European multiculturalism: beautiful fantasy, ugly reality

Did you ever see the movie, 'Harvey"? It's a James Stewart movie from 1950. It's a pleasant story about a quiet, shy man (the James Stewart character) in a small, American town whose best friend just happens to be an invisible, six-foot-three-inch tall rabbit. 

The man (James Stewart) takes his invisible best friend with him everywhere he goes. He takes his Rabbit to a bar for a drink. He gives his invisible friend a seat. He orders a drink for his Rabbit. He opens doors for his Rabbit, talks to the Rabbit, even interrupts conversations with real people to stop, then listen to what his Rabbit friend has to say.

He lives in a fantasy world. He can't tell the difference between his fantasy and reality. For him, his fantasy is  reality (the plot of the movie is to suggest that, perhaps, his fantasy really is real). He is, by at least one definition, insane (here).

By this definition, Europe itself may be insane. Europe can't tell the difference between fantasy and reality.           

Europe's insanity isn't about tall rabbits. It's about multiculturalism. It's about Europe cultural elites failing to accept that multiculturalism has failed.

This inability to accept reality has pushed Europe's elites to retreat into a fantasy. This fantasy posits that, because of the new Islamic migration into Europe, everything is A-OK.  

The multicultural ideal is that all cultures are equal. In theory, this means no one is better than anyone else--and no one is lower, or worse than anyone else. Since all cultures are equal, the ideal suggests, no one culture has the right to tell another culture to change. 

This is the truest equality, how we behave with each other. By accepting this ideal, all cultures in a diverse community can coexist. Because all are treated equally, discrimination can't secure  a toe-hold. With discrimination gone, racism evaporates-- because, you see, there's no racism when everyone is equal.

That's the theory. In practice, it doesn't work.

Keep in mind that we are talking about insanity here. One aspect of that insanity is that, even as Germany's leader, Andrea Merkel, has stated that multiculturalism is dead (financialtimes,here), Germany's elites--as elites do in other European countries--still carry on the multicultural fantasy regardless (here).

Germany's elites ignore the reality. They live the fantasy. 

One might argue that it has been immigration into Europe that has killed multiculturalism. The reason is, Europe's elites are stymied. They can't account for cultural differences multiculturalism says don't exist.

When Muslims immigrate to Europe, they bring an Islamic culture that's very different from Western culture. These differences make it very, very difficult for Muslims to integrate into a Western country. These difficulties lead to problems Europe will not address. 

Multiculturalism is stubborn. It cannot accept that there's a vast "cultural gulf between rich, liberal, secular Europe and some of the countries from which recent migrants come" (theeconomist, here). Everyone is equal! Nothing else counts!

For example, look at attitudes towards women. This is an important issue because there's been a surge of sexual crimes in Europe directly attributable to the new migrants (Germany migrant rape crisis, here). 

The West believes a woman has the right be go out alone at night. She has the right to dress however she wants, subject to local standards. She has the right to feel safe in public spaces. 

Many Muslims reject those rights. Theor Islamic culture is very different. They believe any woman who goes out alone at night is 'open prey' for a sexual assault: why else would a woman go out alone at night or, why would she go out alone at night 'dressed like that?' (theeconomist, here)?

Such differences challenge the multicultural belief that all cultures are equal. This difference is a challenge because, if all cultures are equal, what right does anyone have to pressure Muslims to change how they treat European women? 

Multiculturalism in Europe fails because the cultural elite  won't accept that, if there are victims of Islam, it might be "that non-Muslim women tend to be its greatest victims" ( Migrant crisis: Islamic rape culture comes to Europe, here). Such a failure would suggest that the 'equality' of multicultural dogma is, as Germany's Merkel has said, a sham.

So what happens when young Muslim men go out and start to rape Western women (Germany's migrant rape crisis, here)? European culture-leaders stick their heads into the sand; or, alternately, these opinion-leaders creates a fantasy. They use that fantasy to ignore the reality. As a result, European women and children are victimized--sacrificed to the multicultural dogma (here).

The fantasy is this: the culture elites of Germany believe that the recent enormous Islamic migration into Europe is reason to celebrate (gatestoneinstitute, here). This influx, they claim, transforms Germany (ibid). 

Because of these new immigrants, Germany's ethnic and cultural homogeneity has become more open, more diverse, more balanced (ibid). Moreover, Germany has a severe worker shortage problem that, left unsolved, will limit Germany's growth potential. The migrants are the 'silver bullet' that will solve Germany's worker-shortage problems (ibid). 

That's the fantasy. The reality is quite different. It's ugly. 

These migrant newcomers may not be interested in working. Currently, some 600,000 able-bodied migrant men are on welfare (ibid). It's altogether possible that this number represents most of the able-bodied migrant men who have recently come to Germany. They're 'on the dole', and they're draining Germany's treasure, not adding to it through income tax payments.

Then, there's crime. One recent German study showed that recently arrived migrants are behind some 90% of a violent crime increase in one region of Germany--and there's reason to believe this percent will be duplicated in studies of other portions of Germany (ibid).  

Germany isn't the only place this is happening. It's a European reality. The problem is, the EU's cultural elite refuses to address this reality.  For them, it simply doesn't exist.

Europe's elite is no different than the James Stewart character in the movie, "Harvey". Neither can tell the difference between fantasy and reality.

Both are insane.