QUOTE(UNDEAD 1 @ 03/06/08 10:07am)

horrible,if i moved to the middle east they probably kill me in a week for breaking some sort of religous law.
I don't think most of us liberty-believers would last a few steps out of Saudi International Terminal -or whatever its called.....
well you know my opinions that a healthy free society's laws has to supercede manipulative religious doctrines. Here are some of my other thoughts.[ tylenol time....

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I live in Canuckland [like Cross I moved here from UK] and I love the system here -given we are heavily multicultural there's a general live and let live respect amongst the cultures. We had our history of divisive 'cultural' attitudes up here -and I lived through some of the most frictional ones in the last 2 decades, now there is a harmony -not perfect, but people live very well together compared to 20 years ago when 'multiculturalism' was a bitter topic to discuss. There are super-mosques here and a multitude of varied cultural events, tv stations, stores.... but there's not the general attitude of needing to have our official rules in the languages of immigrants; we do have this available as a privilege regarding 'government info access', but its not the law- nothing like the USA govt,
needing to
have hispanic speaking officials present at elections and for driving permits. Some would erroneously compare Quebec and the French language issues-however, the Quebecers were the original immigrants from Europe, Brits came after-so from my non-Quebecer view having French as an official language up here is all fair in my books.
Secondly regarding 'political correctness'. I think up here in Canada our govt. strives to put the principles of democracy before 'migrated' cultural clashing practices. I've seen the most bizarre cases up here-including ethiopians wanting to be allowed to perform 'female circumcision' [true], and when I was in Toronto there was a hilarious [actually -no, a bit disturbing /church bells we're used to of course, but this 'vocal chanting' seemed too bizarre] episode of a muslim prayer wailing from a loudspeaker [I believe a tradition in some muslim countries] all over downtown from parts unknown at a certain time of the day - it took about a week before City Hall could track down from which roof was the source of it to cut it off. The danger of bending over backwards too much to community 'power leaders' has its danger of one thing leading to another where lines are blurred and its too late to stop yielding to more infringing demands and appeals.
Thirdly- 'towel heads and political correctness'. I was born a Brit to immigrant parents.My thoughts on the name-calling enviroment. Its easy by some, either through the media or misconceptions to categorize all immigrants as a whole as out to takeover -regarding 'taking jobs' and being too bold for their own good. Typically an immigrant arrives in a country just wanting to get by. But the negative connotations are aroused by the few amongst them that want to take advantage of the system for personal fraudulent/criminal reasons or to maintain their power soapbox position they had through the rules of their culture in the homeland they left. Blaming the rest of the immigrants for the actions of these few is a mistake. Its everyones choice to name-call - but what do you mean by it, and what does it mean to an individual is the question. Do most people as the brunt of the name-calling say 'what did I do now!' - can the name-caller tell them the answer?- Normal people have their limits to continuous sniping at - the levels of limits vary, but there is a level.
[Put another way-A squad of soldiers may be the most well behaved unit in an army but they'd have a limit to their niceness if they got sniped at continuously while on patrols in a populated area.]
Often these troublemakers/policy change wishers, actively try to encourage the non-affiliated immigrant to follow their ways with some kind of intimidation in hand and they do so through weak-knee-d politicians. It's no fun for the average 'joe' immigrant just wanting to do his workday and hear on the news or from strangers how they're directly involved in some conspiracy to takeover a system. For example, in a thread by someone who used to be here equated seeing a large riot-like crowd in 1 or 2 photos as the general sentiment of the Muslim community in the UK... he'd be correct to say the 'extremist' sentiment, but imo a divisive stretch to claim otherwise -especially since he's never lived or visited the UK.
It seems easier not to realize this process rather than blame a whole group as out to disrupt the system. This comes through name-calling and wild accusations. The only way most non-minorities in the West can understand that agitating lifestyle on a daily basis is to live in Pakistan or a Talibum-run village [-ok not that bad. One thing we shouldn't forget is that it was fine when hundreds of thousands of towel heads [sikhs/muslims and africans - ] were fighting with the West against Global Fascism and helped defeat it.
Political correctness to me has always meant 'polite correctness'. Sure, most joking or stepping on toes attitudes are unintentional but there is a blur between someone who means well and someone who means to insult. For me I'm in the polite in general camp- its no stretch for me to feel 'awkward' about not joking or acting offensively to other cultures or groups. I'm not sure how having to be 'politely correct' is one of our society's downfalls. Rather, blame the politicians for foolishly ignoring the dangers of yielding to non-democratic demands of cultural leaders. It's not that hard to say no if the politician has moral fibre rather than thinking of the votes he'll get in the next election - that person should be your valid target -they give the power to 'unfair policy change seekers' where they formerly had none.I'm with Shred in his opinion.