In America, All Cultures Must Assimilate

 To assimilate does not mean to become identical.  What it means is that we must all share basic American political values as set forth in our Constitution and as interpreted by our Supreme Court.  Let's look at some examples of where the assimilation took place with a degree of difficulty.  Let's consider the Irish wave of immigration.  These immigrants were not received with open arms.  But the Irish famine gave them few options.  Despite the chilly reception they received upon their arrival, they were mostly shielded by the rights granted them under our constitution.

Consider the Italians.  Some were actually rounded up and interned during WW II.  These injustices were not practiced everywhere in America.  But to the extent that they were practiced at all should fill us with sorrow.  Japanese-Americans were also interned during that war.  But, again, it was not uniformly practiced.  Japanese-Americans in California were interned, but not Japanese-Americans in Hawaii.  In short, America was a great country, but it had its flaws.

Jews were a group not welcomed as far back as Peter Stuyvesant.   Nor were they admitted to this country from Europe when the Germans were busy killing off half of all the Jews living in Europe.  But like the Irish and like the Italians and like the Latinos after them, they made America their home and contributed to its prosperity.

The negroes, colored people, African-Americans, Blacks, or whatever label is in vogue, followed a very different path.  First, they didn't come voluntarily.  They were captured and taken from their homes by members of hostile tribes and sold to the slave ships waiting in anchor off the west coast of Africa.  From there they were shipped to Brazil, the Caribbean, and America to work on various plantation crops such as sugar, cotton or tobacco. The slavers were Portuguese,  Spanish, Dutch, American etc.  Ultimately, Americans, mostly in the north recognized slavery for what it was; namely, the inhuman subjection of one people by another.  After a massive conflagration slavery was ended.  But more work had to be done.

Slavery was followed by Jim Crow.  That lasted until the '60s when civil rights legistlation was passed.  We now track the progress made by various groups by statistics on employment, education, family assets, and so forth.  Some statistics puzzle us.  Why do Black immigrants from Africa or the Caribbean seem to do better than American Blacks?  Why are there so many killings of Black youths by Black youths in our major American cities?  Clearly, more work needs to be done.

But what does "Black Lives Matter" bring to this situation.  It seems to separate Blacks from other Americans.  If separation were the answer, Farrakhan would have solved the Black problem ages ago.  In time, Blacks will learn that BLM is just one more blind alley.