There was a fascinating and frightening Salon/Der Spiegel article yesterday, "Generation Jihad?" (subscription required), concerning the recent wave of riots in and around Paris. It puts the rioting in context with the rest of Europe, where decades-long attempts at multiculturalism and inclusion seem to have failed appallingly, leaving thousands of unintegrated communities, ghettos where Muslims and other minorities are unable to break through economic barriers, where rage and frustration boil and blister. Consider this, then, a companion to my August 16, 2005 blog wherein I wrote of my "deep-seated belief that as human beings, we all have far more in common than the petty little nonsense that divides us, and that we will all be better off when we find ways to live together as people first and Africans/Americans/Asians/Europeans second." In that entry, I considered Jared Diamond's theory as to whether the experience of a politically-unified China is what caused it to fall behind the disparate Europeans, whose political disunity resulted in constant competition and advancement. Perhaps, I mused, my lifelong impulse toward increasing global unity might in fact lead to the stifling creativity and competition. Then I veered off into a weak conclusion, musing about maybe writing a story someday that might deal with the issue fictionally. To hell with that--let's go ahead and ask the difficult questions now. And questions are all I have--answers are far, far away.
Question 1: Must There Be Ghettos? Recently, President Bush has been touting his "guest worker" program for immigrants, in which illegals would be granted three-year work visas, during which time they could apply for--but not necessarily be granted--green cards. (Convenient, isn't it? Get a few years of cheap labor out of someone then ship them back. The cold calculations of immigration policy.) In a radio address last month, Bush said "If an employer has a job that no American is willing to take, we need to find a way to fill that demand." This always struck me as a peculiar notion--why would Americans be so unwilling to take certain jobs? Granted, ditch-digging and sanitation work aren't what you would call glamorous, but are we Americans so inherently Grand that such jobs are beneath us? Or to put it another way, why would an unemployed American be any less likely than an unemployed emigrant to take a dirty job? If you need a job and that's the only thing you can get, why wouldn't you take the job? Buried in President Bush's statement is exactly that implication.
But look around you. Here in L.A., how often are you going to see a crew working on a lawn that isn't Mexican? How many hot, rotten, dirty jobs are filled by people whose skin isn't white, whose language is not English? What is the percentage, exactly? Is it fair to say that in our supposed melting pot of a nation, as many as 80% of our most rotten jobs are being taken by people who are not white anglo-saxon protestants? It raises a very uncomfortable question: for we who live in the "majority," who enjoy the relatively placid life with cars and computers and time to blog our thoughts to the world, must there be a wretched underclass laboring to do the jobs that, in fact, we wouldn't do in a million years?
If my power goes out I want it fixed pronto; if the cable TV goes kerflooey I want it back right now before Lost comes on; I want my new book from Amazon to arrive in 24 hours; if nearby tree roots again invade my plumbing, I want it taken care of before my next flush; and I want all this to happen invisibly so as not to disturb my tranquil little life--or my blogging time.
But I wouldn't take those jobs, precisely because I don't have to. I'm fond of saying that my life hasn't been peaches and cream, that we were on food stamps (briefly) when I was a kid, that I'm miles from rich now. But I would not be a sanitation worker in a million years, and I've got the education and the background to make damn sure that I don't ever have to. Let's leave aside the question of whether I am inherently more or less capable than anyone else: I'm a good typist, I've got decent organizational skills, and if I walk into an office as a presentable WASPy guy with a Bachelor's degree, I will get the job. Change only one part of that equation, make me a recently-arrived Mexican with the same typing and organizational skills, with an equivalent degree, and my chances of getting that job are seriously diminished. Utterly unfair, but a fact of life. How many Eastern bloc émigrés who were once doctors in the old country are now driving cabs?
Question 2: Do the Parisian Riots Mean We're All Doomed? The Salon/Der Spiegel article asserts that the suburban center of the riots, Clichy-sous-Bois, "serves as evidence that the French route of soft integration has failed miserably." Its mayor, Claude Dilain, "has been a proactive mayor, setting up free soccer training for local youth, appointing youth leaders as mediators and making sure that the community's waste collection service functions properly.... By any measure, Dilain has done everything right." Yet his city is aflame night after night, as rioters, mostly immigrants or the children of immigrants from North Africa and sub-Saharan Africa, assert their anger over their overwhelming lack of economic prospects. The article quotes a police officer as saying "The logic behind this unrest...is secession."
There was a smaller-scale riot in Birmingham, England recently; the London bombers seemed to be well-integrated children of immigrants; even in Amsterdam, friendly, laid-back, pot-smoking Amsterdam, where 1 out of 10 Dutch citizens was born somewhere else, quiet racial and economic divisions have been festering under the surface of what was supposedly the most liberal, culturally-advanced nation in the European Union; and since the murder of filmmaker Theo Van Gogh last year there have so far been 106 "reciprocal acts of revenge" against Dutch Muslims. The question has to be asked: if the Dutch can't pull off cultural integration, is there any reason to think we can?
Question 3: The Breeding Problem. No liberal likes to talk about population patterns because it sounds uncomfortably like advocacy of eugenics. But I know for a fact that in Miami, the majority population is Cuban, and if you want a job there you would be very well advised to learn Spanish. Now mostly these are Americanized Cubans, and as a native of the city I don't think the way of life is really all that different than it was 30 years ago; but there are subtle differences, and as time passes there is no reason to expect those differences to diminish.
But what if our Cuban neighbors in Miami weren't so well integrated? What if there were just as many and they were really truly pissed off about economic hardships? If our majority population ever decided to rise up in revolt as these French Arabs have done, what would happen to the City of Miami? Would it in effect secede, as the French policeman asserted? Might it not be argued that here in L.A., there are parts of town that are effectively independent, where the police do not go? Both L.A. and Miami have seen riots, big nasty powerful riots. And who's to say that one of these days, the residents of Watts and Compton won't have the numbers and the strength to really make their voices heard?
Well then, we say, we would just have to find a way to do a better job of welcoming these people into the broader population, just as the French are going to have to do. But admit it: doesn't the prospect make you just a teeny bit nervous? It's nice being part of the majority; and are you really prepared to make room in the club for those guys standing on the street corner looking for day work? Not just one or two, here and there; but in their thousands, all of them wanting a little of what you have.
If you run with Jared Diamond's argument, all this is, in the long run, good for us: population, cultural and economic competition lead to a greater rate of innovation and advancement for everyone. Modern ghettos are hell-holes to be sure (I have stark memories of Chicago's Cabrini-Green, a place I drove past often but never ever went inside), but at least there is running water and electricity, yes? Surely that represents some kind of progress, doesn't it? Can we comfort ourselves that modern ghettos are better than the older ones? That even if progress for everyone is slow (glacially slow; geologically slow), still it's progress, so we're not ultimately doomed. The short-term, though, it doesn't look as comfortable as we might like it to.
As I said: lots of questions, and I'm nowhere near an answer on any of it. I have no conclusions to offer, nothing to wrap this up, just a growing sense of unease and ever more questions.
No comments:
Post a Comment