Brexit Stage Right
Brexit was not solely about economics, tax policy or being part of a greater union with the Continent - Brexit was a reaction to both elected and unelected elites demanding total obedience and fealty to often absurd commands simply because some official said so. I can remember at time when I lived in Edinburgh when a grocer in London was actually fined for simply printing pounds and ounces on packages with kilograms and grams instead of just printing the metric measures.
The infatuation of being a "citizen of the world" has now ended in England - not so much in Scotland, that voted "Remain" (William Wallace and Robert the Bruce are spinning in their graves right now). Implied in such an appellation is the support for open borders, preferential treatment of immigrants, equivocation of extremely disparate cultures to native culture and the assumption that diversity is an end in and of itself.
“Diversity” has had too long of a run without critical examination. Academia loves it - as do the quota-mongers in government. It is also used to defend illegal immigration but “diversity” for the sake of being diverse has just become a way for “progressives” to say to others “look at me, look how evolved and tolerant I am” but it isn’t “tolerance” at all. It is just putting a check in the box of the “progressive” job application. They are not concerned about diversity except as a badge of “progressive” achievement. The fact is that “progressives” only care about differences, they think that tossing a bunch of different colored marbles in a bag makes them all unified, all the same. Nothing could be farther from the truth.
As it is with much of true political and philosophical thought, the concept of diversity has its origin in the natural world – and as such can be described in scientific terms. There are two types of diversity with definitional roots in the science of chemistry. These are what I would term to be solution diversity and mixture diversity. The two are very different.
The technical definition of solution is this: a solution is a homogeneous mixture composed of only one phase. What you have here is a solute and a solvent combining to form something entirely new with properties different from the constituent parts. Solutions cannot be separated into their individual parts after they are mixed.
I would propose that this is the type of diversity that we want, that this is very beneficial to our country. This is the historical diversity of the American Colonies and post-Revolutionary War America. It is the diversity of Ellis Island and the genesis of idea that America was a “melting pot”. People brought their varied heritages with them but ultimately blended and combined to catalyze into Americans – not Italian-Americans, German-Americans or Mexican-Americans – just Americans. While they maintained a fondness for their origins, they subjugated that fondness to the love, devotion and loyalty to their new home.
A mixture is a material system made up by two or more different substances which are mixed but are not combined chemically. The materials are in suspension and the heavier particulates will eventually precipitate or fall out of solution the minute that the mechanical mixing action stops. This is the “diversity” that we have today - it is what Britain has. Disparate groups with allegiance to foreign countries intent on retaining those loyalties. Rather than assimilate, they retreat to cloistered areas and resume the same customs and lifestyles as their old countries, most refusing to even learn the language of the United States.
It is a mistake to assume that all people who come here legally or illegally are here to become part of America. The common excuse for illegal immigration from Mexico is economic. Once these illegal aliens satisfy their economic goals, they have no need to assimilate – being here illegally also creates a secretive culture, assuring that assimilation will never take place. Legal immigration assures that the people who come to America are coming because they desire to actually become an American, not simply as a method by which to satisfy an economic need. There is a purpose for the process of legal immigration that transcends simple protection of sovereignty.
Creating diversity for its own sake creates a mixture, not a solution. Mixtures are weak and eventually break down. Solutions do not.
America still has this illness - primarily in the progressive fever swamps. The reason they see love of country, American exceptionalism and the populist nationalism of someone like Trump is that they have given up on their own affiliation with America to be a "citizen of the world." They may call themselves "Americans" and physically reside here but their actions say different. Perhaps a Texit or a Utexit isn't as far fetched as it once sounded.