The goal of the social liberals seems to have turned from racial equality to racial diversity. Now, this happened several decades ago, but most people don't seem to have even realized it.
Why? A new synonym for equality has been put forth: diversity. Their definitions, however are quite different.
Equality: rights, treatment, quantity, or value equal to all others in a given group
Diversity: ethnic variety, as well as socioeconomic and gender variety, in a group, society, or institution
Encarta ® World English Dictionary ©
The argument for this merging of concepts is that equality follows diversity. Right. The school busings of the 60's should have showed us that that assumption is false. Politicians decided that the best way to equalize the schools was not to improve the poorer performing black schools and redraw attendance boundaries without regard to race, but to bus black kids across town to white schools, and white kids to black schools. Black kids were still treated poorly, but now they were being treated badly while with white children, as if them attending the same school made them better.
The proper assumption is that diversity will follow equality. Make people equal, and society will be less fragmented and more diverse. You see, as prejudices, hatred, and barriers to political and other activity are torn down, people on both sides will be more willing to mingle with those of different races. At the very least, equality should be the primary focus, with diversity being a secondary goal.
But that is not the thinking of today's political and educational elite. Now, diversity is the shining crown jewel of social liberalism. Teachers and politicians gush about the great gains they have made in diversity, never once mentioning equality or fairness. Equality is possible without diversity, believe it or not.
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It seems that the definition of diversity is taking a negative tone. Equality and diversity are different things, so they SHOULD be explained differently in school. Diversity is only a positive thing when it means allowing other ethnicities and cultures to differ from your own, and being able to accept those differences. I hope I explained this well enough.
I think you are taking a rather dramatically one-sided view of the reasons behind and the process of desegregation, but that's a tangent that I will leave for the moment. I also think that the merging of diversity and equality is not so foreign to the core and original concepts of our founding fathers as you seem to suggest. For example, here we have the words of our first President, George Washington, who said...
This is a clear recognition that our founders not only understood, but valued the diversity of our early citizenry. And not only that, but a recognition of the idea that this diversity should not in any way stand as an obstacle to the concepts of freedom and equality.
percivale
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"cdesign proponentsists" - (LINK)
I love the link, lol.
Nicholas Aden
Self-Promotion
I never suggested that diversity is un-American, or that desegregation was bad, only that the extremes that government went to promote diversity rather than equality were outrageous. And diversity is a central theme of our nation's history, but equality is even more so.
"A government big enough to give you everything you want is big enough to take everything you have." - Barry Goldwater
"... the ostensible means [diversity] of acheiving a desired end had become the end itself." - Clarence Thomas
Equality and diversity are mutually compatable and separate goals.
They both deal with race, although diversity also deals with culture.
Are you against either?
Why?
If people were only treated equally when they joined a unified culture that would be equality without diversity.
I am not against diversity or equality. I am simply for equality first, before diversity. Equality and diversity are not independent, they are connected. However, that does not mean that one equals the other. Also, equality does deal with culture; for example, compare two black families. One might be Baptist and from the deep South, while the other might be Muslim, and recently emigrated from North Africa. Suppose that their skin tones are exactly the same, and they have the same ancestry. They are still different, and equality would protect both of their beliefs and ways of life.
I never suggested that people should have to give up their beliefs or cultures to "join a unified culture". I said that when race, ethnicity, etc. are not taken into account, then diversity will flourish. Besides, people are inherently diverse, not merely their cultures.
"A government big enough to give you everything you want is big enough to take everything you have." - Barry Goldwater
"... the ostensible means [diversity] of acheiving a desired end had become the end itself." - Clarence Thomas
Everyone must realize that even people have problems getting along even with help
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