I’m a big city transplant to rural Manitoba, and I’ve brought many of my big city values with me - vaguely socialist, think my taxes should be relatively high when I make good money to care for others, supportive of the idea of multiculturalism. This is the first time I’ve lived around people who generally have a very different value set. I like these folks a lot - they are kind, humourous, and have a dedication to their community I never saw in the suburb I was raised in. People genuinely care about each other and make huge efforts to make sure their neighbours are well looked after. At the same time, they look with suspicion and exasperation at anyone who is ethnically or culturally different from them, especially the neighbouring Indigenous communities.
There is a constant battle here for resources from the provincial government out of Winnipeg. Many basic services are lacking - the nearest functional police station is 40 minutes away, and the province is threatening to remove ambulance services from the town and possibly the hospital. The province moved the hydro station out of town so blackouts now take hours to address rather than minutes like they used to. They wanted to shut the school down a few years ago. Each of these fights were taken up as individual efforts, some were won and some were lost. However, I think these fights should be seen as part of a broader effort to actively preserve and protect the local culture. There’s a particular mix of Scots and Ukrainians that have built this small town into what it is, with the robust community institutions that exist.
This is where I think multiculturalism should come in. This town and the neighbouring towns and reserves require resources to make sure their people can live their lives the way they want to, which preserves a way of life different from the urban cosmopolitan default this country has moved towards. Actual multiculturalism means supporting people who live in diverse ways, not that everyone works 9-5 in an urban environment and eats slightly different food at home or wears fancy clothes once a year. It should mean supporting and growing reserves, small towns, and ethnic communities both urban and rural with a baseline of services that allows people to thrive.
I think that to make multiculturalism a real thing, it has to apply to cultures regardless of setting. I think a concerted effort needs to be made to tell rural people - especially Indigenous and long-established settler communiti
... keep reading on reddit ➡Doing a policy review paper, in it I am to look at the "problems" that multiculturalism can be attributed to. I would imagine that the best answer has something to do with foreign cultural practices conflicting with Canadian values but am unable to find anything specific (Quebec is so iffy because it operates differently towards immigrated Canadians) Does anyone know of any issues we currently face that would lead one to want to ammend our multiculturalistic policy?
Hi all,
I've been thinking about this issue for a while now and am finding that it can be tough to identify the premises that are used in the debates as well as what their implications are.
Looking at the polling, there is widespread public opposition to multiculturalism. What I'm trying to identify is whether this opposition is to the existence of multiple cultures within Britain in itself, or more to the sense of a loss of a uniquely British culture. What are your thoughts?
EDIT: a particularly interesting graph that is relevant for this discussion.
https://preview.redd.it/cdmz3zdpjam41.png?width=782&format=png&auto=webp&s=60fd5eeb037748687508435a2dd0da9c90077d02
This is not a huge problem for me but it runs through my mind from time to time and I thought I would get your thoughts. I think largely due to being a mixed race person I don't really feel extremely tied to each of my races. I make friends, talk to and feel comfortable with everyone of all races (sometimes I question whether I even feel too comfortable). I noticed that most people do not have as racially diverse a friend group as I have and I think a lot of it is due to my being mixed race. I obviously am culturally influenced from my races but I guess I am less firmly tied to both because in both places I don't fully fit in. I think of myself as "a human" rather an a person of x race.
The thing is that my city has a reputation as a "multicultural" place but I notice that it basically is not multicultural as much as a city of many cultures and cultural ghettos, many people just seem to stick to their race and culture. (I notice that even for art/cultural events from different countries predominantly many people just seem to attend the events for their culture and skip 99% of the rest, I don't think that most people in my city are any more interested in other cultures). Also they don't trust people from other races, they want to hire people from their own race etc. Sometimes I think people wonder, "Why are you talking to me/being so friendly to me ? I'm not of your group," and it's almost slightly viewed with suspicion.
So for someone like me, it's hard to individually opt out of the system. I'm open to letting people of other races in but in a way they are shutting me out. I've even notice that due to appearing somewhat ethnically ambiguous some people will assume I am of their race and will be friendly to me at first but then when they find out that I'm not of the same race they get less friendly/helpful.
One good thing is that there are a lot of mixed race people here so it is not seen as weird. And the large diversity of cultures makes for lots of good foreign movies/art/food/culture and you can learn a lot.
