Integration, multiculturalism etc.

Very few groups of people over the years have moved elsewhere and discarded their culture to solely and totally imbibe the culture of their host. It is the reason we see towns in the US, Australia, Canada and other places named after towns in the UK and it is the reason you see similarities in the culture of those countries compared to the place they migrated from. So, nothing new there.

The present challenge, which everyone is keen to blame on one thing or the other, is actually a very unfortunate set of circumstances, which in the UK for instance, dates back to the late 1950s and 60s when we needed a fair volume of cheap labour and we reached out to the colonised and previously colonised nations, offering them jobs here in the UK. They came in their droves, and you had families with both parents having to work round the clock to survive (setting aside all the other issues that generation faced, which is very well documented); their kids received very little attention as the parents were at work, round the clock. The children then had to attend schools where the discipline (usually corporal punishment) they were accustomed to back in the Caribbean and other places, no longer applied, and they found themselves in a very unfamiliar system, where the could get away with virtually anything – and the teachers were not at all used to dealing with kids from those circumstances – with little consequence. They were harshly measured against the existing system, which was in place for British kids who had a family support network (grandma & grandpa nanny service etc., which helped the parents free up time) and the immigrant kids simply couldn’t cope and didn’t measure up and the system gave up on them. It is such as sad & unfortunate situation. Yes, a handful of determined kids made it through and against all odds went on to achieve something in a tough system that simply wasn’t fit for purpose.

Multiculturalism in the basic sense of it, is not what has failed. It is the inability (dating back decades) of society and government to have recognised the predicament that immigrants being brought in, we’re going to face, and perhaps trying to find a system that would work for them. Instead, it appears it was easier to demonise them and society gave up on them. Today, we are facing the brunt of that situation yet again, with knife crimes etc., and again, the reaction appears to be the same, we haven’t learnt anything. We trot out statistics about how many minorities are in jail and commit crimes and how many parts of the country is now a cesspit and we demonstrate they are areas t where immigrants have settled. I have also been guilty over the years for a lack of understanding of why immigrants would litter or do things that were perhaps acceptable where they’re from, instead of immediately imbibing what we do here etc. It is all just such an unfortunate vicious cycle. We now have a major problem on our hands, even as more immigrants come in, be it legally or illegally. They will again face the same vicious cycle; those that secure jobs will be working round the clock, while their children run amock on our streets and we’ll start chalking up the statistics on knife crimes etc, yet again.

Kindness is probably the only lasting solution. I understand the anger of right-wing folk and others in the country who do not wish to spend another penny on hotels for refugees etc., but we must find some kindness deep down, to try to end this cycle. It is cutting off one’s nose to spite one’s face, if we continue down this same old road yet again. It may be too late to impact the current predicament of knife crime etc., but why compound it? We must find kindness in our hearts, to try to deal with this situation, even if we cannot undo the past and that generational nightmare that has led to the kids and grandkids of the generation that moved here in the 1950s and 60s full of resentment and stuck in poverty, while we label them as drug-dealers etc. and bang as many of them as possible in prisons. One can only feel saddened by the situation. Is there a solution? heaven knows…..