bias, young men who are confused by their religious teaching whilst living in a society which largely casts aside religion. Alienation between the cultural values of home and the apparent sale of any lingering cultural affinity by the locals. . The arguments about the lack of a male role figures and the self segregation into ethnic ghetto lifestyles which also are determined by racial stereotyping, which only seems to question the benefits of, or lack thereof, of the push to mix.
The prophets of this promised land of ethnic conformity without the inherent tension between the groups have a lot to answer for. No great educational process, just a push to mix as quickly as possible and see how it works out. It's rarely a problem on the one to one individual level, it's only when the crowd of like faces gets together to swap notes that common threads are discovered and prejudice alights it's venomous comparisons.
The people who felt it their duty to concoct this brave new world, the politicians, doing as they always do, paying service to the needs of their paymasters, big business. That moment in time when cheap labour was needed as a substitute for proper investment and training, so why not import the malleable low skill labour from far off countries who made up the Empire. They wouldn't be missed and weren't likely to graduate to the industrial representative bodies such as the Unions and far from home, un-represented were chaff in the hands of exploitive employers.
That was then and now we have a a largely ghettoised, racially aware cohort who feel resentment for their plight, living a life alien to that which still flows through the veins of their relatives in Islamabad or Mumbai, Dhaka, Kingston or Port of Spain. Is it any wonder they draw together like a crowd in the members stand at Lords, to reminisce and find so much in common. Is it any wonder they find in their common affinity the need to reinforce it with a display of arrogance towards the grey uncaring folk around.
Our history is littered with under investment in people. We segregate the rich and the poor in our schooling system, relegating the largest number to failure and struggle whilst the others travel a different road through life. Is any wonder that our folk heroes are Robin Hood, and Dick Turpin, the archetypal outriders who struck at the rich and powerful in desperation.
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