Benjamin Herscovitch writes:
“Any genuine liberal democracy will be multicultural: a commitment to liberal rights and freedoms is counterfeit unless it comes with a commitment to cultural diversity. Beyond a corruption of liberalism, the idea of a monolinguistic and monocultural Australia is only plausible if we deny who we are. Australia is Chinese, Indian and Vietnamese just as it is Irish, English and Italian. Multiculturalism is not a collective aspiration; it is not a policy that can be terminated. It is unapologetically an Australian reality.”
Be careful not to throw the baby out with the bath water. Australia’s strength lies in its core values, many of which stem from its Anglo-Celtic past. One of those strengths is an open society that has successfully integrated successive waves of immigrants into mainstream Australian culture. Our culture has been enriched by the experience.
A unified society requires a cohesive set of values to which everyone subscribes — no matter their ethnic background, language or religion. We should celebrate our ethnic and cultural diversity but not use multiculturalism as an excuse for failing to properly assimilate some minorities. We need to be tolerant of diversity but intolerant of anything that conflicts with our core values of fairness and tolerance. To act otherwise would be simply un-Australian.
A cultural revolution to celebrate | The Centre for Independent Studies.