Does America Embrace Diversity?

Flip through the pages of the New Trier year book and it seems obvious that we celebrate diversity at our school. Indo Pak, Filipino Club, and Chinese culture club are just a few of the ethnic organizations we take so much pride in sponsoring. And throughout (most of) America's history, people across the world have idolized our country as a place that welcomes all and opens up all kinds of doors that can only lead to a prosperous and happy future. But rather than instantly living the "American Dream," jumping into mainstream America, the vast majority of immigrants would move to slums to live with others of the same nationality, hence creating China towns, German towns, etc., throughout the country. But if America, and even New Trier, truly embrace diversity, why do foreigners seem to feel they must always stick with their own people? Obviously there were significant barriers, especially language, that immigrants faced and continue to face upon arrival at the U.S., which make instantly joining mainstream America virtually impossible. However, that does not explain why those who have grown up in America and speak English as a first language continue to associate themselves with others of their background. In the movie Mean Girls, as Lindsay Lohan's friend explains their school's cliques, she points out the cool Asians, Asian nerds, and cool black kids, to name a few. It seems that while we celebrate the idea of having a diverse population, it is instinctive that as individuals, we tend to stick with people of similar backgrounds; thus, having a segregated society is inevitable.


I found an article that discusses some of the psychology of this pattern. The author writes "On the one hand it is a frequent observation that individuals find it difficult to identify with a massive and monolithic society or state; individual identities are frequently hyphenated. The social fragmentations which serve as objects of identification can be based upon regional, ethnic, linguistic, racial, class, sex or age cleavages. Whatever their basis, and whatever their manifestation, it is not possible to deny the pervasive existence of these divisions. Pan-cultural universals such as this may best be interpreted as being rooted in some general human psychological need and the one postulated here is the need for some relatively small and stable reference and identity group."


We cannot help but want to stick to a smaller clique, one where we have much in common with others and can easily relate to them. Being with people who are similar to ourselves helps strengthen our own sense of identity because we get a better understanding of who we are through interacting with those who we believe are similar to ourselves. Our population as a whole may be diverse, but our cliques most often are not. It is in our nature to stick with our own kind, and so rather than always pushing foreigners to assimilate, we ought to accept our cultural differences and try to let immigrants live their own version of the American Dream, whatever that may be. The best, most realistic way to embrace diversity is to accept and embrace differences among ourselves. One question we have considered during this unit is whether or not we embrace diversity in America, and I think that while we cannot expect everyone of every race to live in one happy integrated society, we should embrace diversity by allowing American citizens, regardless of their background, to embrace their ethnicity, to allow their ethnicity to remain an important part of their identity, rather than pushing them to assimilate and ignore their background to better fit in with white mainstream America. So while embracing diversity does not mean we must fully integrate ourselves with those of differing backgrounds, it can mean that we continue to appreciate cultures that immigrants bring to America, and that we put less emphasis on pushing them to assimilate.

The Nuclear Dominoes

After discussing the Domino Theory, the U.S. policy of the 50's that promoted the belief that if one country came under the influence of communism, its neighboring countries would soon follow, it seems to me that today, we are living amidst a real domino effect when it comes to nations possessing nuclear arms. North Korea and Iran are both (likely) struggling to build nuclear programs against the will of the United States and the international community, and why? One of the most likely reasons is that they feel threatened as more and more nations develop nuclear weapons, these smaller nations understandably feel vulnerable without this incredible source of protection. So as more countries begin to arm themselves with nukes, even more countries will feel a desperate need to also develop this defense mechanism, hence creating a new sort of nuclear arms domino effect. So while Kim Jung Il and Ahmadinejad may be two insane leaders who should never be in possession of such destructive weapons, can we really blame them for wanting to be, when the rest of the world works to arm themselves?

I found an article discussing this topic, and it states that "CIA Director George J. Tenet warned yesterday that the 'desire for nuclear weapons is on the upsurge' among small countries, confronting the world with a new nuclear arms race that threatens to dismantle more than three decades of nonproliferation efforts. 'The 'domino theory' of the 21st century may well be nuclear,' Tenet said...'We have entered a new world of proliferation.'" Soon enough, many more countries could be in possession of nukes. With Iran and North Korea covertly constructing nuclear programs, we seem to be witnessing a secret nuclear arms race, and their acquisitions of nuclear weapons will only exacerbate the consequences of the nuclear domino effect. How do put a stop to these falling dominoes? The most obvious solution would be that no one have nukes. And while this is highly unrealistic, I think that before the United States try to get Iran, North Korea, and whoever else is trying to develop nuclear weapons, to terminate their programs, we should consider disassembling our own nuclear arsenal. If no one had them, no one would have justification for building them. Even if we claim to use them for the sole purpose of protecting our own citizens, before we even built this brutal weaponry, we should have further questioned the destructive power of nukes, their mass murder of people who, while they may be living in our enemy's territory, have no intention of harming our own people. One of the main questions we considered when studying war was when is killing civilians justified? And it seems that by simply possessing nuclear weapons, because they inevitably cause mass civilian casualties, countries make the statement that there are and will be times when killing thousands of innocent people is necessary. A human being is a human being, whether they be American, Vietnamese, Japanese, Russian, whatever, and before we construct a weapon that can kill hundreds of thousands, we must ask ourselves if owning, let alone dropping such a bomb, is ever really justified.