A few years ago, Marylanders made the horrendous mistake of electing Robert Ehrlich as its Governor. Ehrlich's four years in office were a disaster for the state, no small part of which was deliberately inflicted by Ehrlich himself. As a former State of Maryland employee, I know something about how deliberate it was. But I'll save that for a later column. For today, I'll focus on a rhetorical blunder made by Ehrlich during his one and only term: an assessment by him of multiculturalism as "bunk."
It's what you would expect from someone who grew up in an almost all-white neighborhood, and built a career in an almost all-white party. Anything that isn't white is a threat, and must be treated that way, even in the face of evidence to the contrary.
One of the best pieces of evidence is a neighborhood in New York City: Elmhurst, in the borough of Queens. I had the good fortune to live there in the early 1980s, as it was beginning the transition from a neighborhood of mostly European ethnicity to one that blended that ethnicity with Latin American and Asian populations. It was a neighborhood without majorities, only minorities that managed to get along and live their lives without conflict--or fear.
It was as diverse as it could possibly be--and it worked. And, although not quite as diverse as it once was, it still does.
Multiculturalism is not "bunk." Multiculturalism is our soul, and our future.
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