Hyperbole. All that is asked is to respect a list of shared rules without "muh culture" or "muh religion" exceptions, learn the local langauge(s) (and this is where people who already know the language get a head-start), and to become involved in the local life (making friends who can vouch for you, being part of local groups, participate in local politics, all in a productive fashion) if you want to become a citizen. Equal rules and equal standards for all. Honkey Americans who have had permanent residence in Switzerland for 40 years but haven't even bothered to learn the names of the villages which surround their place of residence get rejected, too.Brive1987 wrote: ↑ There isn’t a simple single solution to rebuilding a culturally intact state.
However immigration, integration and economic strength aren’t exclusive concepts. Why Switzerland is one of Europe’s strongest ethnostates despite matching Australia for 30% foreign born population. Wow. All they did was make sure the vast majority of migrants were culturally aligned and then they apparently subject them to North Korea level integration sessions.
The weaknesses of Anglo nations are double standards, special concessions, relaxing rules for a group because of some reason. In the UK, for example, this means publicly recognized religious courts (an insane idea, which goes against the principle that the law should be equal for everyone). I don't know enough about Australia, but it's possible that there are similar loopholes against common, shared rules because of the old "it's against my religion/culture" excuse.
And nobody accused Switzerland of being a fascist ethnostate for that reason. Well, nobody influential at least. So what's stopping Australia from changing its immigration rules? You don't even have any deals with the EU.Switzerland has also led the game narrowly voting in a couple of nifty initiatives.
In February 2014, the federal popular initiative "against mass immigration" was accepted. The referendum aimed to reduce immigration through quotas and limits the freedom of movement between Switzerland and the European Union.
In November 2010, the people's initiative for the deportation of criminal foreigners was adopted. Following the approval of the proposal, foreigners convicted of certain offenses or who were paid illegally social insurance benefits or social assistance lose the right of residence and are expelled from Switzerland.
Because honkey foreign criminals get the boot, too. Because those rules aren't based on race.Note, these initiatives haven’t stopped Switzerland from belonging to the Wetsern Liberal Democracy club. In fact I’m not aware of a single UN resolution condemning the place for casual racism.
I think that the only proposals which look questionable in your list are "cultural markers" and a "cultural religion". But it depends on how they're implemented: if the "cultural markers" are more about fluency in English/degrees/qualifications, and the "cultural religion" is more about liberal democratic values (so treating all citizens respectfully, respecting rules of law, accepting secular separation of church and state, accepting freedom of speech without pandering to "offended feelings", etc) then the plan doesn't seem too bad.For Australia a couple of bloody obvious options would be:
Develop a standard of living strategy that doesn’t involve a never ending stuffing of people into Melbourne and Sydney to simply keep the fires burning.
Reduce immigration to 70K pa
Reintroduce cultural markers as primary criteria for applicants.
Reassert a nominal culturally based religion for swearing in, Christmas messages etc.
Cut funding to culturally unaligned institutions like Islamic schools
Rewrite the curriculum to positively reflect heritage, history and traditional institutions.
Massively improve baby incentives - tax cuts, bonus and child care subs
Have a one day of the year where alien cultures are recognised otherwise FiFo
Introduce civic service for civic benefits
Etc etc.
"Equal rules for everyone with no exceptions" is the gold standard you should be promoting. The problem with "multiculturalism", loosely defined, is that it allows room for special concessions, exceptions, loopholes, etc. which undermine equality before the law. One example of this are "hate speech" laws, which are a loophole that (for example) muslim theocrats use to stifle criticism of islam. Another example is the idea that there's "no such thing as Australian/Swiss/Host Country culture" but that the cultures of immigrants are real and important. That's a double standard: either no culture is important or all cultures are. And so on, and so forth.
Integration is based on saying "those are the laws and principles of the land, everybody who lives here has to obey them or face consequences, and if you don't know how or why, we'll teach you". I don't see why "western" liberal democracies can't adhere to this principle and still be (by virtue of being liberal democracies) lightyears better than theocratic or authoritarian clusterfucks.
The problem is that for some people the idea of making everyone respect the same laws and principles is "oppressive" for some reason, mostly because they assume that some groups are Eternal Victims and can't be expected to follow a common set of rules. We see it on a small scale with third wave feminism, where "activists" whine that poor women are "oppressed" by being called sexy or attractive ("objectification!") but can call men hunks or nice pieces of meat with no repercussions whatsoever. That's a clear and obnoxious double standard, but when you say so you're accused of being "sexist", "misogynistic" or other slurs.
The notions of Eternal Victimhood and Eternal Guilt are a big obstacle to equal standards, because if someone is always a victim and someone else is always an oppressor then it's easy to argue that equal standards are actually a form of discrimination, and the Eternal Victims permanently need help to "catch up" in the forms of loopholes, special concessions, being treated with kid's gloves, being "protected" by "allies" and never being assumed to be personally responsible and able to make their own choices, etc.
You don't need an "ethnostate". You need to stop feeling guilty about enforcing the same rules for everyone. Another example, one that is very relevant to the nature of the Pit as a secularist/atheist board: secular groups should treat islam like they treat Christianity, with the same amount of criticism and mockery, instead of leaving islam alone because "it's the religion of brown people" (which isn't even true) or because "everyone on the Christian right already bashes muslims" (so what? offer better criticism, don't just chicken out for fear of being called a bigot).
Only IF the idea of equal rules for everyone is firmly ingrained in society you can face concrete issues about poverty, inequality of legal representation, police misconduct, lack of healthcare, etc. which are real and create practical inequalities which need to be addressed. But again, the focus should be on equal rights AND equal duties, with no catering to "offended" people and no special loopholes.
