Misapplied Conservatism 101

Class, today's lesson is self-study.

Read this:

The myth of Hispanic family values

"..the pro-immigrationists often say that because Hispanic and Asian immigrants have "good family values," such immigrants are "good for America." In fact, the family ethos of many Hispanics is markedly different from that of the traditional European or American family, not to mention the increasingly disordered American family of today. As Latin America expert Lawrence Harrison has argued, the Latin American family, notwithstanding its recognized strengths (or perhaps as a result of them), is characterized by a closed loyalty within the family circle, a lack of trust toward those outside it, and nonparticipation in civic life. This behavior pattern, known as "amoral familism," has been a major factor in the unhappy political history of Latin America. Confucian cultures are also marked by extreme patriarchal authority (extreme even by the supposedly patriarchal standards of traditional Western culture), deeply institutionalized habits of corruption, and an absence of civic mindedness. By contrast, the traditional American family, as Toqueville famously remarked, was the seedbed of good citizenship in a society based on ordered freedom. Thus to say that an immigrant group has "good family values" tells us precisely nothing about that group's compatibility with America."

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