> To uproot racism, you need to rally your population behind common denominators and values.
That's all very nice but how do you apply it to the situation where you have a minority group with little to no interest in integrating into the indigenous culture?
That’s a non-answer. National populist parties rise with increased immigration and a feeling of their society changing from what they’re used to.
How do you tell people who vote for these parties to not do it? I’m also an immigrant but it’s become very clear to me that telling people what they want is bad and they shouldn’t want it is not working at all
The short answer is a fuzzy “more educated and equal society”. You don’t tell people what to do. They will automatically do the society-endorsed right thing(tm).
Just like religion and blind faith drops when education increases.
You could argue that “marginalized local communities” are driving the votes for populist parties, thus creating the whole problem, and by taking better care of them will actually free up more resources for everyone in the long run, because immigration is no longer this massive expense that everyone thought it was.
My understanding is that the Yamato are not indigenous to Japan. For example [1]:
> Now [1997], in two landmark actions, a court and Japan's national legislature have taken the first steps to recognize that Japan's Ainu (EYE-new) people predated the Yamato race that conquered its land and systematically attempted to stamp out its existence. For Japan, a nation with a near-religious belief in the homogeneity of its people, these decisions mark the first time it has ever formally acknowledged a minority group living in its midst.
[1] Apologies for the AMP link, but trying to open the article URL directly redirects me to the Baltimore Sun home page.
...or when "indigenous" culture pretend that integration only works in a single direction-minorities being absorbed into bigger group without impacting any change in "original" culture.
That's simple. Integrate or be removed. Cultures across time have dealt with attempts to supplant them with hostility. Whether you see that as a viable option is up to you.
True, I have heard they are assimilating their Muslim population very effectively too. They even have assimilation holiday camps, fun for all the family.
I'm sort of morbidly fascinated by the equation in the American press of "China's Muslim population" with "China's Uyghur population". They're very different things.
There’s another large Muslim minority group called the Hui, who aren’t included in the Xinjiang camps and are generally treated well by most accounts I’ve seen.
The Hui also got caught up in the "war on terror" (read: anti-Muslim policies) that supposedly only targeted Uighur separatists. Example from Chinese state media: https://www.globaltimes.cn/content/1092308.shtml
Now, arguably the anti-halal policies were about trying to ban misleading advertising, because it's a bit silly to claim halal status on everything. Malaysia is another country that also has a bit of problem with this. But then, China has an awful lot of other misleading advertising and false claims (in particular around TCM and efficacy of folk remedies) that the government ignores or promotes. Why only target halal?
Misleading advertising aside, it's definitely the case that Arabic script for halal disappeared from legitimately halal restaurants all over China as part of this crackdown. The message seemed to be that it is okay to be Muslim, just keep quiet about it and do not advertise it too much.
The Hui are definitely suffering, in the public mind, from conceptual association with the Uyghurs. As long as the Uyghurs claim to represent "Islam", it's somewhat unavoidable for the Hui to be dragged down with them.
Nevertheless, it is quite plainly the case that oppression of the Uyghurs targets them for being culturally distinct (and, to a certain extent, seditious), not for being Muslims. It baffles me that Western media are so monomaniacally focused on criticizing this in terms of "oppressing people because of their religion" when (1) that is obviously not what's going on, and (2) "oppressing people because of their race", which is going on, is at least as bad in the eyes of Western media consumers as "oppressing people because of their religion" is.
Every time this happens, it signals as loudly as possible that the reporter has absolutely no clue what they're purporting to talk about. And it is fascinating that it seems to be so important to so many of them to talk about it anyway.
> But then, China has an awful lot of other misleading advertising and false claims (in particular around TCM and efficacy of folk remedies) that the government ignores or promotes. Why only target halal?
Well, from the article:
>> The Ningxia government has taken measures against the pan-halal tendency and Islamic thought influenced by theologies common in Arab nations, which is referred to as Arabization.
>> The Ningxia Ethnic Affairs Commission vowed in May 2017 to properly handle the pan-halal and Arabization tendencies, promoting socialist core values and placing national flags at religious sites, read a statement on the website of the Ningxia government.
I feel pretty sure that what they really care about is the Arabization. The two aren't totally unrelated; a marketplace that bifurcates everything into "halal haircuts" and "haram haircuts", "halal art lessons" and "haram art lessons" is providing space for (or, depending on your point of view, expressing) the idea that what's most important is to be a Muslim first and Chinese second.
I imagine it's somewhat to differentiate the Uyghur Muslims from other Muslims. Especially given that the general Muslim population has been demonized for so long.
Be kind of harder to convince the population to care about the other if that other is already lumped to a group that is given an enemy attribute.
That's all very nice but how do you apply it to the situation where you have a minority group with little to no interest in integrating into the indigenous culture?