The Dangers of the Liberal Mind in Armenia

[londontsi]

Re: The Dangers of the Liberal Mind in Armenia

Multiculturalism and integration describe environments where your inner strength to preserve
your and your offspring's national identity is tested.

New immigrants with inner strength survive during their lifetime.
It is never without losses to the other camps or eventually in the melting pot.

Survivability of your identity becomes less and less probable with the number of years and newer generation.

In the unlikely event of the third generation surviving they will find many of the characteristics of
their claimed roots look and feel alien to them.

These environments will be periodically rejuvenated with new immigrants giving the facade that
that's where all the national buzz is. It is relatively short term.

What's worse about it is that the loss is to where the survivability of the community
is (was) strongest e.g. Lebanon, Iran, Armenia etc.

[Siggie]

Re: The Dangers of the Liberal Mind in Armenia

Many proponents of this kind of "we're all citizens of the globe" thing, embrace that for the reason that it discourages the kind of "us" vs. "them" division among human beings that makes it easier to harm one another. Just throwing that out there for discussion.

[Sip]

Re: The Dangers of the Liberal Mind in Armenia

What's ironic is that what people refer to as "melting pots" are actually settings that tend to foster individuality where as the more traditional "roots" sound to me like more a setting where everyone is basically the same

[Mos]

Re: The Dangers of the Liberal Mind in Armenia

Multiculturalism and integration describe environments where your inner strength to preserve
your and your offspring's national identity is tested.

New immigrants with inner strength survive during their lifetime.
It is never without losses to the other camps or eventually in the melting pot.

Survivability of your identity becomes less and less probable with the number of years and newer generation.

In the unlikely event of the third generation surviving they will find many of the characteristics of
their claimed roots look and feel alien to them.

These environments will be periodically rejuvenated with new immigrants giving the facade that
that's where all the national buzz is. It is relatively short term.

What's worse about it is that the loss is to where the survivability of the community
is (was) strongest e.g. Lebanon, Iran, Armenia etc.

It's at that point that the new generation views their parents culture, country, and values as foreign to them that they are considered successfully assimilated. Our diasporas should only integrate in the sense of being law abiding, hard working, and respectful to the country/society around us. We should not integrate further then that, because further is crossing the line into assimilation. We need to be insular, close-knit, and resilient.

Many proponents of this kind of "we're all citizens of the globe" thing, embrace that for the reason that it discourages the kind of "us" vs. "them" division among human beings that makes it easier to harm one another. Just throwing that out there for discussion.

We are "citizens of the globe" but in this globe there is diverse collections of cultures, values and mindsets that make people different from one another. Armenia is a country for Armenians by Armenians. I would never want to see Armenia be a country for many ethnic groups, I want it to remain an Armenian state. That is why multiculturalism is dangerous for Armenia.

[Siggie]

Re: The Dangers of the Liberal Mind in Armenia

It's at that point that the new generation views their parents culture, country, and values as foreign to them that they are considered successfully assimilated. Our diasporas should only integrate in the sense of being law abiding, hard working, and respectful to the country/society around us. We should not integrate further then that, because further is crossing the line into assimilation. We need to be insular, close-knit, and resilient.



We are "citizens of the globe" but in this globe there is diverse collections of cultures, values and mindsets that make people different from one another. Armenia is a country for Armenians by Armenians. I would never want to see Armenia be a country for many ethnic groups, I want it to remain an Armenian state. That is why multiculturalism is dangerous for Armenia.

I think the problem is with deciding exactly what a sufficient departure from our values or mindsets looks like. Where's the line between adapted and assimilated? Further, who is the arbiter of what is the collective Armenian mindset and/or culture? I think we'd have to agree on that before we can make statements about how much of the Diaspora population has assimilated. Until then we're just guessing based on our own limited experiences and biases.

So you don't want anyone who's not Armenian living in Armenia? How will you decide who is Armenian? There have been enough disagreements about who's Armenian among members.
Further, wouldn't the people immigrating to Armenia get assimilated into Armenian culture? If so, then why is this a bad thing? If not, then why do you think it would be different than other minorities in their host countries?

[Mos]

Re: The Dangers of the Liberal Mind in Armenia

I think the problem is with deciding exactly what a sufficient departure from our values or mindsets looks like. Where's the line between adapted and assimilated? Further, who is the arbiter of what is the collective Armenian mindset and/or culture? I think we'd have to agree on that before we can make statements about how much of the Diaspora population has assimilated. Until then we're just guessing based on our own limited experiences and biases.

As I said, it's rather simple. When an individual views his parents culture, values, and country in general as foreign than he is successfully assimilated. In my view though, there's a simple question that can also point to this. "If a war broke out between Armenia and the country you live in, which country would you fight for?". I think in all it's pretty obvious to distinguish assimilated Armenians from non-assimilated ones. Of course, there is the tricky situation of the ones in the process of assimilation who have conflict which side to go to. This is not really guessing, it comes straight from the definition of assimilation and from looking at immigration patterns in several countries.

So you don't want anyone who's not Armenian living in Armenia? How will you decide who is Armenian? There have been enough disagreements about who's Armenian among members.
Further, wouldn't the people immigrating to Armenia get assimilated into Armenian culture? If so, then why is this a bad thing? If not, then why do you think it would be different than other minorities in their host countries

I want Armenians to always be the great majority in Armenia. I want Armenia to remain always an Armenian state. The same logic of "wouldn't the people immigrating to Armenia get assimilated" was used by Western European countries, their logic was flawed, and now look at their demographic situation. Never count on assimilation, especially since the immigrants that would come to Armenia would be ones from poorer countries, mostly Muslim, similar to the ones that have immigrated to Europe, not assimilated, and thus created the demographic disaster that we see there.

[Siggie]

Re: The Dangers of the Liberal Mind in Armenia

As I said, it's rather simple. When an individual views his parents culture, values, and country in general as foreign than he is successfully assimilated. In my view though, there's a simple question that can also point to this. "If a war broke out between Armenia and the country you live in, which country would you fight for?". I think in all it's pretty obvious to distinguish assimilated Armenians from non-assimilated ones. Of course, there is the tricky situation of the ones in the process of assimilation who have conflict which side to go to. This is not really guessing, it comes straight from the definition of assimilation and from looking at immigration patterns in several countries.

I don't know... I think you'd run into people who by those questions as determinants would be Armenian, but whom you yourself would say aren't Armenian based on other characteristics, circumstances, etc.

It IS guessing if you're saying the current generation is like that. You don't have any numbers based on which to generalize to the whole "current generation" whoever they're defined. Knowing the definition of assimilation doesn't help you determine the percentage who are assimilated (it doesn't even necessarily give you a metric to measure it by even; e.g. knowing the definition of self-esteem, doesn't tell who what percentage of the population have low self-esteem). Nor does knowing the immigration rate tell you about assimilation because you don't know that those who immigrated are assimilated. You don't even know the proportion of immigrants who assimilate, so you can use that piece to infer about the numbers of assimilated based on the numbers immigrating.

I want Armenians to always be the great majority in Armenia. I want Armenia to remain always an Armenian state. The same logic of "wouldn't the people immigrating to Armenia get assimilated" was used by Western European countries, their logic was flawed, and now look at their demographic situation. Never count on assimilation, especially since the immigrants that would come to Armenia would be ones from poorer countries, mostly Muslim, similar to the ones that have immigrated to Europe, not assimilated, and thus created the demographic disaster that we see there.

So, you're now saying we don't know, people who immigrate might not assimilate?

[Mos]

Re: The Dangers of the Liberal Mind in Armenia

I don't know... I think you'd run into people who by those questions as determinants would be Armenian, but whom you yourself would say aren't Armenian based on other characteristics, circumstances, etc.

It IS guessing if you're saying the current generation is like that. You don't have any numbers based on which to generalize to the whole "current generation" whoever they're defined. Knowing the definition of assimilation doesn't help you determine the percentage who are assimilated (it doesn't even necessarily give you a metric to measure it by even; e.g. knowing the definition of self-esteem, doesn't tell who what percentage of the population have low self-esteem). Nor does knowing the immigration rate tell you about assimilation because you don't know that those who immigrated are assimilated. You don't even know the proportion of immigrants who assimilate, so you can use that piece to infer about the numbers of assimilated based on the numbers immigrating.

Well obviously that question posed isn't the final decider, but in my view it says a lot, because it says to which country the person holds allegiance to. Maybe for Western Armenians it's a better question if they have allegiance to Armenian nation or country of residence as they don't come from the country of Armenia or Soviet Armenia. Also, another indicator is with which group of people the individual feels more comfortable with, with which group of people it connects more easily to. So these main factors in my view can say a lot about person's "status".

Assimilation is a reality and a fact. It's impossible to come up with concrete numbers of statistics regarding assimilation, but I believe that we can all agree it's occurring and it's detrimental to Armenian nation. Assimilation is the ultimate dilemma and problems for any immigrant group in the world.

So, you're now saying we don't know, people who immigrate might not assimilate?

We do know, just look at Europe. Same thing can happen to Armenia, which itself has a low birth rate and high migration rate, if the ideals of "multiculturalism" are spread and immigrants encouraged to come and make Armenia a more "diverse" society.

[londontsi]

Re: The Dangers of the Liberal Mind in Armenia

Our diasporas should only integrate ......

You cannot plan it,
You cannot manage it,
You cannot restrict it
You cannot stop it.

Its a waterfall.

[Mos]

Re: The Dangers of the Liberal Mind in Armenia

You cannot plan it,
You cannot manage it,
You cannot restrict it
You cannot stop it.

Its a waterfall.

Obviously we can't do those things, in the end people decide for themselves, but what we can do is inform people and save the people who are falling into the assimilation trap. It may not do much, but little is better than nothing.