Diversity: crap?

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If diversity is crap, then nationalism is worse, isn't it? Why stop at getting rid of racial, cultural, or religious identity...let's just all be people. Not American, or German, or Chinese, or Canadian, or Iraqi...just people.

Wars are fought over nationalism...a lot more harmful than a little cultural diversity I'd say.
 
Bluer White said:
I think the disappearing American identity has everything to do with family structure changing.

What was the divorce rate 50 years ago compared to today? The percentage of unwed mothers? Did mom have a fulltime job 50 years ago, or was she a homemaker who had a sitdown dinner waiting for the family every night?

This definition of the "American identity" is always based on some fleeting romanticist fantasy of the 1950s, which, in the larger scheme of American culture, was an insignificant decade not representative of this nation whatsoever.

And if the 1950s was such the ideal, then why did it explode so ingloriously only a decade later? That's because, unless you were a white Protestant heterosexual male, the 1950s weren't a paradise at all.

The divorce rate is higher than it was 50 years ago, because women, specifically, are no longer interested in being in a wholly subordinate position to unappreciative, abusive, or lazy husbands. I often think that marriage, as an institution, has been failing, because its most ardent supporters refuse to acknowledge the modern reality of marriage being an equal partnership. Instead, you've got religious fanatics who think marriage has failed, because women aren't submissive enough to their husbands or because gay people want to get married.

As for "Mom having a fulltime job," look at the dramatic change in our economy since the 1950s. Most families--and remember that "most families" back then and even today are not college educated--cannot afford to live on one income alone. As for those who are highly educated? Well, when you've racked up tens of thousands of dollars in student loan debt, can you really afford to stay home and raise children?

This reality is more in line with the "American identity" than that unrealistic decade after WWII. After all, only a few decades prior to the 1950s, many Americans worked seven days a week--children included--for very little money and no labor protections. And since the "American identity" since the 1980s has been all about deregulation and a steady erosion of labor laws, I don't think we should be all that surprised by what we see in our country today.
 
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