I am responding to your informative editorial along with other articles on multiculturalism (Indian Newslink March 1).
Having travelled extensively and as an ethnic person living in New Zealand for more than 20 years, I wish to make some comments on this topic.
I have not encountered any major problems in the North and South Islands where I have lived and worked practicing my culture.
New Zealand, with its Western values, has been good to all its ethnic migrants, so much so that people here have had no problem going to a Church, Mandir, Mosque or Gurdwara, wearing different clothes, enjoying cultural and religious functions and continuing to speak in their mother tongues.
I see no problem here.
Prominent failures
However, if we were to take a quick look at Germany and UK, we would notice that multiculturalism has not worked and if anything, it has led to segregation, ghettos and lack of respect for the values of the host country.
In some cases, the host countries have been bombed by their migrant population. Germany and UK have spent millions of dollars on migrants, including translation services and facilities, simply because the migrant families have no desire to learn the host country’s languages.
The problem is that the host countries have changed to suit the migrants and no attempt has been made by the latter to adapt and adopt. It has come to such a situation in UK, where some towns and cities, people cannot openly sing Christmas carols or have Christmas trees as this is deemed to be offensive to migrants. This is political correctness gone awry and politicians losing their grip to please migrants at the expense of their own values.
Retain values
Do we want this sort of multiculturalism in New Zealand?
I would New Zealand to continue with its western values that entail respect and tolerance towards ethnicities. There is no need to entrench multiculturalism into our constitution. We want a multiethnic community and not the culture of honour killings, forced marriages, female infanticide, genital mutilation, the anti-Semitism, hatred and intolerance of gays, lack of respect for women and so on.
New Zealand has opened it arms to welcome us. We should not change the country’s core values to suit our needs and the last thing we want is to come up with our own little China, India or Malaysia.
Vijay Narayan is an Indian Newslink reader based in Papatoetoe, South Auckland
