Rachel Maddow on the history of "nativism"* and anti-immigrant sentiment in the US (fair warning: there's a section running several minutes of The Hairpiece spewing hate):
Adam L. Silverman has this post at Balloon Juice on the same subject.
It's a recurring nightmare, and it's not just America, or even any country established by immigrants. Look at what's going on in Europe right now, and the countries of Europe are largely homogeneous in ethnic make-up. Or were. Or think about the inter-tribal conflicts in Africa resulting from the creation of nation states with boundaries imposed by the colonial powers. It's all "Us vs. Them."
In part, I think it's due to our existence as social animals: by definition, membership in a group leads to distrust of those not in the group. Think of howler monkeys or gibbons vocalizing to establish their territories -- certainly one of the less harmful means of doing that. Chimps can get violent.
But we're so much more advanced than that. Aren't we?
Adam L. Silverman has this post at Balloon Juice on the same subject.
It's a recurring nightmare, and it's not just America, or even any country established by immigrants. Look at what's going on in Europe right now, and the countries of Europe are largely homogeneous in ethnic make-up. Or were. Or think about the inter-tribal conflicts in Africa resulting from the creation of nation states with boundaries imposed by the colonial powers. It's all "Us vs. Them."
In part, I think it's due to our existence as social animals: by definition, membership in a group leads to distrust of those not in the group. Think of howler monkeys or gibbons vocalizing to establish their territories -- certainly one of the less harmful means of doing that. Chimps can get violent.
But we're so much more advanced than that. Aren't we?
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