Thank God I didn't go to Delaware

Indoctrination At Delaware (Forum)

Many universities try to indoctrinate students, but the all-time champion in this category is surely the University of Delaware. With no guile at all the university has laid out a brutally specific program for "treatment" of incorrect attitudes of the 7,000 students in its residence halls. The program is close enough to North Korean brainwashing that students and professors have been making "made in North Korea" jokes about the plan. The Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (FIRE) has called for the program to be dismantled. Residential assistants charged with imposing the "treatments" have undergone intensive training from the university. The training makes clear that white people are to be considered racists - at least those who have not yet undergone training and confessed their racism. The RAs have been taught that a "racist is one who is both privileged and socialized on the basis of race by a white supremacist (racist) system. The term applies to all white people (i.e., people of European descent) living in the United States, regardless of class, gender, religion, culture, or sexuality."

Read the whole thing if you'd like to get depressed. The human tendency to totalitarian systems never stops unless you fight back.

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The Great American Melting Pot - Assimilation vs. Multi-Culturalists

Update: My dad sent me an email about Baba in response to this post, which does a much better job of describing his immigrant experience than I did, particularly about how important family is:

Dear David,

I read your comments that you felt that Baba was a bit envious of the accomplishments of his children and grandchildren. I think we have some different experiences about how my Dad regarded the success of his children and grandchildren and I wanted to share them with you.

It was my experience that he was very proud of my work at Honeywell. In fact, I know that he was often complemented on my performance and contribution to the success we had with the first implementation of a large mainframe computer at the Aero Division of Honeywell. We both worked in the same plant in Minneapolis and I know that the V.P. and General Manager talked to my Dad often regarding my work because my Dad would tell me about those conversations. My Dad promoted my accomplishments in the army to those senior executives and was responsible for getting my name and letters of recommendation from the army to their attention. My Dad was highly regarded as a long-time professional manager in the manufacturing operation at Honeywell and was known throughout Honeywell in the Minneapolis area at that time. I know that I worked especially hard knowing that my success was also a reflection on my Dad. I got a lot of fast promotions and at ! one time, was the youngest supervisor at the Aero Division and had around 80 people working for me with a budget of $2.5 million (including the computer and IBM equipment). but it was a very responsible job and I was 30 years old. That was a lot of money in 1962.

Baba, was also very proud of his grandchildren. You probably didn't experience that adulation because you didn't get to Minneapolis very often as an adult. But, he always asked how David was doing. He got to see Leslie often because she went to St Olaf in Northfield, MN and often visited everyone in Minneapolis. Then, when she graduated, she worked as a teacher in Minneapolis and often visited her grandparents.

Whenever Mom and I visited Minneapolis, it was a ritual to visit the homes of all of Lorraine's children. My Dad just loved showing off their houses and activities. He really loved to show-off Dede's, Jimmy's and Rickie's houses and would then give us a tour of Jimmy's plumbing company.

I never felt that he was at all envious of their accomplishments. In fact, I always felt that he believed that he was more of a catalyst and was somewhat responsible for their work ethic and success. I always felt that he was excited with their accomplishments. He was a leader and a good manager.

I know that in my house, my parents and grandparents would renew the memories of their old Swedish food, music and traditions. But, I never saw that there was a desire or yearning to return to their homeland to live or to change their American way of living. My dad was proud to be an American. He was also proud to be a Swede, but he was now an American. And, from what I can remember of my grandparents (my mother's parents), they were now Americans too. In fact, my grandparents always had a 2'x3' portrait of President Franklin Roosevelt hanging in a prominent location in their dining room. Both of my uncles were in World War ll and my grandmother went to work at Honeywell during "the War" to help with the war effort.

I didn't know if I had shared some of these feelings with you but they are important memories to me.

Dad

Betsy & I did get to Minneapolis on our honeymoon trip across America. We will never forget Baba driving us around to see all of the cousins homes. It was a real experience.

Thanks Dad.

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Melting pot - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Eric, the above link is to the Wikipedia about the melting pot. It is pretty detailed and is a pretty large topic including arguments about if the "melting pot" is truly inclusive, or was pretty much only white Europeans and they excluded non-whites such as the black slaves and the Chinese.

There seem to be two points of view discussed in the article, and they are worth considering.

1. "The melting pot idea is most strongly associated with the United States, particularly in reference to "model" immigrant groups of the past. Past generations of immigrants to the United States, it is argued by some, became successful by working to shed their historic identities and adopt the ways of their new country. Typically immigrants absorbed the ways of the "host" society, while loosening to varying degrees their connection to their native culture." That is, immigrants left behind their old life, and embraced the crazy mixed-up cultural stew that is American life. By doing so, they were no longer "German" or "English" and became "Americans."

2. Multiculturalists claim that assimilation can hurt minority cultures by stripping away their distinctive features. They point to situations where institutions of the dominant culture initiate programs to assimilate or integrate minority cultures.

Although some multiculturalists admit that assimilation may result in a relatively homogeneous society, with a strong sense of nationalism, they warn however, that where minorities are strongly urged to assimilate, there may arise groups which fiercely oppose integration. With assimilation, immigrants lose their original cultural (and often linguistic) identity and so do their children. Immigrants who fled persecution or a country devastated by war were historically resilient to abandoning their heritage once they had settled in a new country. These are peoples who want to move to the U.S. but not embrace the U.S. way of life. They want to remain whatever they were: European, African, Chinese, whatever.

My own thoughts:

I will propose, from personal experience, that both happen all the time. First generation immigrants want to fiercely cling to the language, culture and customs of their youth. In turn, they want the established culture of their new country to accommodate them. Their children, exposed to a different (American) way of life want to assimilate. It causes a clash of cultures between generations that is hard to bridge.

My own grandfather Gus who immigrated to the U.S. as a teenager was a success, and his absolutely American children were even more successful and his grandchildren are all very successful. Ultimately, though, I think that Baba the immigrant was stuck between two worlds and was a tad resentful of the American way of life of his children and grandchildren. And that is pretty common.

I work with several immigrants now and hear them talk about how much better their homelands are, how much better the culture is, how much better the restaurants, etc. And they are really upset at how American their kids are acting. When I casually mentioned to one that it's great that their kids are assimilating he really got angry. He doesn't like it at all, probably because his children's assimilation will prevent him from ever moving back to his beloved homeland. (And he has applied for U.S. citizenship!)

I like the idea of tying the essay to food. If you think about what cultural traditions are, they revolve around family, language, entertainment and food. One of the great blessings of living in America is the wonderful diversity of foods we have available to us at both the grocer and at restaurants. Many of our favorite foods we eat at home have nothing to do with our northern European lineage, but come from Mexico, Spain, China and Italy. The assimilation of many different cultures into the American way of life is like a stew. Each ingredient adds something important. The results are delicious and unique.