This is a short video by one of the greatest minds of our time. When you listen to Thomas Sowell discuss the German/Czech culture clash it isn’t hard at all to make correlations to exactly what some in this country are attempting to do via ignorance or malice or maybe a combination of both.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: stickman428,

It annoys me to no end when I hear afro-american, Asian American,insert country-American. You're just an American, your race or country of origin does not matter. Are you my brother or not, and do you believe in America's founding principles or not?

stickman, thank you for posting that.
My wife and I were discussing this issue today. I can give at least two more recent examples off the top of my head where political ideologues fostered ethnic conflict for their own purposes that led to horrible wars and many thousands of deaths: Yugoslavia and Rwanda.

In both cases, neighbor turned against neighbor; you will recall stories from Sarajevo of people who had lived in peace for their entire lives turning on one another. My recollection is that it was Milosevic of Serbia who was most responsible for stirring this up.

In Rwanda, a civil war initiated by the mostly Tutsi Rwandan Patriotic Front led later to the Hutu leaders calling for the murder of Tutsis, leading the murder of 500-800,000 Tutsis, and an estimated 250,000 to 500,000 women raped.

I hadn't known the history behind the Czech-German ethnic dispute (although I should have!); but I have spoken with ethnic Germans left behind in Romania who could not get jobs, etc. and lived in quite dire poverty, just because of their German nationality.

In the early 90's our local school board had an open meeting to discuss a proposed multicultural curriculum for the schools. I spoke against it, using the counterexample of Yugoslavia compared with our own success in assimilation of minorities. Of course the decision was already made and anything we said made no difference.

Come to think of it, I also gave a talk at my very leftist Cal State alma mater when I was "distinguished alumnus", advocating assimilation rather than ethnic division.

quote:

Originally posted by sjtill:
In the early 90's our local school board had an open meeting to discuss a proposed multicultural curriculum for the schools.

That's when it began up in these parts as well. High Schools put it in their curricula and colleges began requiring a multicultural elective for graduation.

Once again, the commies playing the long game. Many of us saw it back then, but too many didn't.

Sowell summarizes one example of an historical argument against social Justice and divisive politics.

See my signature line. I've been using it for years.

Thomas Sowell es el jefe!

“Focus on ethnic differences as a fundamental basis for social and political arrangements seems to intensify ethnic separatism and mutual hostility.”
— Donald Kagan, On the Origins of War and the Preservation of Peace (New York: Anchor Books, 1995), 293.

Despite his unfortunately limited impact on society as a whole, Thomas Sowell is one of the very few people whose inevitable passing I truly dread.

quote:

Originally posted by Skins2881:
It annoys me to no end when I hear afro-american, Asian American,insert country-American. You're just an American, your race or country of origin does not matter. Are you my brother or not, and do you believe in America's founding principles or not?

Former President Theodore Roosevelt in speaking to the largely Irish Catholic Knights of Columbus at Carnegie Hall on Columbus Day 1915, asserted that, There is no room in this country for hyphenated Americanism.

...and he was right.

Down in Omaha there is the American-Italian Society. I asked one time why they put the American in front of the Italian when no one else does when using hyphenated identities. I was told by an old guy “because we are Americans first”. I don’t have a problem w/ it when it is that way.

When I think about five people I would like to have dinner with Thomas Sowell always makes that list.