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bdul Malik Gismar, please consider submitting the essay “Is multiculturalism dead?”, The Jakarta Post, April 15 to newspapers in the US. It is the most thoughtful and clearly reasoned short piece I’ve yet read on multiculturalism.

We often hold beliefs, that have been handed down to us over the years, without knowing the logic of their origin. Thank you for your brief history lesson, which places your central argument in perspective.

Much of my frustration with what I’ve read about this divisive subject fails to take into account an historical understanding of that “universal truth” that is the basis of muticulturalism. The current rationale is that one has the right to judge another; therefore all views are equal.

This belief, cherished by the left in the US, falls completely when applied to the “culture” of conservatism, as most Liberals believe that coexistence cannot be reached with conservatives; that there is something cosmically wrong with conservatism (and vice versa).

I think you have got it just right. “We need to conceptualize a toleration that does not end in a rational consensus, but in coexistence.” And therein lies the problem, too.

Coexistence is increasingly difficult as people and the media cross barriers that once kept differences at bay. New York City (where I used to live) and Indonesia (which I’ve often visited) both present some of the more profound challenges and opportunities worldwide for people to learn to coexist.

Dexter Lane
Denver, Colorado