Sen. Lindsey Graham says he scolded the president for saying something scatological about certain countries and their immigrants. “Diversity has always been our strength,” he allegedly said. By my count, this makes Graham the bazillionth person to proclaim some variant of “diversity is strength.”
Is it true? I think the only close to right answer is, “it depends.” Specifically, it depends on what — often clichéd — analogy you have in mind. Diverse stock portfolios are more resilient. Diverse diets are healthier. But that doesn’t mean picking bad stocks will make you richer or that eating spoiled foods is good for you.
I once heard Jesse Jackson explain that racial integration of the NBA made it stronger and better. He was right. But would gender integration of the NBA have the same effect? Would diversifying professional basketball by height? Probably not.
All of these analogies can take you only so far. Thomas Sowell once said, “The next time some academics tell you how important diversity is, ask how many Republicans there are in their sociology department.”
There’s a growing body of evidence that even if diversity— the kind that results from immigration — once made America stronger, it may not be doing so anymore. Robert Putnam, a liberal sociologist at Harvard, found that increased diversity corrodes civil society by eroding shared values, customs and institutions. People tend to “hunker down” and retreat from civil society, at least in the short and medium term.
There’s a growing body of evidence that even if diversity— the kind resulting from immigration — once made America stronger, it may not be doing so anymore.
(Excerpt) Read more at latimes.com ...
